Real Estate

Theo Epstein built championship teams in two of baseball’s most demanding markets, ending long title droughts with the Boston Red Sox in 2004 and the Chicago Cubs in 2016. In a keynote conversation with CREDA President and CEO Marc Selvitelli, CAE, at the CREDA Conference in Denver, the Fenway Sports Group senior advisor and former president of both clubs shared lessons on leadership, data and developing the neighborhoods around ballparks.

Look Through More Than One Lens

Early in his career with the San Diego Padres, Epstein worked between an old-school scouting director who only wanted to watch players and the team’s lone statistician, who only wanted to run numbers. He learned from both and concluded that the clearest way to predict performance is to combine the two.

Analytics eventually took over the industry, but Epstein cautioned against taking it too far. Players aren’t simply the output of a model, he said, and relying only on numbers – in any industry – dehumanizes the process. With the Cubs, getting to know and support players proved a bigger advantage than any statistical breakthrough.

Tough Calls, Transparency and Trust

Epstein called trading franchise icon Nomar Garciaparra in 2004 the hardest decision of his Red Sox tenure. The move drew a public outcry, but the team went on to win the World Series.

Leaders can’t sell a controversial decision in the moment, he said. It depends on the trust and relationships already built, and on getting everyone behind the organization’s vision. Part of the job is doing what’s right for the organization, even when it’s unpopular or carries personal risk.

In Chicago, Epstein wrote a five-year plan and shared it openly with fans, including that familiar players would be traded. Planning for the future while selling the present doesn’t work, he said, because fans see through it. He also warned against rushing a long-term plan: a short-term fix can undo many good decisions. To guard against that, he kept disciplined long-term thinkers in his inner circle to push back.

Lessons from Fenway and Wrigley

Epstein worked at MLB’s two oldest ballparks – Fenway Park (1912) and Wrigley Field (1914) – both embedded in neighborhoods. Wrigley’s residential setting limits the Cubs to 30 night games a year, a constraint Epstein accepted since the neighbors were there first.

Rather than replace either ballpark, ownership renovated both so new features looked as if they had always been there. The same principle should guide surrounding development, he said: it must honor the authenticity of the experience. Chasing trends can bring the wrong kind of commercial tenants, leading to turnover that cheapens the area.

The biggest opportunity – and challenge – is drawing people on non-game days. Enhancing game day is the easier part, Epstein said, and both organizations had hits and misses.

Timing matters, too. Wrigley’s redevelopment benefited from a favorable environment, while Boston’s ambitious plans stalled when a less development-friendly mayor took office and interest rates shifted. When macro trends are involved, he said, timing can’t be forced.

Closing the conversation, Epstein shared his favorite moment of the 2016 title run: during a rain delay in Game 7 of the World Series, after Cleveland tied the game, the players crammed into a small weight room for a team meeting instead of retreating to their lockers. The Cubs went on to win. For Epstein, it reflected years of building trust and integrity – a connection that can’t be faked.

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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Yes, a sports venue can launch a district, but only great placemaking, strong market fundamentals and year-round activation will make a sports-anchored development succeed. Those were among the insights shared by panelists discussing the new playbook for sports-anchored development at the CREDA Conference in Denver. 

Moderator Yvette Roman, founder and owner of Denver-based Ellipsis Construction, was joined by Matthew Breest, principal at global design firm Populous, where he co-leads the venue-anchored mixed-use group, and David Cannon, executive vice president of commercial real estate at Larry H. Miller Real Estate.  

Larry H. Miller Real Estate is focused on three mixed-use districts in the Salt Lake City market. The first is the Power District, a roughly 100-acre brownfield redevelopment project that the company hopes will eventually become home to an expansion Major League Baseball franchise. The second is Jordan Commons, adjacent to the Salt Lake County Convention Center in Sandy, Utah. It serves as home to the state’s two professional soccer teams, Real Salt Lake in Major League Soccer and the Utah Royals of the National Women’s Soccer League. The third project is Downtown Daybreak, which has already hosted two seasons of Triple-A baseball with the Salt Lake Bees in an 8,000-seat ballpark. At full buildout, the district will offer 200 acres of urban-scale, mixed-use development in Salt Lake County’s highest growth corridor, with a master-planned community approved for 20,000 homes. 

Populous worked on the recently opened Kai Tak Sports Park in Hong Kong, where a decommissioned municipal airport was replaced with a 50,000-seat stadium across 70 acres, with outdoor recreation “kind of pinwheeling around the stadium,” Breest said. “You have waterfront, you have park frontage, and it’s just this wonderful kind of love letter back to the city.” Populous is also in the process of delivering the new Aloha Stadium Entertainment District in Hawaii, the largest mixed-use development in the Southern Hemisphere currently underway. It involves roughly four million square feet of phased development. 

Cannon and Breest shared numerous lessons learned in their work with sports-anchored developments and candidly discussed ongoing challenges. Among their insights: 

The venue is the catalyst, not the product. Both panelists emphasized that a district will be judged 20 to 50 years out as a neighborhood, not a sports destination. Breest said success would mean the stadium ultimately becomes “invisible” because it resides inside the city’s most desirable neighborhood. Cannon cited the test of putting a thumb over the sports venue on a master plan and asking, “Is this still a great place that I would want to come visit with my family?” if the venue didn’t exist.  

Sports can’t fix weak fundamentals. Cannon said a sports venue cannot overcome a market that is missing population growth, job growth or rents that justify new multifamily construction. “Sport venues alone can’t solve problems and change gravity. There’s got to be another story than just sport,” he said. 

Plan for “low tide,” not just game day. Cannon said a district must handle thousands of people arriving and leaving at high tide on event days yet still feel inviting on a weekday afternoon. He admitted that his firm hasn’t fully solved this issue yet. To create a destination that remains active on non-game days, Breest said a district must offer “tertiary downstream attractors. Like great restaurants, these kind of things. … how do you bring families in? How do you make [the district] compact? How do you make it walkable? How do you solve for all the parking but entice people to be like, ‘I’m going to leave my car and I’m just going to be able to walk through this district.’” 

Someone must own activation. Larry H. Miller Real Estate keeps one shared calendar across sports, the community association and entertainment venues, updated monthly with a 12-month rolling view. Cannon said relying on the pro sports schedule alone is inadequate, especially early on. 

Open with more than the venue. Cannon’s biggest regret at Downtown Daybreak is that the ballpark, built in 14 months, opened before enough else was in place, so it felt like it was “on an island.” His advice is to sell more of the vision for the larger district from day one. 

Design the public realm before the building. Breest said his team no longer jumps straight to venue design; it starts with district layout, programming and urban design, treating the stadium as a placeholder. Each site must be tailored to its own specific market and community. “Once you get the public realm and this vision set, it’s actually going to influence the greatest outcome for a ballpark or a stadium,” he said. 

Community engagement starts early and never stops. Breest warned that without real buy-in, including from city council, a project faces years of delay or stoppage. Community benefits work must be authentic, he added. “Otherwise, you’re just not going to reach the full potential of the project. And you don’t want to disenfranchise people in the process.” Added Cannon, “You’ve got to share the vision and the excitement, the emotion. That’s why the renderings are so important. Those renderings are exciting. … You truly have to have a story in the market, data that says, yes, this is a net positive for our region.” 

Housing and daytime population make it a real neighborhood. Daybreak’s first multifamily building puts 200 units directly overlooking the ballpark, within a plan for 5,000-plus homes and over one million square feet of commercial space. Cannon wants office to create lunch crowds that sustain restaurants. Breest tied this to affordability: If people can’t live there, they commute in and the district never becomes a 24/7 community. 

Sports venues clear the way. Breest said sports projects tend to net large land assemblages, horizontal infrastructure and public-private cooperation that parcel-by-parcel development rarely achieves. “I just love that it clears the way for action and results,” he said. “All our cities need a lot of housing. All our cities need more grocery stores. They need more [child care facilities]. Sports districts pave the way to create ancillary opportunities for all those businesses.” Added Cannon, “Sports just have a way of uniting and bringing people together like nothing else.”

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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Artificial intelligence is rapidly moving from an individual productivity tool to an enterprise-level strategy for real estate and construction companies. But as adoption accelerates, the question is shifting from what AI can do to how companies can deploy it effectively, measure its value and ensure it supports the work that matters most. 

Will Mitchell, CEO of Rabbet, moderated a panel at CREDA Conference featuring Matt Boras, managing director of RXR Arden Digital Ventures, Ethan Argov, managing director, capital markets and investments of Trailbreak Partners, and Dusti Wofford, global head of digital and technology strategy for Trammell Crow Company. The panelists discussed how their organizations are using AI, where they are seeing measurable returns and what it will take to move beyond fragmented experimentation. 

From Individual Experimentation to an Enterprise Strategy 

At RXR, a New York-based vertically integrated real estate owner, operator and developer with approximately 30 million square feet of commercial real estate, AI adoption is supported by a roughly 10-person digital lab that works with property management, investment management and development teams to identify business problems that technology can solve. 

“We’re pursuing multiple paths at once,” Boras said, including enterprise-wide access and education, department-level consulting, and identifying work that AI can tackle that previously would have been too time consuming. 

Denver-based Trailbreak Partners has built an asset management platform from the ground up that consolidates information from multiple property management systems into a single dashboard covering its development and operating portfolio.  

“Two years ago, the company looked very different in terms of staffing and overhead, and it’s a direct result of integrating AI into the business,” Argov said. 

For Trammell Crow, the challenge is scaling experimentation. Wofford said the company initially encouraged practitioners to “go play” with AI and identify potential applications in their own jobs. That generated a significant backlog of ideas but also exposed the limitations of disconnected tools and agents. 

“Having a bunch of agents working independently and not replicating the strategy across your enterprise will only get you so far,” Wofford said. “Today our focus is more on an enterprise AI framework.” 

She noted that 80% of AI efficiencies involve doing the same thing, while the differentiation comes from the more complex 20%. “When you are thinking about your AI strategy, lean into the pragmatic and things you can actually change, but don’t forget about that 20% because that’s what’s going to help your company,” she said. 

Measuring ROI  

At Trailbreak, Argov estimated that AI has increased bandwidth by approximately 25% to 30% across development and operating functions, allowing the company to manage more information and projects without proportionally increasing staff. 

“Cost efficiencies are one thing. But it’s about driving revenue,” Wofford said, pointing to the potential for AI to give employees more time to pursue deals, underwrite opportunities and focus on revenue-generating activities. 

She cited a simple example of ROI: a research executive who used an AI productivity tool to perform work that otherwise would have required hiring a high-end analyst, making the economics compelling even after the technology cost. 

For RXR, Boras said the value is also about enabling work that would not have been practical before. For example, AI can allow asset managers to re-underwrite properties more frequently by gathering and interpreting information that previously would have required too much manual effort. 

Start With the Work That Consumes Time 

For Trammell Crow, contract analysis is a significant opportunity. AI can help identify obligations and potential risks in purchase and sale agreements, joint venture agreements and construction contracts. Wofford also described an application that automates invoice coding after an initial setup. 

Trailbreak has focused heavily on asset management reporting, compliance and construction draws, using AI to flag unusual financial variances and ensure required documentation is included before submissions reach lenders. 

Perhaps most valuable, Argov said, is the ability to search the company’s existing legal and deal documents quickly and verify the underlying information. 

“That has saved us a lot of time,” he said. 

Boras also highlighted computer vision applications that review construction documents, identify potential errors and monitor construction progress, with the goal of preventing rework and change orders. 

Flexibility is Critical 

With AI models changing rapidly, the panelists cautioned against building a long-term strategy around a single vendor or model. 

Wofford argued that companies should create an enterprise AI framework that allows different models to be used for different tasks and swapped out as performance and pricing change. 

Boras similarly noted that the industry is still figuring out how AI should be priced, particularly as token-based costs introduce variable technology expenses. Outcome-based pricing may ultimately become more common, with companies paying for a completed service or work product rather than model usage. 

The Human Advantage 

Despite the technology focus, the panel repeatedly returned to the importance of human judgment. 

AI can eliminate repetitive work, but real estate remains fundamentally a relationship business. Deal making, business development, negotiation and the ability to understand people cannot simply be automated, noted Argov. 

“Humans add such an intricate part to relationship building, which is all real estate is,” Wofford agreed. 

The panel’s primary message was not that AI will replace real estate professionals, but that companies that use AI effectively can create organizations where people spend less time searching, compiling and checking information, and more time making decisions, pursuing opportunities and building relationships.

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

The post Beyond AI Experimentation: Building an Enterprise AI Strategy in Real Estate and Construction appeared first on Market Share.

Today’s office market is increasingly bifurcated. Tal Diamant, partner and co-chair of the office practice group at BCLP, describes the divide as one between newly constructed Class A office buildings in high demand and older, Class B and C properties that may be candidates for conversion – or may simply be too old to remain viable. 

At the CREDA Conference in Denver, Diamant hosted a panel of four industry experts examining which office markets are attracting tenant demand and what options remain for older buildings. 

The Mismatch Challenge 

The central challenge in mixed-use and office development is a mismatch between available office assets and tenant demand. According to Chris Payne, senior vice president of investments at Prime West Developments LLC, downtown Denver has a 38% vacancy rate, but only one-third of the available space meets what tenants want. Payne said tenants are looking for spaces that foster creativity, collaboration and innovation. He added that 70% of tenant representatives say their clients will not compromise on location. 

Sergio Valentini, regional vice president at Ware Malcomb, said Los Angeles currently has a 40% vacancy rate. Valentini said companies are competing to recruit the best talent, which increases the importance of high-quality office space. He added that Class B buildings in the right environment can be brought to a Class A standards and that most new buildings are build-to-suit. 

What Do Tenants Want? 

Sean Whitney, senior director at JLL Capital Markets, suggested that tenants in certain markets will pay more for the right environment and location. He pointed to renewed tenant demand in metropolitan areas, saying demand in metro Denver has doubled year over year, while San Francisco demand is 150% of its 2019 level. The increased demand tends to centralize in highly desirable neighborhoods, such as Denver’s Cherry Creek. 

Brandon Kramer, managing director of investments at Marcus & Millichap, explained that certain submarkets are faring much better than downtown. He called Denver’s Cherry Creek “one of the best submarkets in the country right now for office,” and said that tenant-to-owner conversion is becoming more common. 

Cost Considerations 

Both Whitney and Kramer offered optimistic perspectives on the future of mixed-use and office development, particularly in Denver. Whitney said 2.5 million square feet of older property in Denver is currently being converted, which would remove about 8% of current supply from the market. Meanwhile, Kramer said a reset is already underway in Denver’s downtown commercial real estate market, suggesting the market bottomed out about a year ago.  

Despite those optimistic outlooks, all panel members agreed that the financial bottom line ultimately drives mixed-use and office development. Whitney said the cost of speculative construction has doubled in the past seven years. Valentini stated, “It’s really financial calculation more than anything. Most buildings, we can convert, we can tie into another use. We can reposition them. Some are going to be more efficient than others, and some are going to be more expensive than others to do. And so that’s why it becomes really a numbers game, whether or not it can be done.” 

Regulatory concerns are another significant issue. Kramer argued that Denver’s challenges are entirely manufactured through over-regulation and high property taxes. He cited the Energize Denver Building Performance Policy, passed in 2021, which requires buildings over 25,000 square feet to convert fully to electricity. Compliance costs could range from $80 million to $400 million, making it impossible for commercial real estate developers to move forward. 

Solutions 

A solutions-focused approach is paramount for mixed-use and office real estate to move forward. Panelists pointed to record levels of office debt maturing over the next three years and said banks are increasingly unwilling to grant extensions. Against that backdrop, landlords and equity partners must determine which Class B and C structures still have value and which no longer serve a viable purpose. Valentini said Class B buildings in the right environment can be brought to a Class A standard. Class B buildings in the wrong location, as well as Class C and D buildings, require more critical evaluation. In many cases, he suggested the best approach may be: “Let’s just scrape them and move on.” 

All panel members agreed that governmental policies fostering a business-friendly environment in metropolitan areas are essential for future mixed-use and office development, particularly the repurposing of Class B assets. One form of government support is public-private partnerships, which panelists cited as a tool for revitalizing downtown spaces. Payne pointed to tax incentives in Illinois and New York under which developers receive 30-year tax abatements to convert old buildings. He said such incentives have helped spur revitalization in Chicago and New York City and could potentially do the same elsewhere. 

The bifurcated office market presents a complex challenge for investors, developers, landlords, tenants and communities. The panelists’ discussion, however, underscored that high vacancy alone does not tell the full story. Location, building quality, conversion costs, financing and public policy all help determine whether an office asset can compete, be repositioned or has reached the end of its useful life. As Payne puts it, “We’re not talking about real estate. We’re talking about solutions.” 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

The post Finding Solutions in a Bifurcated Office Market appeared first on Market Share.

At the CREDA Conference in Denver, a “Beyond Green Buildings” session looked at how sustainability can create value in commercial real estate.  Moderator Shawn Hesse, vice president of sustainability advisory at JLL, was joined by Alvaro Concha, senior project manager on JLL’s sustainability consulting team, and Cody Silva, who leads global realty investment and partnership programs at Amazon. Together, they made the case that solar, batteries and energy efficiency should be treated as tools that add power capacity to a site, and that the best way to deploy them is through partnership between landlords and tenants. 

Why Power is Reshaping Industrial Value 

Major occupiers have made big carbon commitments, yet tenants rarely bring up sustainability when a lease is negotiated. Hesse described that disconnect as the starting point for the work JLL and Amazon have been doing together, which focuses on translating broad market signals into decisions at the deal level. The signal that matters most today is power. As Hesse put it, “Everybody knows the thing that’s driving demand right now is power.” 

Industrial power costs have risen 31% globally over the last five years and 18% in the U.S. JLL projects a 41% global gap between what occupiers need to meet their carbon goals and what is in the development pipeline. Meanwhile, about 75% of U.S. industrial stock is more than 10 years old and lacks the power capacity newer tenants need. 

Regulation adds additional pressure. JLL finds that 81% of buildings in regulated markets are at risk of not meeting greenhouse gas standards, which makes quick fixes like on-site gas generation a risky long-term bet. The value side is catching up as well, with JLL’s early tracking showing that rooftop solar alone adds about 4% to industrial property value. 

To learn whether energy upgrades could reduce risk and add value for both landlords and tenants, JLL analyzed about 70 sites across 10 markets in the U.S. and abroad. Alvaro shared three findings from the report. First, solar added value in every market by boosting NOI, resilience and marketability. Second, other technologies like EV charging depended on the market, so strategy has to match location. Third, timing matters. Starting the conversation three to five years before a lease expires gives landlords and tenants time to build a co-investment model where both come out ahead. 

From Tenant to Partner 

Power is hard to secure today, and Silva argued that many underwriting models haven’t caught up. A building without the capacity tenants need could look very different by the end of its next lease, yet landlords often see energy upgrades as a risk of their own, worrying that a future tenant won’t want electrified HVAC or a row of EV chargers.  

Today, the tenant typically pays for these upgrades, including any power work that comes with them. Amazon instead wants to share the cost through financing that gives landlords what they’re after, which is cash flow and a real estate return on their capital. That can mean splitting capital costs, earning a return through a solar contract or future power purchase agreement, or structuring the deal around each party’s cost of capital. Now in roughly its third year, the program has been incredibly impactful, according to Silva, and other institutional firms are moving in the same direction. 

Trust is what makes this process work. Hesse noted that JLL has sometimes built separate decarbonization plans for a landlord and a tenant at the same address, with neither talking to the other. Concha found that starting small, often with data sharing, quickly changes how landlords approach the conversation. For tenants, Silva’s advice was to meet landlords where they are. “If you’re on the tenant side, or you’re just very interested in sustainability, I would say learn the fundamentals of deal-making within the real estate environment and speak in terms of the landlord,” he said. 

Three Takeaways for Building Value 

• Sell power, not green. Tenants want power first. Position solar, batteries and efficiency as capacity and resilience that protect the asset. 

• Start early and start small. Open the conversation three to five years before a lease expires. Share data. Add smart meters. Build trust before talking terms. 

• Share the cost and the upside. Speak in rent, escalations and cost of capital. Explore co-investment, third-party developers and local incentives to make the numbers work for both sides. 

Power is becoming the deciding factor in industrial real estate, and the buildings that have it will win the next generation of tenants. The panel showed that landlords and tenants don’t have to fight over who pays for that future. By starting early, building trust and sharing both the investment and the return, they can add capacity, reduce risk and create value together.

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

The post Power Up: Rethinking Sustainability in Industrial Real Estate appeared first on Market Share.

Senior housing is entering one of the strongest stretches in its history, but it rewards developers who treat it as an operationally focused business first. That was one of the core messages from a session at CREDA Conference this week discussing why senior living is positioned to offer the next wave of opportunity within multifamily. 

Lisa McCracken, head of research and analytics at the National Investment Center for Seniors Housing and Care (NIC), moderated. She was joined by Julie Ferguson, president of the Southern Division at Ryan Companies US, and Arick Morton, CEO of NIC MAP, the senior housing industry’s data provider. 

The average senior housing resident moves in at about age 80, Morton said. The 80-plus population is expected to grow about 35% over the next five years and roughly double by 2050, he said. 

That demand is already converting into move-ins. Since recovering its pandemic losses, the sector has absorbed units at 1.5 to 2 times its pre-pandemic pace. Meanwhile, construction starts have fallen to near all-time lows, squeezed by building costs, labor inflation and interest rates. 

As a result, occupancy has gained roughly 200 basis points a year for four years, reaching 90.4% in NIC’s primary markets as of the third quarter. NIC estimates the sector needs about 100,000 new units per year to keep pace. The most ever delivered in a single year is about 56,000. 

Capital is Following the Fundamentals 

Investors have noticed. “We’ve had all the traditional investors and lenders … but there’s a lot of new capital coming into this space,” McCracken said. Traditional lenders and REITs are now joined by private equity, family offices, sovereign wealth funds, pension funds and life insurance companies. In industry outlook surveys, senior housing regularly shares the top spot for investor confidence with data centers. “Who would have thought [that]?” McCracken commented. 

Better performance data has helped. For years, senior housing returns were buried in an “other” category of the NCREIF Property Index; after a decade of NIC advocacy, the sector was broken out in 2024. The numbers show a sector that took a hit during the pandemic but has proved to be durable over 20 years, thanks to need-driven demand. It also rebounded faster than most property types after the global financial crisis of 2007-2009. 

Building Makes Sense Again 

Ferguson said that from 2017 to 2022, Ryan built and developed more than 30 senior living communities across the U.S. There is a “significant difference in the volume of senior living versus multifamily volume. That’s important to point out,” she said, “because senior living is not as large of a product type, but it certainly has its place in the market.” 

Three years ago, it was cheaper to buy existing senior housing communities than to build new ones, so investors largely walked away from development. Ferguson said that over the past six months, rising valuations have closed the gap. “Those are at parity today, and that’s been driven by a lot of the equity that’s come into the space,” she said. “We’re seeing cap rates in the senior living space sub-5[%], which doesn’t happen very often and kind of sounds a little like a multifamily cap rate. So folks who built a lot of product pre-pandemic and delivered a lot of product during the pandemic have really benefited from the desire of people to invest in this alternative space.” 

McCracken noted senior housing projects are penciling on the coasts, where rents support new construction, while activity in the middle of the country remains thin.  

Morton pointed out that, as is the case with multifamily more generally, the real unit of analysis for senior housing is the submarket. “It’s a submarket business,” he said. “Most senior housing is going to compete on, call it a 15- to 25-minute drive time.” 

Not Just Multifamily with Extra Amenities 

The panel was candid that multifamily experience doesn’t translate directly. About a decade ago, Ferguson said, a number of multifamily developers entered senior living assuming housing is housing. Perhaps one or two are still in the business. 

The differences start with the building. Multifamily typically runs 80% to 85% rentable square footage, whereas senior living runs 55% to 65%. “It’s an amenity-rich environment,” Ferguson said. “You need a lot of different spaces for your residents, so that rentable-square-foot ratio is very different.” 

Rather than unit absorption, analysts focus on net worth and market penetration: the share of age- and income-qualified seniors who choose senior living. That rate has held near 10% nationally for decades. 

The Operator is Critical 

In multifamily, management can often come later. But in senior housing, Ferguson said, equity partners want to know the operator before they commit, and the operator should help shape site selection, market selection and design. “If your operations are not going well, if your marketing team isn’t getting it done, it doesn’t matter what your real estate is like. [Senior housing] is a very operationally focused business.” 

She advised looking beyond portfolio size to what qualifies an operator as institutional quality: strong systems, the ability to recruit and keep talent, and a track record that can be verified. 

McCracken noted that operators and developers also must be careful about how they market senior housing to aging baby boomers. “If you’re selling sick care, frail care, that is not the message that’s going to resonate. It’s the longevity, the wellness programming, the lifestyle. That has been a big shift in our sector. And that’s even within memory care and assisted living.” 

As Ferguson said, “This is real estate, but it’s also healthcare and hospitality.” 

For developers and investors willing to respect those nuances, the panelists emphasized that the opportunity is real, and the industry welcomes new entrants who come prepared. 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

The post Data Points to Senior Housing as an Emerging Opportunity Within Multifamily appeared first on Market Share.

Adaptive reuse offers developers access to locations where new construction would be difficult, but developers should beware of the misconceptions that it is cheaper and faster. That was the message Mark Taylor, managing director, residential, American Real Estate Partners (AREP), shared during a session at the CREDA Conference this week in Denver.  

Taylor has completed more than a dozen adaptive reuse projects as head of AREP’s residential segment. His most recently completed project, CityHouse Old Town in the historic district of Alexandria, Virginia, is a case study in the challenges and opportunities of converting an office building into housing. Taylor told conference attendees that adaptive reuse is much more complicated and expensive than a new build, but its appeal is that “it gains you access to a location you’d be hard pressed to [get] otherwise.” CityHouse occupies a seven-story office building constructed before the city adopted its current zoning codes. “You could not build a seven-story office building in that location today, which is why you do it.” 

To determine whether a site can justify the cost and complexity and ultimately turn a profit, Taylor employs an evaluation method he calls the “five gates.” 

Gate 1: Location 

Is the building located where somebody wants to live? Location is the first and most important gate. People choose to live in a particular apartment complex because it meets their needs and they can afford it. Adaptive reuse also appeals to people Taylor calls “tastemakers,” who choose to live in apartments that align with their personal brands.  

At CityHouse Old Town, Taylor and his team considered Alexandria’s position as a Washington suburb and the average income of $131,000 among area residents. From there, they examined what residents could reach within a five-minute walk and a five-minute drive. Could they live, work, shop, stay, play, learn, heal, watch and savor within the five-minute radius? CityHouse passed gate one with ease. 

Gate 2: Submarket Economics 

What are you actually buying? While a developer may initially think that they are buying an office building with the intent to transform it into an apartment complex, Taylor countered, “No, you’re buying structure.”  

Adaptive reuse requires costly work. Developers will likely need to de-tenant the facility, demolish parts of it, and make substantial changes to meet environmental regulations, possibly dealing with asbestos and PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls; a group of man-made synthetic organic chemicals made of carbon, hydrogen, and chlorine atoms). Given such expenses, Taylor’s threshold for a viable conversion is $3 per square foot in rent. “If you’re not getting three dollars a foot in rent, put the pencil down. Don’t waste your time anymore.”  

Comparable properties for CityHouse Old Town commanded rents of $4.24 per square foot, despite being in much less desirable locations, so the project passed the second gate. 

Gate 3: Building and Environmental Reality 

A building constructed to code in the 1980s – or even earlier – is unlikely to meet code in 2026. Moreover, adaptive reuse involves a number of unknowns. Taylor advises developers to assume the worst on the unknown environmental and structural conditions of a building.  

CityHouse Old Town project finished $1 million under budget and ahead of schedule, largely due to extensive testing during due diligence and appropriate contingency allowances. Those included 7% for owner and escalation contingencies during conceptual design and 5% for construction contingency.  

Gate 4: Programming – Office Bones, Residential Life 

Converting an office building into residential units means working with an existing layout. Fitting homes into a 25,000-square-foot office box requires careful attention to ceiling heights, dead walls and window placement. But existing spaces can also create opportunities. CityHouse Old Town originally had a substantial parking garage. Because parking ratios differ for office and residential uses, Taylor’s team was able to remove 2.5 floors of the garage and repurpose the space as a multistory atrium.  

Gate 5: Is It Worth It? 

CityHouse Old Town has demonstrated the value of adaptive reuse. It now contains 199 homes averaging 989 square feet, with 95% leased. The handful of retail spaces leased more slowly than anticipated, although two tenants were retained and new tenants are gradually joining the retail mix.  

Putting the Gates to Use 

Ultimately, CityHouse Old Town shows how a desirable location can justify a demanding conversion with the economics, building conditions and residential design to support it. Taylor’s five gates provide developers with a way to test a site’s potential before committing to a project. 

For developers weighing the costs and benefits of adaptive reuse, Taylor emphasizes due diligence. At CityHouse Old Town, he negotiated a 90-day due diligence period and extended it by another 30 days. That gave his team time to speak with existing condominium owners and leaseholders, all of whom were subsequently bought out. Moreover, Taylor stressed that adaptive reuse is much riskier than new construction. Thorough investigation and allowances for the worst-case scenario are critical to determining whether a project is viable. 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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Adaptive reuse is hardly a new concept. Buildings have been modified and repurposed for centuries as cities, industries and communities have evolved. But today, adaptive reuse is gaining renewed attention for another reason: embodied carbon. 

Anand Parthasarathy, principal and practice leader with BranchPattern moderated a discussion with Scot Murdoch, partner at KSS Architects; Eliana Peralta-Sapienza, building performance analyst with BranchPattern; and Mounir Tawadrous, senior associate at KSS Architects, on how developers and design teams are evaluating existing buildings for their economic potential and ability to reduce the carbon impact of development. 

The panelists agreed that adaptive reuse can offer significant environmental and economic advantages, but it is not automatically the right answer. The key is understanding the building, the market and the extent of modification required. 

The Case for Keeping What Already Exists 

Murdoch said clients evaluate adaptive reuse through a number of lenses. 

“There has to be a business case and a functional case as to why you would want to repurpose a building,” he said. “Then there’s the physical case – is the structure capable? We’re also starting to even see a social aspect with adaptive reuse as jobs and people are moving back to cities.” 

The panel highlighted several projects that demonstrate how those considerations can lead to successful reuse. 

One example is an old Packard manufacturing building in Long Island City, Queens, New York. The heavily reinforced concrete structure had significant historic character and existing tenants but lacked sufficient vertical circulation to move product from the loading dock through its eight stories. Rather than replacing the structure, the project team added an external freight system with two new freight lifts. 

Character can also be an economic asset. Older buildings offer proportions, volume and nonuniformity that are difficult to replicate in new construction. In this case, the building was attracting tenant attention and leases even as core-and-shell work was underway. 

Another project involved a former New York Times printing facility in Edison, New Jersey. The building had enormous power capacity and clear heights of approximately 50 feet in some areas. The team gutted the facility and converted it into a data center. Iron Mountain ultimately occupies approximately 830,000 square feet of data hall space. 

The project also illustrates the value of existing development rights. Because the building had a floor-area ratio of 4:1 – meaning it contained four times as much floor area as the site itself – a new building on the same site would have been limited to roughly half that density, or about 2:1. Preserving the existing building allowed the owner to retain development value that could have been lost through demolition and new construction. 

The Embodied Carbon Advantage 

The environmental case for adaptive reuse comes largely from preserving materials that would otherwise be demolished and replaced. 

Peralta-Sapienza said some projects have been able to retain approximately 60% of an existing structure. Depending on what is preserved, that can produce embodied carbon reductions ranging from approximately 10% to 30% or more. 

“For a lot of embodied carbon requirements in some jurisdictions, the minimum that you have to achieve is a 10% reduction,” she said. 

One of the strongest examples discussed was Prologis’ Project Nexus in San Leandro, California, a cutting-edge sustainable industrial and advanced manufacturing facility. The project retained approximately 60% of the existing structure and combined adaptive reuse with material and design optimization. The result was a 40% reduction in embodied carbon compared with the project’s baseline. 

The project addressed a 27-foot clear height by extending the building approximately 20 feet using insulated metal panels. The team also incorporated mass timber in the office mezzanine, improving both carbon performance and the employee experience. Project Nexus ultimately achieved LEED Platinum certification and received recognition from NAIOP (now CREDA) San Francisco Bay Area chapter as the 2024 Development of the Year. 

The 40% reduction is particularly significant because leading embodied-carbon standards often target reductions of approximately 20%. Adaptive reuse combined with thoughtful new construction can go well beyond simply preserving an existing structure. 

Regulation is Moving the Market 

The panel expects embodied carbon to become increasingly important as jurisdictions adopt new requirements. 

For example, California’s 2024 CalGreen provisions apply embodied-carbon requirements to nonresidential buildings larger than 100,000 square feet, providing pathways that include building reuse or whole-building life-cycle assessment and require a 10% reduction from a baseline in applicable cases. 

The implications extend beyond regulation. Tenants with net-zero goals are increasingly interested in lower-carbon facilities, while lenders and investors are asking developers to report both embodied and operational carbon. For long-term owners, retaining existing carbon can also help future-proof an asset against increasingly stringent carbon requirements and potential penalties. 

Municipal incentives can further strengthen the case for adaptive reuse. The panel cited redevelopment grants, tax incentives, brownfield programs, TIF programs and historic tax credits as potential sources of support. In New Jersey and Pennsylvania, Murdoch noted rehabilitation incentives that have included a 20% qualified rehabilitation cost credit. 

Ultimately, successful adaptive reuse requires analysis early in the development process. Teams need to evaluate structural capacity, building systems, operational requirements, embodied carbon and available incentives before committing to a strategy. 

The panelists expect adaptive reuse to become increasingly mainstream as construction costs rise, regulations evolve and embodied carbon becomes a larger part of development decisions. 

“[U.S. Green Building Council] LEED [certification] has elevated the way we all practice,” Murdoch said, pointing to its influence on building and energy codes. He predicts that embodied carbon will become a more essential consideration for developers. 

The panelists emphasized that adaptive reuse is not the right solution for every building or every development. Rather, adaptive reuse is becoming another critical tool in the developer’s toolbox, one that can preserve economic value, shorten the path to market, reduce embodied carbon and create new life for buildings that might otherwise be demolished. 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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Geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan delivered the breakfast keynote at the CREDA Conference in Denver, a wide-ranging talk on the end of globalization, shifting demographics and global security. 

You had to be in the room to hear all of it; below, a few of his key insights into the state of U.S. industrial construction, the limits of the nation’s power grid and the future of data center demand. 

Industrial Plant: A Stalled Build-out 

If attendees track only one statistic, Zeihan said, it should be total construction spending on manufacturing facilities – “shovels going into the ground.” 

He attributed the recent surge in that spending primarily to private enterprise rather than federal incentives, noting that the Inflation Reduction Act and CHIPS Act together accounted for less than 20% of the total. “I would interpret the surge as American private enterprise realizing that we need to double the size of the industrial plant to prepare for the end of China and globalization,” he said. 

That momentum has reversed. Zeihan pointed to tariff uncertainty – he cited the 10,000th tariff change since January of last year – as a deterrent to long-term planning. The result, he said, is “the biggest decline in industrial construction spending in modern history at a time that this number really needs to be at least twice what it is already.” He added that about 40% of the spending that remains is for data centers. 

Power: The Grid is a Local Constraint 

Zeihan described a second obstacle: the nation’s high-voltage transmission network. High-capacity transmission lines are concentrated in Appalachia, a legacy from the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s when these were established to move power from coal country to nearby population centers rather than ship the coal itself. 

“If we need to double the size of the industrial plant, that means we need at least 50% more electricity,” he said, adding: “That assumes we don’t build another data center.” 

Outside the areas served by high-capacity lines, power generation and manufacturing generally must be located close together. “It’s very rare in the United States to get your electricity from more than 50 miles away from where you are,” Zeihan said. 

Asked what one federal policy change would most accelerate domestic industrial construction, he pointed first to congressional action to make it easier to ship electricity across state borders. “Until you get that, we’re all kind of stuck struggling on our own,” he said. He also called for changes to the Jones Act, which requires that cargo moved between U.S. ports must travel on American-built, -owned and -crewed ships, which has pushed freight from waterways to trucks. 

Data Centers: Build Now, Get Paid Up Front 

When asked which geopolitical shift the commercial real estate industry is most underestimating, Zeihan answered: “The end of data centers.” 

He clarified that data centers will remain essential for the internet, computing and other existing uses. His concern is the AI-driven expansion, which depends on high-end semiconductors produced through one of the most complex supply chains ever built – more than 100,000 distinct steps, 30,000 inputs and 9,000 companies across roughly 50 countries. In Zeihan’s view, that supply chain cannot survive the breakdown of globalization, and rebuilding it could take at least 20 to 30 years. 

When supply is disrupted, he said, semiconductor fabrication facilities will be able to remain operational for six to 18 months. The graphics processing units at the core of AI data centers run continuously and burn out in four to six years. 

His advice for the real estate developers, investors, owners and others in the room was not to stop building. “Does that mean I don’t think you should build data centers? Not what I’m saying,” he said. “The ones that we are building now will be the last ones we have for a while. Just if you’re in the real estate world, keep in mind that there is an end date here and get paid up front.” 

Where Industrial Growth Could Happen 

Asked which areas stand to benefit most from a return to manufacturing, Zeihan identified three regions: 

• The Texas Triangle, which benefits from integration with northern Mexico. However, he noted that power constraints and a shrinking pipeline of new workers will likely limit the explosive growth of recent years. 
   

• The northern half of Auto Alley, particularly Indiana, Ohio and Michigan, where existing industrial plant and skilled workers could support retooling – though he said this depends in part on continued integration with Canada. 
   

• Northern Appalachia, where existing high-capacity transmission allows power plants to serve facilities in other states. Combined with the Ohio River and a large blue collar workforce, “the three things that you need are right there,” he said. “But policy has to shift to bring them together.” 

Zeihan expects state and local governments to play a larger role in industrial development in the coming years. “It really is up to state and local governments to step in and find a way to make things happen,” he said. 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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“The cloud rests on concrete,” claimed Jason Tolliver, president, Americas logistics and industrial, Cushman & Wakefield – a succinct reminder that the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence depends on an enormous physical infrastructure operating behind the scenes. From construction and power to transportation and ongoing operations, industrial development and logistics provide the backbone supporting the digital revolution. 

At the CREDA Conference in Denver, Tolliver brought together three industry leaders to examine the expanding footprint of AI data centers and the opportunities and challenges accompanying their growth. He called data center development the “hottest topic, not only of the current time, but probably the most transformative topic that I’ve seen in my entire career in commercial real estate.” 

Mike Ryan, national president, Ryan Companies US, Inc., said that AI data centers are the highest and best use of commercial real estate in the current market. “If it can be a data center, it probably will end up being a data center,” stated Ryan, with the acknowledgement that community support and power are necessary prerequisites. 

Winning Community Support 

Gaining community support for data centers remains a critical issue. Jey Muthukrishnan, head of NORAM storage distribution and deployments, Meta, explained that data centers are fundamentally changing people’s lives, and the key to gaining public support is honesty about the issues that matter to local communities. According to Muthukrishnan, communities are often willing to accept data centers because the centers provide well-paying jobs over an extended period. A multi-year build is followed by ongoing operations and eventual rebuilds, all of which require local labor. 

Ryan concurred with Muthukrishnan’s assessment, explaining that common priorities emerge when community members are asked what they want for their neighborhoods: good, durable jobs, a strong tax base and funding for schools. 

However, while data centers can provide significant economic benefits, some states and local communities remain reluctant to allow their construction. Abatements will likely remain in place in some states, but resistance at the municipal level can be less rigid. 

In many cases, Ryan explained that communities simply want more time to understand the potential impacts of data centers. Real estate developers can partner with community leaders to help write zoning codes and establish data center policies. Locally elected city council members are frequently not opposed to data centers on political grounds, rather they need assistance in establishing a framework for this relatively new use of land. 

Addressing Energy Concerns 

One of the most prevalent sources of pushback against data centers is their energy usage. But taking reports of power consumption “at face value” misrepresents the comprehensive impact of data centers, said Jesse Laver, vice president, data center logistics, DHL Supply Chain. Laver explained that hyperscalers are proactive adherents to climate pledges, investing aggressively in solar and alternative energy and even paying for sustainable aviation fuel to transport materials. Ryan agreed with Laver’s assessment, adding that his company is currently working on data centers that will entirely run on clean power. 

Opportunities Beyond the Data Center 

When communities are amenable to the establishment of data centers, all three panelists concurred that such development creates tremendous opportunities for partnerships. Laver explained that 85 to 90% of hyperscalers want an end-to-end logistics partner. Currently, only 40% feel that this need is being met, presenting a substantial opportunity for logistics providers to fill in the gap. 

Beyond logistics, the increased prevalence of data centers presents new opportunities throughout commercial real estate as manufacturers demand buildings that can support evolving manufacturing processes. Ryan predicted a significant increase in volume for both speculative industrial and build-to-suit business due to what he calls the “AI-enabled flywheel,” whereby AI capabilities transform manufacturing processes and, in turn, create additional demand for industrial real estate. 

Keeping the Growth in Perspective 

The rate at which data centers are disrupting the commercial real estate space is noteworthy, yet the rapid pace of expansion can also be overstated. Ryan asserted that data centers are not fully displacing other uses of commercial real estate. A large data center requires approximately 500 acres, meaning that 1,000 data centers would occupy roughly 500,000 acres nationwide. 

Data centers may occupy only a fraction of the available land across the U.S., but their influence extends far beyond their physical footprint. “Data is the drug of choice” in today’s world, says Muthukrishnan, noting the growing expectation for instantaneous, high-quality information. Even without the AI component, he noted, data essentially runs our daily lives, making the infrastructure that stores, processes and moves it increasingly indispensable. What that means, noted Muthukrishnan, is that “unless you want to change everything about our lives – and I don’t think any of us are up for it – data centers are not going away.” 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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Downtown Denver is changing from a place where people work to a place where people want to live. That was the key takeaway from a walking tour as part of the CREDA Conference that took attendees through several of the city’s adaptive reuse projects. For years, downtown emptied out at the end of the workday. Now, older office towers and other underused buildings are being turned into apartments, bringing residents into the heart of the city. 

Living With Character 

The tour began at Art Studios, led by Daniel Nichols, project manager and partner, The Nichols Partnership. The building was once home to the Art Institute of Colorado. Today it holds 192 studio apartments for people who want to live downtown at a more attainable price. The design leans into the building’s past. The Nichols Partnership drew on the site’s history and local setting, and art left behind by the school still has a place in the building. The result feels less like a standard apartment complex and more like a home with a deep and rich history. 

One lesson from Art Studios stands out: these projects work best with help from the city, which can smooth the path through policy and share some of the cost. The Denver Downtown Development Authority (DDA) plays an important role, offering loans that help make these costly conversions possible.  
 
Building a Neighborhood 

The next stops on the tour were led by Jennifer Ramsey, adaptive reuse and downtown project champion for the City of Denver. 
 
At High Fidelity Plaza, Ramsey showed how big these projects can be. Two towers on 17th Street will become 712 apartments, along with a childcare center, a restaurant, shops and a public plaza. The buildings sold for just $3.2 million (roughly $3 per square foot), and the project is backed by a $63 million DDA loan. 

The hope is that the childcare center will help draw young families downtown. A restaurant and plaza give neighbors a place to gather. Each one adds life to streets that used to go quiet after work. Other projects nearby follow the same idea. The Petroleum Building is becoming 178 apartments with a rooftop deck, with help from a $14 million DDA loan. The historic Denver Dry Goods building is in the middle of a $67 million project to add affordable homes for households earning 30% to 80% of the area’s median income. 

On the walk back, Ramsey pointed out Denver Energy Center on Broadway. The building sold for $5.25 million, and there are plans to convert it into 386 apartments with a restaurant. 

The Bigger Picture 

Downtown’s office market is still looking to find its footing post-COVID with more than a third of office space (38.6%) sitting empty in the second quarter of 2026, according to CBRE. That was the first quarterly drop in vacancy since 2024, and more space was leased than vacated for the first time in nearly two years. The recovery is uneven. Companies are moving into the newest buildings in Cherry Creek, and vacancy in top-tier Class A office space is at its lowest level in more than a year. As a result, older towers downtown are being left behind. As older buildings leave the office market, talk of a future shortage of high-quality space is growing. 

Conversions address both sides of the problem. They take outdated office space off the market and bring people downtown around the clock. If the trend continues, downtown Denver will be known less for its empty offices and more for the people who call it home. 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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2026 Chair Celeste Tanner shared her reflections with the Commercial Real Estate Development Association (CREDA) board of directors on a meaningful year for the association that included a rebrand, several legislative successes, membership growth and record-breaking events.  

The following is a look back, in her own words: 

“What a year! 

For those of you who were in Toronto last year, you’ll remember Alex [Thomson, 2025 Chair] gave us a literal poetic sendoff. I couldn’t come close to his verse, so I will spare you my own poetic skills today. 

But reflecting on that passing of the gavel made me think about what actually makes poetry special. I love poetry because it is an unwavering attempt to bind the soul of humanity into tight rules of meter and verse. Imagine that: squeezing your entire being, your reason for existence, into a few short lines – and inevitably failing.  

For this reason, most poetry is terrible; a poet tries to stand upon a long history of greatness and the words… just don’t work anymore. The whole message falls apart. And we wait, somewhat impatiently, for one brave artist to break through the wall and completely reopen our eyes to the way we understand ourselves and what we can achieve. 

That process should feel intimately familiar to every person in this room. It is the exact journey our association has navigated over the last several years. 

For decades, our name – the constraint of those five letters – stood upon a proud history, but it ultimately failed to reflect our full scope, our true reach, and our reason for being. If I’m honest, that gap became infectious. We began to lose sight of who we truly represent and the sheer scale of this collective body. 

That was then. 

I began my term by announcing that I would be the final chair of NAIOP. Today, I am incredibly proud to stand here as the very first chair of the Commercial Real Estate Development Association. 

With the launch of our rebrand, we aren’t just changing a few letters on a logo.  

We are signaling a clear, deep understanding of our members and your priorities in today’s market. 

You’re already seeing the results at this conference, where, for the first time ever, we’ve tailored multiple education tracks to customize your experience.  

And the results speak for themselves: this is, by far, the best attendance ever for the annual meeting.  

Why does that matter? We are industrial developers, and so much more: Multifamily development has grown into the second-largest asset class in our membership. Number 3? Data centers. Membership now spans nearly 4,000 companies, ranging from nimble one-person shops to the largest real estate firms on the planet. 

We represent the most diverse and prestigious organization in commercial real estate – where hyper-local networks are backed by CREDA Global’s research, advocacy, and strength. As Walt Whitman famously wrote: “Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself. I am large. I contain multitudes.” 

We contain multitudes. We are a force. We are at the threshold of a massive opportunity across all 55 of our chapters. Speaking with one unified, clear voice, we are unstoppable – especially in our mission to reshape the public perception of commercial real estate. 

I urge you: continue to leverage the growing power of this network, both nationally and in your home markets. 

• Remember that CREDA membership is the secret handshake that connects you directly to market-makers in every major metro across North America. 

• Tell your peers that being a CREDA member means having the heavy hitters of real estate advocacy in your corner at the federal, state and local levels. 

• Remind yourself to tap into the unparalleled data, insights and research this association delivers. 

Thank you for being the brave artists who chose to break through the wall rather than amble along the perimeter. Thank you for trusting our staff and leadership to build a brand and a voice that reflects the incredible, community-shaping work you do every single day. 

And the best is truly yet to come.” 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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In 2014, Denver’s iconic Union Station was brought back to life through a $55 million public-private revitalization effort, turning the formerly neglected landmark into a dining and retail hub. Ten years later, $12 million was invested in renovating the station’s Great Hall and the guest rooms in the luxury boutique Crawford Hotel, located on the station’s upper floors. 

Eighty trains per day passed through Union Station in its heyday. That is no longer the case; just two Amtrak trains make stops daily. But the station is still a transit hub, offering light-rail service to and from Denver International Airport as well as bus service throughout the metro area. It also serves as a stop on the free bus service that runs the length of downtown’s 16th Street.  

The city of Denver and RTD (Regional Transportation District), which owns the property, awarded the revitalization project to the Union Station Alliance, consisting of Sage, Urban Neighborhoods, McWhinney, REGen LLC, and Larimer Associates in 2011. 

Ed Blair, area general manager for Sage Hospitality, which manages Union Station, recalled when he used to commute through the station and its ceiling was falling in. “To see the transformation that has happened to this property and this part of the city… is pretty remarkable,” he told CREDA Conference attendees who took part in a walking tour of Denver’s downtown area. 

Consider that more than 10,000 people now pass through Union Station each day. It is also a popular gathering place, with Blair noting it is sometimes referred to as “Denver’s living room.” In fact, the revitalization of Union Station is largely credited with breathing new life into Lower Downtown, known as LoDo. 

But as Andrew Iltis pointed out on the next leg of the tour, this success story is uneven. While LoDo is flourishing, including attracting more residential development, Upper Downtown (the northern part of what was once referred to as the central business district) is not, with office vacancy around 40%. “It’s the story of two downtowns,” said Iltis, senior vice president of planning and community impact at Downtown Denver Partnership. “Our vision is to mimic and bring the story of LoDo to Upper Downtown.” 

Part of that effort involved the $175 million multiyear project to revitalize 16th Street, a pedestrian-friendly avenue that fully reopened last October. The 16-block project addressed improving safety, mobility and infrastructure, and reconfiguring sidewalk and transit service to create a more welcoming public realm.  

Downtown Denver Partnership is also involved in helping to reimagine the three blocks of Skyline Park along Arapahoe Street, including a portion at the 16th Street pedestrian corridor. The desire is to reconnect the park’s blocks and activate them with more cultural activities and opportunities for social connection.  

Iltis pointed out a recent small example of transforming the blocks: a large-format screen attached to a building and funded by the Denver Theatre District. In time, the screen may host interactive games or show concerts at Red Rocks, adding more life to the area. Block 2 of the revitalization, due to be completed next year, will include splash pads, a water feature and beer garden-style kiosks, among other features. A central plaza and stage will support year-round programming.  

Iltis said Downtown Denver Partnership realized there wasn’t enough energy in the market to change the entire Upper Downtown area at once. Instead, the organization has identified “catalytic nodes” that might lead to additional investment. 

One of those nodes is Glenarm Plaza, a food market and public plaza on 16th Street with open-air seating. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Iltis said, an idea was raised: “Let’s see what happens if we start activating this space. Sure enough, people started to gather.” Eventually, the plaza became one of the locations for the “Skynets Over Downtown” temporary art installation. 

Glenarm sits across from the Denver Pavilions, a three-level, open-air shopping, dining and entertainment center built in 1998. The pandemic and the long-term construction along 16th Street proved to be something of a one-two punch for the Pavilions, which is about 65% occupied currently, said Kim Sperry of Sperry Advisory, a consultant for the Denver Downtown Development Authority. 

The development authority, which initially formed to help support the revitalization of Union Station, bought Denver Pavilions from its previous owner at the end of 2025 for $45 million. It also acquired two on-site parking lots from Brookfield Properties for $23 million, which has created the potential for a large-scale mixed-use development in the future, Sperry said. “The true redevelopment potential is on those parking lots,” she added. 

The current vision involves vertical development, whether multifamily or a hotel, that also incorporates back to retail at the Pavilions. In the meantime, the development authority is still focusing on day-to-day operations at the Pavilions and making ongoing capital investments, including in underground parking. This past September, Denver artist Olive Moya completed a 47,000-square-foot mural – one of the largest in Colorado – on one side of the Pavilions. 

“We’re bullish on downtown,” Sperry said, “but it’s going to take a little bit of time.” 

The walking tour ended at Populus, a luxury boutique hotel completed in Upper Downtown in 2024. Created by Urban Villages, it stands as the country’s first carbon-positive hotel. The distinctive exterior design, which mimics Colorado’s native aspen tree, is from architecture firm Studio Gang and was led by MacArthur Fellow Jeanne Gang. 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

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Denver’s sports franchises are no longer just building venues – they are building neighborhoods. That was the takeaway from a walking tour as part of the CREDA Conference that explored how these districts are reshaping the city’s urban core. 

The tour began with a walk through McGregor Square, a vibrant mixed-use development across from Coors Field. Opened in 2021, it includes The Rally Hotel, 103 for-sale condominiums, an 11-story office building and ground-floor restaurants and retail arranged around a 17,000-square-foot plaza. The plaza’s stadium-sized LED screen anchors watch parties (televised World Cup games brought 2,000-plus attendees on multiple occasions), concerts and seasonal ice skating. 

A panel discussion followed, moderated by Matthew Breest, principal, Populous, with Damani Leech, president, Denver Broncos; Matt Mahoney, senior vice president of development, Kroenke Sports & Entertainment; and Brian Mirakian, senior principal, Populous. 

Two Districts, Two Starting Points 

The Broncos are planning a stadium district at Burnham Yard, about a mile from their current stadium and still in the urban core. Full build-out will total about 4 million square feet, roughly 60% of it housing, with office, retail and entertainment making up the rest. About 58 acres of the site is a former rail yard that includes a 140,000-square-foot locomotive shop. 

Leech said the team wanted to control the fan experience outside the stadium for its 10 home games and roughly 15 other major events each year – and saw a better use for the land. “A 50-acre parking lot throws off a little bit of cash, but not that much,” he said. 

The Kroenke team is building around an established venue. Ball Arena and the adjacent River Mile together cover about 130 acres downtown, and the company has committed to keeping the Nuggets (NBA) and Avalanche (NHL) at Ball Arena through 2050. A $140 million arena renovation is the first step. The initial phase of surrounding development calls for a 5,000-seat performance venue, a 300-key hotel, about 190 apartments and potentially a 145,000-square-foot office building – “our version of McGregor Square,” Mahoney said. 

Programming the Everyday 

Mirakian, whose firm has designed 23 major league ballparks, said few of its current projects are separate from the overall district strategy. “For most of these ownership groups, the vast majority, actually, the revenue is going to come from the district over the [sports] anchor itself,” he said. 

That revenue depends on year-round programming. Working with the Chicago Cubs, Mirakian said, the firm learned that the most important activation “oftentimes is … the Wednesday afternoon, the Thursday morning” – yoga in the park, summer concerts, holiday markets. 

Transit and open space also matter. Mahoney noted that the Ball Arena plan includes a three-acre park and two light rail stations on the property, and that the Broncos site will have a Front Range rail stop. Each district also aims to open access to the South Platte River. “Denver has an incredible asset with the South Platte River, and we’ve never embraced it,” he said. 

A Neighborhood First 

Both executives said their districts must succeed on days without games. “This neighborhood has to stand on its own,” Leech said. 

Mahoney applies a simple test to his master plans: covering the arena and asking whether it’s a neighborhood he would live in. 

Community input shaped both projects. Mahoney said residents asked for a range of housing types and price points, as well as job opportunities. Leech described two community meetings – one filled with Broncos fans in orange and blue, the other with neighbors focused on construction impacts, light rail access and connections to the river. “All things that have nothing to do with touchdowns,” he said. 

That commitment to the neighborhood reflects a long-term view held by both ownership groups. “It’s forever holds. It’s not a build and sell perspective,” Mahoney said. Leech noted that Broncos home games can bring four generations of the ownership family together in one suite, while Mahoney said Josh Kroenke joins every planning meeting, preparing to see the project “to the finish line and beyond.”

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

The post Beyond Game Day: How Denver’s Sports Districts Are Building Neighborhoods appeared first on Market Share.

Energy policy, building codes and the nation’s growing demand for electricity are creating both challenges and opportunities for commercial real estate. At the Commercial Real Estate Development Association’s Board of Directors meeting this week in Denver, Michael Sangaline, senior advisor in the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation, outlined several DOE initiatives with direct implications for developers, building owners and the broader real estate industry. 

“I wanted to be here in person to make you aware of a few efforts underway at DOE that have the potential to positively impact and support the real estate industry,” Sangaline told the board. 

His remarks focused on three areas: building energy codes and performance standards, voluntary programs such as ENERGY STAR, and efforts to address large energy loads, including data centers. 

The cost of building performance standards 

Sangaline highlighted the uncertainty surrounding the costs of complying with building performance standards, noting that retrofit cost data is often limited, varies significantly by location and can be unreliable. 

He pointed to Colorado as an example. DOE and the national laboratories recently conducted a new analysis of the state’s building performance standards using more current retrofit cost data and artificial intelligence. The analysis estimated total first costs of $3.3 billion to $6.1 billion – significantly higher than previous state estimates. 

“These ranges demonstrate the need for better, more transparent data on building retrofit costs,” Sangaline said. “Uncertainty in costs can have a large impact on the affordability of buildings.” 

He also cited the Sheraton Denver Downtown Hotel – the host hotel for the CREDA Conference – where information shared in a recent court case estimated $23 million in building upgrades to comply with Energize Denver. 

For policymakers, Sangaline said the answer is greater research, cost data collection and technical analysis before policies are adopted. “Transparency around these considerations is essential in the deliberation process,” he said. 

Balancing efficiency, affordability and choice 

Sangaline also discussed DOE’s work analyzing the costs of updated building energy codes. The department and national laboratories recently analyzed the 2024 International Energy Conservation Code and found that wholesale adoption for residential buildings could increase construction costs across states by more than $57 billion. 

DOE is conducting similar analyses for commercial and multifamily buildings, as well as more stringent local “stretch” codes. 

Sangaline outlined three principles guiding DOE’s approach: base model codes should focus on cost-effective and technologically feasible energy efficiency; efforts that go beyond those codes should be voluntary and market-driven; and codes and standards should be fuel neutral. 

He emphasized the impact of permitting delays on development. “When permits stall, developers often abandon projects altogether, deepening the nation’s housing affordability crisis and slowing economic progress,” he said. 

DOE is working to provide greater transparency around the costs of permit delays and explore technology-based approaches to address them. 

ENERGY STAR and the changing energy landscape 

Sangaline also discussed DOE’s work with the Environmental Protection Agency to transition leadership of the ENERGY STAR program to DOE. He said restoring and stabilizing the program’s baseline operations and core features is a priority, with DOE planning additional updates for partners in the coming weeks. 

For commercial real estate professionals, he specifically highlighted DOE’s intention to support continued success of ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager. 

At the same time, the rapid growth of artificial intelligence and advanced computing is creating new demands on the nation’s energy system – particularly from data centers. 

“Meeting this demand requires continued innovation across energy supply, efficiency and grid operations,” Sangaline said. 

DOE is supporting efforts focused on demand flexibility, on-site power generation and storage, next-generation cooling technologies and water reuse for large energy users. 

Together, Sangaline said, these efforts are intended to improve housing affordability, increase consumer choice and support continued economic growth and innovation. 

“I believe each of these efforts will benefit the real estate sector in key ways,” he told the board. “I look forward to working with you as we make them happen.” 

This post is brought to you by JLL, the social media and conference blog sponsor of the CREDA Conference 2026. Learn more about JLL at www.us.jll.com or www.jll.ca.

The post DOE Official Outlines Energy Priorities and Implications for Commercial Real Estate appeared first on Market Share.