Brookfield to invest in Airbnb, Newguard developments

Brookfield to invest in Airbnb, Newguard developments

A developer buying and building apartments for home-sharing has announced an equity investment deal of as much as $200 million US with Brookfield Property Partners (BPY-UN-T). Toronto-based Brookfield will invest $20 million in Niido’s first apartment community planned in Kissimmee, Fla., near Orlando. Niido, a partnership of Airbnb and Newguard Development Group of Miami, said this fall it will open apartment buildings in Florida and other parts of the country. 

CoStar Group – GlobeSt.com

Regulatory overkill driving Canada’s biggest homebuilder south

Mattamy Homes Ltd., North America’s largest private residential homebuilder, is boosting investments in the U.S. as regulatory excess sends land prices — and frustration — skyrocketing in Ontario, chief executive officer Peter Gilgan said. Mattamy expects to generate more than half its business from the U.S. in the next five years, including the southern states of Arizona, California and Florida, up from about one-third now, Gilgan said of the Toronto-based company.

Bloomberg – Property Biz Canada

Glut of hotel rooms about to hit Calgary market

While construction in Calgary’s downtown office market has come to a virtual halt, activity in the hotels industry is booming. However, that is a problem as more hotel rooms are coming onto the market at a time when the industry has seen declining occupancy rates due to a reduction in business travel.

Property Biz Canada

Canadian mall owners turning prime land into condos

Canadian mall owners are adding condos and apartments to their shopping centres, seeking to capitalize on a supply-constrained housing market while reducing exposure to a struggling retail sector. Developers such as RioCan REIT (REI-UN-T), Canada’s largest REIT, and the property units of some Canadian pension funds are turning prime land into housing in one of the world’s most expensive, supply-constrained residential markets. 

Reuters – Globe and Mail – Toronto Star – Daily Commercial News

Canadians still prefer bricks-and-mortar stores: Study

According to a recent study by Microsoft, Retail Council of Canada, and research tool WisePlum, that surveyed 5,000 Canadian consumers, bricks-and-mortar stores capture most of the retail sales in every major vertical. The report, From Omni-Channel to Frictionless Retail: Insights on Today’s Consumer With Advice and Tips for Retailers found that for discount, grocery and department stores, more than 90 per cent of sales occur in store.

Canada Newswire – Reuters – Property Biz Canada

A celebration of Ottawa’s best offices

Each year, Ottawa-based polling firm Abacus Data asks local businesspeople to rank their most pressing issues and challenges as part of a wide-ranging business confidence survey. Recruiting and retaining talented employees consistently ranks at or near the top of the annual list.

Ottawa Business Journal – Ottawa Business Journal

True North Commercial buys GTA office property

True North Commercial Real Estate Investment Trust (TNT-UN-T) announced it has agreed to acquire a 78,800-square-foot class-A office property located at 3115 Harvester Road in Burlington, Ont. The purchase price for the Harvester Property is approximately $22.75 million, exclusive of closing costs. The closing is expected to occur on or about Jan. 18. 

Canada Newswire – Property Biz Canada – Property Biz Canada – Property Biz Canada

PIRET acquires four properties, sells three

Pure Industrial Real Estate Trust (AAR-UN-T) Monday announced the following transactions: $32.0-million acquisition of a core asset in Fort Worth, Texas; $61.4-million agreement to acquire a core asset in Fort Worth;  $46.7-million acquisition of a core asset in McDonough, Ga; $32.5-million agreement to acquire a core asset in Montreal; $14.9-million disposition of a non-core asset in Etobicoke; $5.9-million disposition of a non-core asset in Vaughan; and $1.9-million disposition of a non-core asset in Winnipeg.

Canada Newswire – Property Biz Canada – Property Biz Canada – Property Biz Canada

Dalfen America Corp expands Columbus footprint

Montreal-based Dalfen America Corp (DAC) has acquired Alum Creek Business Center, a two-building park totalling 303,000 square feet in Columbus, Ohio.  The adjacent properties were built in 1993 and 1996, and are located in close proximity to Rickenbacker International Airport. In the last quarter, the Columbus industrial market has experienced robust growth and activity pushing the vacancy rate down to 4.86 per cent; a 13 per cent decrease according to a Colliers report.

Property Funds World

Meridian Development buys former Saskatoon bus depot

Buying the downtown Saskatchewan Transportation Company bus depot is a unique opportunity to create a landmark in Saskatoon’s downtown core, says Meridian Development’s Karl Miller. The company took possession of the building on Thursday. Miller said there are currently no plans to replace it with something new. The last City of Saskatoon assessment valued the property at slightly more than $4.3 million.

Saskatoon StarPhoenix – CTV

Contamination prompts drop in tax value of Stelco lands

In a bombshell for Hamilton taxpayers, some former Stelco steel-making land will generate about $2 million less in taxes every year. That means the average homeowner will pay $8 more a year to make up for it. The city learned this month the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) has significantly devalued the worth of about 152 hectares (375 acres) of vacant waterfront land.

CBC

Lobbying to save Vancouver Chinatown’s heritage

Melody Ma retraces the steps she initially took about two years ago through Vancouver’s Chinatown. The 20-something freelance web developer and Chinatown activist remembers seeing a construction pit at Gore and East Hastings on that walk. “There used to be all of these interesting mom-and-pop Chinese retailers occupying that building,” she told Postmedia on a similar stroll through Chinatown in mid-December.

Vancouver Sun

Vacancy rates rise in Alberta’s oilsands workcamp sector

Driving by empty workforce accommodation camps along northern Alberta highways near Fort McMurray, the oilsands boom that became a bust still hits home three years after the slide began. The empty parking lots surround plain, functional-looking buildings made up of modular units stacked, stretched end-to-end or lined up like dominos, some complexes containing thousands of deserted rooms. Many oilsands lodges have been “temporarily” closed.

CBC

Alberta’s $3.5B petrochemical plant proceeds

On the same day a $3.5-billion petrochemical plant was given the green light in Alberta, Calgary City Council approved a $100-million economic development investment fund. These two events are unrelated, yet a common thread connects them: Alberta’s quest for diversification and willingness to use incentives to turn this economic dream into hard reality. Civic and provincial officials have been hunting for new ways to grow the economy.

Calgary Herald

Great Canadian Gaming wins bid for four Ontario facilities

A company whose flagship casino is at the centre of a probe into allegations of money-laundering in B.C. has won a bid to take over the operations of four gambling facilities west of Toronto. A 20-year deal with Great Canadian Gaming Corp. (GC-T) is expected to start in the spring of next year. The B.C.-based company will take over day-to-day management of a casino and three racetracks. 

Globe and Mail – CTV – Canada Newswire

Market Trends and Research

Windsor offers Amazon $106M incentive package for HQ2

Windsor is offering Amazon an incentive package valued at $106 million U.S. to land the online retail giant’s HQ2 in Detroit, according to a new report. As reported by Crain’s Detroit Business — an authority on southeast Michigan business news — Windsor’s enticements include property tax increment financing, grant funding, and corporate income tax credits, as well as “prime real estate at a nominal cost.”

Windsor Star

Vancouver industrial sales up in price, down in number

The days of industrial property in Vancouver could be numbered, according to Avison Young’s new report, which puts industrial building sales in the city at $192 million in 2016, the highest annual total on record. However, that value was based on 43 sales, the lowest such number since 2009, when 36 deals returned a combined $34 million. Sales for 2017 aren’t projected to be quite as high: as of Sept. 30, 35 deals translated into $88.5 million.

BCBusiness

California homeowners fear losing insurance

California homeowners and regulators have a new fear about wildfires ravaging the state: that insurers will drop coverage. Massive, out-of-season fires in northern and southern California are causing billions of dollars in claims and challenging expectations of when and where to expect blazes. State law gives insurers more leeway to drop coverage than to raise rates, and some are taking the opportunity, concerning California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones.

Reuters

Real Estate Companies

Timbercreek unitholders approval fund merger

Timbercreek Investment Management Inc., the manager of Timbercreek Global Real Estate Fund (TGF-UN-T) and Timbercreek Global Real Estate Income Fund, announced unitholders approved the previously announced merger of the Timbercreek Global Real Estate Fund into the Timbercreek Global Real Estate Income Fund. It is proposed the merger will occur after the close of business on or about Jan. 22. 

Marketwired

Ottawa to more than triple cannabis licences

The federal government is in the final stage of licensing 208 new cannabis companies, which would more than triple the number of official producers and vastly increase the industry’s capacity in the lead-up to legalization, federal officials said. Health Canada has been under pressure in recent months to speed up the approval process for producers, with frequent complaints in the industry the application process took years to complete.

Globe and Mail (Subscription required) – Globe and Mail (Subscription required) – Windsor Star

Canopy Growth JVs to convert tomato greenhouse for cannabis

Canopy Growth Corp. (WEED-T) has signed a joint-venture deal with Les Serres Stephane Bertrand Inc., a large-scale tomato greenhouse operator in Quebec. The joint venture will lease a greenhouse used for tomatoes and other vegetables from Bertrand that will be upgraded and retrofitted for cannabis production by April 2018. Smiths Falls, Ont.-based Canopy has agreed to issue Bertrand $2.75 million in shares in four equal tranches, based on certain milestones.

Ottawa Business Journal – Canada Newswire

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Real Estate Investment Trusts

NY REIT sells one of its final Manhattan office holdings

New York REIT’s (NYRT-N) everything-must-go sale is in full force. The company is selling its building at 306 East 61st Street to JMC Holdings for about $47 million, according to Crain’s. The 82,000-square-foot seven-storey building is one of the last properties left in New York REIT’s formerly large portfolio and is known as the Interior Design Building due to its several tenants working in that industry.

The Real Deal

Retail

At least seven companies investigated in bread price-fixing probe

The Competition Bureau’s investigation into allegations of bread price-fixing includes at least seven companies from bakery wholesalers and discount chains to Canada’s three major grocers, according to court documents. George Weston Ltd. (WN-T) and Loblaw Cos. Ltd. (L-T) admitted Tuesday to participating in an industry-wide bread price-fixing arrangement for more than a decade and tipping off the country’s competition watchdog.  

Victoria Times Colonist – BNN – Globe and Mail – Canada Newswire

Canadian grocers profit from penny-rounding: Study

Grocery stores across the country are cashing in on the demise of the penny, according to a young researcher at the University of British Columbia. Third-year economics and mathematics student Christina Cheung has written a paper that says Canadian grocers are making $3.27 million per year from penny-rounding.

Canadian Grocer

Infrastructure

Windsor parking garages approved for $4.1M in upgrades

City council has approved taking $4.1 million of the $6 million Windsor is getting for the sale of its Canderel parking garage to make major improvements to its two remaining downtown garages. The Pelissier Street and Goyeau Street parking garages are getting security cameras, LED lighting and major improvements to their outdated, dirty appearances.

Windsor Star

Keeyask dam cost could reach $10.5 billion

An independent review of Manitoba Hydro‘s capital expenditure program warns the Keeyask hydroelectric dam could cost the province billions more than expected. It also blames the Crown corporation’s lack of construction management experience and skills for failing to keep the multi-billion-dollar project on track. The report, written by Calgary consulting firm MGF Project Services, was commissioned by the Manitoba Public Utilities Board.

CBC – Winnipeg Free Press

Other

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