QuadReal to acquire Toronto’s 56 Yonge Street

QuadReal to acquire Toronto’s 56 Yonge Street

QuadReal Property Group today announced it has entered into an unconditional agreement to acquire 56 Yonge Street in Toronto, currently the site of the Hotel Victoria. This property is located immediately adjacent to the iconic Commerce Court office complex. The acquisition is scheduled to close on June 28, 2017. No financial details will be released. 

Canada Newswire

Montreal condo tower project gets green light

The $400-million project to raze and build over the old Montreal Children’s Hospital site reached a crucial milestone Wednesday as the city’s public consultation office praised the development’s “innovative” potential. But the Office de consultation publique de Montréal cautioned the condo development needs to scale back its size, increase green space and prioritize social housing.

Montreal Gazette

Changing of the guard at Concert Real Estate

Brian McCauley has been the heir apparent to succeed David Podmore as president and chief executive officer at Concert Real Estate Corporation for several years, and he said people shouldn’t expect many changes when he assumes his new title on June 2.

Property Biz Canada

Ottawa property managers merge

With roughly 72 million square feet of managed property valued at more than $800 million between them, two Ottawa condo management firms are joining forces in preparation for impending changes in the market. Capital Concierge and Integral Property Management are merging to become Capital Integral Property Management, the two firms announced Thursday. 

Ottawa Business Journal

CEO growing Farm Boy one meal at a time

Walk into any Farm Boy location and it quickly becomes apparent the Ottawa-based grocery chain has managed to do something very few Canadian retail chains have mastered: create a store shoppers want to visit, not have to visit. The staff seem genuinely friendly (they’re even trained to lead customers to products, not simply point at them).

Financial Post

Easton’s Group unveils The Westin Toronto Airport renovation

The Easton’s Group of Hotels recently unveiled the results of a $10-million renovation at The Westin Toronto Airport hotel.  The renovation included an update to all the guestrooms and suites, meeting spaces, lobby, and two on-site restaurants; Crosswinds Restaurant & Bar and Atmosphere Restaurant.

Newinhomes.com – Property Biz Canada – Property Biz Canada – Property Biz Canada

Parcel Y office tower coming to Saskatoon

Amid the doom and gloom surrounding Saskatoon’s high downtown office vacancy rate, the developers behind a three-tower hotel-condominium-office development on Parcel Y at River Landing are ready to begin construction on the first of two office towers this summer. The 13-storey, 185,000-square-foot tower would offer a riverfront location like no other in the city.

Saskatoon StarPhoenix

Curb commercial sprawl to attract talent: Report

The Toronto region needs to stop building office parks surrounded by giant, parking lots on the fringes and start urbanizing its job zones, putting employment near transit and creating pedestrian friendly business parks. Urban planner Pamela Blais says the same measures being used to curb housing sprawl need to apply to the commercial sector.

Toronto Star

AHIP acquires 18 NE U.S. hotels

American Hotel Income Properties REIT (HOT.UN-T) announced it has agreed to acquire through its subsidiaries a geographically targeted portfolio of 18 premium branded Marriott and Hilton hotels containing 2,187 guestrooms and located in Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut and Pennsylvania for approximately $550 million Cdn, including brand-mandated property improvement plans. 

Marketwired – Property Biz Canada

Sprott buying REITs because cities are so crowded

Sprott Asset Management LP  (SII-T) is buying Canadian REITs because residents have nowhere else to go. More than a third of Canadians live in the Toronto, Montreal or Vancouver metropolitan areas, 2016 census data show, while peers New York, Los Angeles and Chicago account for just a 10th of the U.S. population.

Bloomberg

GBCI Canada to be one-stop green building shop

Canadian building owners and property managers are about to get much wider access to leading-edge green building and performance management tools and services. The Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) and Green Business Certification Inc., (GBCI) based in the United States, will become partners in Green Business Certification Inc. Canada.

Property Biz Canada

Mortgage fraud not limited to Home Capital: CMHC CEO

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation CEO Evan Siddall says mortgage fraud in Canada is clearly not contained to Home Capital Group (HCG-T) – and policymakers are working to “get ahead” of the problem. “Are there only 45 brokers in Canada conducting fraud?” Siddall  said. “No, there’s more. But our numbers suggest it’s really quite small,” he said. 

BNN – Financial Post – CTV – Globe and Mail (Subscription required)

Lululemon to close 40 Ivivva stores; stock surges

Lululemon Athletica Inc. (LULU-Q) is shutting down 40 of its 55 Ivivva stores, citing years of operational losses. The Vancouver-based retailer said Thursday the line of girls’ yoga and athletic wear will continue to be sold, but mainly online, with half of the 15 remaining Ivivva stores to be converted to Lululemon outlets.

Globe and Mail – Reuters – Business In Vancouver – Bloomberg

Best Buy fuelled by ‘total retail’ strategy

Electronics stores have been among the hardest hit by online giants such as Amazon and Alibaba, but Best Buy Canada (BBY-N) has managed to hold its own since folding its Future Shop banner two years ago. “We knew that radical change was required,” Kamy Scarlett, the retailer’s senior vice-president of retail and chief of human resources, said Tuesday. 

Financial Post

Distillery giving Baltimore waterfront a new spirit

Rising high above the new Sagamore Spirit distillery in South Baltimore is a white water tower with three maroon diamonds on each side, a nod to the jockey silks of the thoroughbred farm that provides the spring water for the company’s rye whisky. The distillery is the latest endeavour of Kevin A. Plank, founder and CEO of Under Armour (UAA-N). 

Globe and Mail

Market Trends and Research

Haunting images of pre-Expo 86 Vancouver

Before Expo 86, forests of glass condos and the birth of the million-dollar teardown, Vancouver was a mid-sized port city where coffee was served up in greasy diners and the word “microbrewery” didn’t exist. Photographer Greg Girard was there, capturing haunting images of a city just on the cusp of changing forever: 

National Post

Tech companies rethinking high-rise workplace

Seventy per cent of the world’s population will live in cities by 2050. This is a dramatic change over 1 1/2 generations, and it will require us to rethink how we build our cities. At the same time, many tech companies — Amazon, Tencent, Google, Samsung and others — are infusing digital technology into how cities are built and operated.

Building Design & Construction

Self-storage market to become ‘big trend’ in China

Rapid urbanisation and the growth of online retailing in China’s big cities have begun to spur demand for a sophisticated form of mini self-storage geared towards the tech savvy user, according to private equity real estate fund InfraRed NF Investment Advisors. While the self-storage concept is familiar to many Americans, it’s still relatively novel in China, although that’s beginning to change.

Business In Vancouver

Real Estate Investment Trusts

Fronsac REIT announces JV development

Fronsac REIT (GAZ.UN-X) announced plans to develop a free-standing Benny & Co restaurant in partnership with the development firm Odacité Immobilier in Cap Rouge, Que. Project costs are expected to total approximately $2,000,000 with plans to deliver to our tenant before year-end. 

Marketwired

FrontFour, Sandpiper highlight Granite REIT nominees

FrontFour Capital Group LLC  and Sandpiper Group, owners of approximately 6.2 per cent of the outstanding stapled units of Granite REIT (GRT.UN-T), reiterated the strong track record and credentials of its three nominees and reminded unitholders they should vote the BLUE form of proxy FOR FrontFour and Sandpiper’s nominees prior to noon ET on Monday, June 12, 2017. 

Canada Newswire

Retail

Is e-commerce a frenemy of retail?

These days everyone is trumpeting retail’s downturn, with each earnings call, retail conference and panel seeming to ending in the same rueful refrain. Recently, billionaire investor-slash-oracle Warren Buffett shared his perspective on the retail landscape: “The department store is online now.”

The Real Deal – The Street – Globe and Mail

What happens to all the empty stores?

Estimates of the number of retail stores that will close in 2017 range from 7,000 to 10,000. Retail real estate doesn’t vanish if you don’t use it, so what will happen to all those empty stores? No one knows for sure but there are some things we’re seeing now that are important indicators of where all that retail space will go.

Forbes

Restaurants and Eateries

Storm clouds brewing for Restaurant Brands investors

There are “story stocks,” companies whose shares are propelled forward by an easy-to-understand, compelling narrative. Many times, however, the story unravels, the shareholders get burned, and we get to look back at the few who pointed to the red flags well ahead of the denouement. Restaurant Brands International Inc. (QSR-T) is, I submit, one of these stocks. 

Globe and Mail (Subscription required)

Infrastructure

Canada opening first new refinery since 1984

When the feds decided to fund the nation’s first new refinery in three decades in 2012, a diesel shortage had just caused some truckers to be turned away from filling stations, and demand was climbing. Fast forward to 2017, and North West Refining’s Sturgeon plant in Alberta is poised to add 40,000 barrels a day of diesel to an already-glutted market.

Regina Leader-Post

Technology

Telus commits to B.C. high-speed network

Vancouver-based Telus (T-T) has announced it is continuing the ambitious expansion of high-speed data and wireless networks with an additional $4.7-billion in B.C. upgrades through 2020. The work, which includes spending $1.2 billion this year, includes running its PureFibre fibre-optic data lines to “thousands more homes and businesses,” in urban and rural areas. 

Vancouver Sun

Other

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