Spear Street to renovate Calgary’s The District offices

RENX  Commercial  •  Office, Retail  •  Calgary

A San Francisco-based investment company is investing more than $10 million in the redevelopment of a Calgary office complex to make it more attractive to tenants. Spear Street Capital bought the three-building, 370,000-square-foot former IBM Campus in 2014.

Mall of America owner staring down billions in debt

Commercial  •  Bisnow

Edmonton-headquartered Triple Five Group, the developer of the Mall of America outside Minneapolis and the American Dream mall in New Jersey, with another one planned for Miami, is facing acute financial troubles because of the coronavirus.

Related halts payments to Hudson Yards EB-5 investors

Residential, Commercial  •  The Real Deal

Related Companies, one of the EB-5 program’s biggest proponents, is halting payments to such investors in Hudson Yards because of volatility caused by the pandemic. Related told EB-5 investors the project was facing a host of challenges.

The People Space › New BGO managing partner; hirings at Slate, PSR, WBM …

Don Wilcox: Managing Editor

Ontario ban on CRE evictions ‘premature’: Sonshine

Commercial  •  Bloomberg  •  RENX

Ontario Premier Doug Ford acted too quickly in implementing a temporary ban on commercial evictions, said Ed Sonshine, RioCan REIT (REI-UN-T) CEO. “I thought it was a little premature,” Sonshine said. “(Ford) shouldn’t interfere lightly with commercial contracts.”

Multifamily rental sales soar 900% on Lower Mainland

Residential, Commercial  •  Business In Vancouver

Led by land sales and the multifamily rental sector, the total value of commercial real estate transactions on the Lower Mainland soared to $2.15 billion in Q1 2020, a 37.2 per cent year-over-year increase, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver.

QuadReal, LaTerra create $250M L.A. multifamily venture

Residential  •  IPE Real Assets  •  Bisnow  •  Toronto Star

LaTerra Development has teamed up with Vancouver-based QuadReal Property Group – the real estate arm of British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCI) – to invest up to $250 million US to develop and operate multifamily communities in Southern California.

BSR REIT acquires Texas apartments for $51.6M

Residential  •  Canada Newswire  •  RENX

BSR REIT (HOM-U-T) announced it has acquired Retreat at Wolf Ranch Apartments, a 303-suite, garden-style residential community in Georgetown, Texas and the Austin Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) for $51.6 million.

Feds, Ontario funding to help small businesses

Commercial  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)  •  Toronto Star  •  Financial Post

The federal and Ontario governments will spend nearly $58 million to help small businesses move online. The funding will primarily help to expand a Toronto-based program called Digital Main Street to assist entrepreneurs across all of Southern Ontario.

Hoteliers forecast more pain, demand gov’t action

Commercial  •  Toronto Star  •  Globe and Mail

As the summer travel season dawns, hoteliers and the broader tourism industry worry they will be hit longest and hardest by the COVID-19 crisis as confinement measures begin to lift but travellers remain largely unwilling or unable to cross borders.

BentallGreenOak JVs on Nashville Hutton Hotel

Commercial  •  Business Wire  •  RENX

As part of a new three-way venture, BentallGreenOak (BGO), Flank Management LP (Flank), and Geolo Capital (Geolo) announced the acquisition of the Hutton Hotel in Nashville in an all-cash purchase for an undisclosed price.

REIT/REOC COVID-19 business updates

Commercial  • 

Chartwell Retirement Residences, (CSH-UN-T), Canada Newswire

Dream Unlimited Corp., (DRM-T), Globe Newswire

HBC issues bond offering to shore up finances

Commercial  •  Reuters  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)

Department store chain HBC LP is expected to raise up to US$900 million from a bond sale, money that Canada’s oldest company will use to weather the store closings that came with the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Pandemic won’t be end of office buildings: Brookfield

Commercial  •  Reuters  •  Daily Commercial News

The coronavirus pandemic will not be the end of office buildings, Brookfield Asset Management (BAM-A-T) CEO Bruce Flatt said Wednesday. Flatt said he believes “it is ludicrous to think that companies will not return to offices.”

Taubman pushes back against merger termination

Commercial  •  Globest.com

Taubman Centers is pushing back against Simon Property’s declaration their $3.6 billion merger is terminated. Taubman says Simon’s “purported” termination of the merger is invalid and without merit, and that “Simon continues to be bound to the transaction in all respects.”

A third of U.S. malls predicted to disappear by 2021

Commercial  •  CNBC

A third of America’s malls are going to shut permanently by 2021, says Jan Kniffen, a current retail consultant and former exec at The May Department Stores, who says their demise is accelerated due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Students anxious to return: Alignvest Student Housing

Commercial  •  Bloomberg  •  RENX

VIDEO: Alignvest Student Housing REIT managing partner Sanjil Shah, says the online experience has not proven to be satisfactory for students, adding his residences are 90 per cent pre-leased for the fall – four per cent ahead from last year.

Are mortgage deferrals key to financial stability?

Residential  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)

OPINION: As the Bank of Canada fretted over bloated household debts for the better part of the past decade, its biggest fear was that stretched-to-the-limit mortgage holders would collapse under the weight of the next major economic shock.

Quebec announces $71.5M action plan for moving day

Residential  •  La Presse

Quebec’s Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing announced Thursday an action plan with an investment of $71.5 million to prevent tenants from finding themselves on the street on July 1. $21.5 million is intended for the emergency rent supplement program.

B.C. landlords, tenants conflicted over eviction ban

Residential  •  Business In Vancouver

B.C. landlords and tenants affected by COVID-19 are at loggerheads over evictions and unpaid rents as pandemic bans on evictions and rental increases continue. On March 25, Victoria froze rental increases and issued $500 payments directly to landlords to help tenants.