Bisnow

Renters will no longer have to pay fees to brokers who are working for landlords, in a move from New York regulators that has caught the real estate industry by surprise. The change, which is attached to last year’s new rent regulation laws, caused an immediate reaction from those in the real estate industry, some of whom claimed it would result in increased rents. Some brokers told the Times the rule wouldn't wind up saving renters any money, as the landlords paying the fee would just pass its cost on in the form of higher rents. But the new laws passed last year have drastically curtailed landlords’ ability to raise rent on stabilized apartments, which sparked rage from many members of the real estate industry.

Residential properties in the San Francisco metropolitan area will likely see modest rent growth and ample investor interest accompanying the arrival of about 3,600 new units this year, a 2020 forecast from brokerage Marcus & Millichap found. Residential rents grew 3.8% in San Francisco and neighboring cities in 2019, and Marcus & Millichap First Vice President of Investments Clinton Textor says he expects growth of about 5% to 7% this year, citing the area's continued income growth and less-than-stellar housing output. Multifamily properties in submarkets like Burlingame and San Bruno have been fetching cap rates of below 4% and per-unit average prices of about $480K, Marcus & Millichap's report said. Likewise, properties in the submarkets of San Francisco proper see a similar level of interest, even with the state's new rent cap of 5% plus inflation applied to many of San Francisco's properties, Textor and Kochavi say.

Elevator City Partners is seeking to raise upward of 60% of its $400M project budget from opportunity zone funds, co-founder Donray Von said. It is located at the MARTA West End station, within walking distance of the BeltLine and down the street from a nexus of historically black colleges and universities: Spelman College, Morehouse College, Clark Atlanta University and the Morehouse School of Medicine, Gravel said. At full build-out, the entire project is planned for 450 apartment units, 550K SF of office, 170K SF of retail and 420 hotel rooms, according to Invest Atlanta, the economic development arm of the city. ” Von and Gravel declined to identify other potential investors, but Invest Atlanta loan documents identified a number of big finance names that were in talks with Elevator City, including Prudential, Goldman Sachs, TIAA and Bridge Investment Group.

, call it corporate social responsibility, call it what you want, but the impact the property industry has on society is at the forefront of the minds of the people who drive profit and investment in the sector: the big corporate occupiers who take space in buildings, and the big pension funds and investors who build and own them. We want people to come and work for us, and cities too want to work with us, and if you don’t think about these things, they wo For investors like L&G, which with £1 trillion of assets is the world’s eleventh-largest pension fund, the remit is going beyond just making money to meet the liabilities of its policy holders, although it is making sure it does that as well. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink published a letter earlier this year outlining an increased focus on ESG matters for the world’s largest investment manager; and the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, Norway’s $1 trillion Norges Bank IM, said this year that it would sell all its stocks in oil and gas exploration companies.