Here to Help Series: Building for Tomorrow – The Next Phase of Development

 

Webinar Part 3 Recap

ULI Michigan Here to Help Webinar Series

Building for Tomorrow – The Next Phase of Development

“Optimistic – be efficient – be specific – slow growth over the next 12-months – work, play… vacation?,” some of the highlights from our expert panel during Part 3 of ULI Michigan’s Here to Help Webinar Series: Building for Tomorrow – The Next Phase of Development. This record breaking virtual event with 140 registrants was moderated by Sarah Pavelko of the DEGC, and speakers included: Darin McLeskey of Denovo Real Estate, Mike Ferlito of The Ferlito Group, and Cliff Brown of Woodborn Partners.

Joined by our expert panel of local small-scale developers we discussed how they are addressing the impact of the current COVID health crisis on their existing portfolio while continuing to make progress on projects post-crisis; Learning more about their market reactions and explored what is happening locally. Discover our main takeaways below:

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  • Many different challenges have come up due to COVID-19
    • Trouble getting people into buildings for maintenance
    • Changes in pre-screening tenants
    • Halted development
  • What will happen with the shared economy?
    • Office will likely look different at least in the near future
    • Spaces will need to be reconfigured and procedures will become different than they have been in the past
  • Work From Home (WFH) the new norm?
    • WFH could become more popular
    • Changing need in spaces, bigger apartments and homes are selling quickly as people shift focus on home life
    • Housing shortage
      • High end homes selling faster
      • People opting for more bedrooms to accommodate preference for a home office
  • Market impacts
    • People are hesitant to list as they are unsure what the future holds
      • Are we heading toward another recession?
    • Will there be a move toward rural and inner ring suburbs?
      • We took a poll from our audience for their predictions of where development trends are going, and this is what we found…

    • Cities still maintain lots of amenities and humans gravitate to being where the action is (“Suburbs is not where it’s at”)
  • Opportunity for cluster neighborhoods that have a park etc
  • Employment growth in rural markets — office/industrial space
  • Dramatic shift in our supply chain
    • More goods to be made in US as supply chains have broken because of COVID
  • Needs
    • Increase in gap funding
    • Municipalities that are willing to work with developers
    • Figure out how to build affordable and middle-income housing
    • Mitigate construction costs
    • Lower property taxes

    • Many great viewpoints in this discussion and we look forward to expanding on the capital structure topic during Part 4 of our Here to Help Webinar Series: Restructuring the Deal – The New Capital Stack on June 25th at 3:30PM EDT. Register Now!