Search

IN THESE TOUGH ECONOMIC TIMES, even the most high-toned hotels aren't above a little begging in order to lure visitors. For example, the Ritz in Paris is offering rooms at [...]

A year ago, Dennis J. Hiffman, chairman and CEO of Oakbrook Terrace, Ill.-based NAI Hiffman, had the clear sense that something was missing. He was in the process of building [...]

What follows is a compilation of area reviews examining four of the Midwest's most prominent and important commercial real estate markets. H. Lee Murphy profiles Chicago, and Beth Mattson-Teig covers [...]

It's a great time to be renting apartments from Summit Properties Inc. in Austin, Texas. With the city's technology bubble suddenly burst, occupancy rates at the company's two apartment complexes [...]

In San Francisco, Kimpton Hotel and Restaurant Group has felt the nasty sting of the economic downturn. As of October, occupancies were off 30% and higher since Sept. 11 at [...]

For most of the last half of the 20th century, a sprawling 13-acre tract of land on Chicago s Gold Coast was the city s enduring embarrassment. Strategically situated between [...]

Leonard Wineburgh has been a commercial mortgage broker for some 40 years, although his work today hardly resembles those early days. Wineburgh played a critical role recently in a new [...]

At the crossroads of the nation, Chicago has been suffering something of an identity crisis lately. The city that for decades has prided itself on being the biggest and best [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy Leasing and investment sales transactions continue to recover this year as many newly confident commercial brokerages turn to a different kind of transaction - acquiring competitors. [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy Casino developers have to be discouraged. Las Vegas is overbuilt, Atlantic City's economy is a basketcase and voters in emerging markets like Chicago still can't decide [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy The last family moved out of the last high-rise at the notorious Cabrini-Green public housing projects in Chicago in early December. Investors soon will line up [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy As the chairman and CEO of Prime Group in Chicago, Michael Reschke has been known for years as a developer of office towers and shopping centers. [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy The sudden assumption in commercial real estate after the twin towers of the World Trade Center were demolished on 9/11 was that in a new era [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy The high-rise construction cranes around Chicago's skyline have been mostly absent this year, as the marketplace suffers its highest office vacancy rates in at least two [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy If New York City is a harbinger for the future of the hospitality industry, then the prognosis is brightening. Developers are lining up to erect new [...]

Byline: Story by H. Lee Murphy The hotel sector went nearly dark through much of 2009 in the face of falling revenues and mounting losses, but big deals are starting [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy In once-hot hospitality destinations like California, a great divide has cropped up between the most desirable and most troubled markets. Through the first half of 2010, [...]

They're just mad about corned beef in Chicago. And hamburgers. And pizza and frozen yogurt. For the first time in years, as large-format retail development has screeched virtually to a [...]

It's a late August weekend at the Grand Geneva Resort & Spa in Lake Geneva, Wis., and the place is a beehive of activity. Two wedding parties and a community [...]

The path to a U.S. Small Business Administration loan runs more smoothly when borrowers adhere to the agency's myriad formulas and rules. Here are some things to keep in mind: [...]

A half-century ago, the little town of Yorkville, Ill., population 3,000, was like small communities everywhere. The local farmers milked Holsteins when they weren't tending to their corn and soybean [...]

The coming year is shaping up to be a dark hour for the lodging industry. In 2002, in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on 9/11, average hotel occupancy in [...]

As the credit crunch tightens its grip, planned retail projects in suburbs, exurbs and small towns - ranging from regional malls to little strip centers - have been falling apart [...]

Situated at the epicenter of the U.S. economy, Chicago calls itself the railroad capital of the nation. Travel a mile or two on any route from downtown and you'll encounter [...]

While hotel buyers are seizing the opportunity to acquire assets at a discount amid a softening U.S. economy, some high-profile REITs have become net sellers to pay down debt or [...]

Something odd happened on the way to the funeral for hotel deal making this year - at least a few investors refused to attend. Yes, many banks and other high-profile [...]

Sam Zell doesn't like the role of office building landlord any better now that his newest acquisition, the Tribune Co. media conglomerate, is the prime tenant. In the wake of [...]

The economy is dying on the vine while $4 gasoline and rising unemployment have consumers putting purchases of everything from cars to houses on hold. Hotel chains, fearful of faltering [...]

The distressed residential real estate market early this year generated plenty of headlines about sprawling Long Island mansions, surplus Miami condos and raw land around Las Vegas all going up [...]

Facing gasoline prices of more than $4 per gallon, the airlines are busy reducing their fleets of planes while budget-strapped families are parking their SUVs and sedans in their garages [...]

There is deep-seated pessimism in every corner of the retail landscape this year. Chains such as Sharper Image, Goody's Family Clothing and Linens 'n Things are all mired in bankruptcy. [...]

It may go down on record as one of the most wrongheaded obituaries ever conceived. The modern skyscraper, given up officially for dead by real estate investors and developers amid [...]

Byline: H. Lee Murphy The world's tallest building has been enshrouded in secrecy since the start of construction early in 2006, and the project architect, Skidmore Owings & Merrill LLP, [...]

For his first project in Chicago, Donald Trump has been dogged by indecision. Initially he considered a building as high as 2,000 feet, then backed off when he saw high [...]

Outside of the skyscraper strongholds of Chicago and New York, the really tall buildings have been confined to a handful of urban centers in places like Philadelphia, Atlanta and San [...]

When Liberty Property Trust began planning a 57-story, 975-foot tower in Philadelphia in 2002, the firm had no partners, no anchor tenants and no thematic design. But Liberty did have [...]

The commercial paper market is in disarray, real estate lending has ground to a halt in many markets, and mortgage brokers everywhere are running for cover. But not Cohen Financial [...]

The prosperity of the U.S. hotel industry has always tracked the fortunes of the general economy. The lodging sector sank into its last major downturn following 9/11. Now the economy [...]

From the street, the brand-new Point Berkeley in Duluth, Ga., a suburb north of Atlanta, looks like any other neighborhood shopping center. The 217,000 sq. ft. complex is anchored by [...]

Real estate deal making and development are unfolding all around Chicago on a grand scale. The nation's largest convention center, McCormick Place, just opened a 470,000 sq. ft. addition, expanding [...]

A year ago Strategic Hotels & Resorts Inc., a publicly traded REIT in Chicago, went on a buyout binge, acquiring nameplates such as the Westin St. Francis in San Francisco [...]

Last June, Harkins Theatres, an Arizona-based movie theater chain, made its debut in California, opening with a state-of-the-art, 16-screen cinema complex in a mall in Moreno Valley. Harkins' arrival led [...]

Since the Sears Tower in Chicago's Loop lost its title as the world's tallest building a decade ago, big skyscraper proposals have popped up periodically with the promise of winning [...]

Jeffrey H. Schwartz Age: 47 Company: ProLogis Title: CEO Time in current role: two years Biggest accomplishment: Consummating $5.3 billion merger with Catellus Development Corp. in 2005 Short-term goal: Building [...]

Marc Boorstein Age: 44 Company: MJ Partners Real Estate Services Inc. Title: CEO Time in current role: Fourteen years Biggest accomplishment: Persuading large institutional investors to consider self-storage a legitimate [...]

When Yorktown Shopping Center opened in 1968 in the Chicago suburb of Lombard, the enclosed regional mall spanned 1.3 million sq. ft. and ranked as the largest retail mecca in [...]

Buoyed by strong occupancies and room rates, the hotel industry is poised to embark on its biggest construction binge since the go-go days of the late 1990s. Lodging executives believe [...]

The game of golf, which hasn't been kind to public REIT investors in recent years, is attracting the interest of private-equity investors. The biggest deal in the history of the [...]

Raw land for commercial development in the Phoenix-Scottsdale corridor has become scarce of late. No wonder: Indian reservations comprise nearly one-fourth of all the land in Arizona, with some of [...]

Everyone loves to complain about high taxes - it's practically the national sport. But for Chicago office building owners, the complaints ring particularly true. A new study commissioned by the [...]