Real Estate Daily News Buzz is designed to give news snippets to readers that our (yet to be award winning) editors thought you could use to start your day. They come from various business perspectives, real estate, government, the Fed, local news, and the stock markets to save you time. Here you will find the headlines and what the news buzz of the day will be.
Monday, the Standard & Poor's 500 index added 0.77 points, or 0.03 percent, to 2,439.07. The Dow gained 14.79 points, or 0.1 percent, to 21,409.55. The Nasdaq composite slid 18.10 points, or 0.3 percent, to 6,247.15.
U.S. crude rose 37 cents, or 0.9 percent, to settle at $43.38 a barrel in New York. Brent, the international standard, gained 29 cents, or 0.6 percent, to close at $45.83 a barrel in London. Wholesale gasoline rose 1 cent to $1.44 per gallon. Heating oil also added a penny to $1.38 per gallon. Natural gas gained 10 cents, or 3.3 percent, to $3.02 per 1,000 cubic feet.
US stock indexes close mostly higher; oil recovers -- U.S. stock indexes closed mostly higher, snapping a four-day losing streak for the Dow Jones industrial average on a day of largely listless trading. Utilities led the gainers as falling bond yields made high-dividend companies more attractive to income-seeking investors. Phone companies and real estate investment trusts, which also tend to offer high yields, notched gains. Financial stocks also did well. Technology companies declined the most, giving up gains from an early rally.
Company curbs sale of panels used on burned London high-rise — U.S.-based Arconic says it is discontinuing sales of one type of aluminum composite paneling for use on high-rise buildings following the deadly fire at a London apartment tower. Arconic says its Reynobond PE panels will no longer be sold for high-rise projects. The panels may have been a factor in the rapid spread of the June 14 blaze that killed at least 79 people at Grenfell Tower.
BMW announces $600M expansion as it celebrates 25 years -- BMW plans to invest an additional $600 million in its South Carolina plant and create 1,000 more jobs over the next four years. CEO Harald Krueger's announcement Monday coincides with the German automaker celebrating 25 years of manufacturing in South Carolina.
New York City Tops List for Flexible Office Rates “New York City is the most expensive big city in the world to rent a desk, according to a new report about flexible office space. The city topped a list of the largest international central business centers for the cost of renting flexible office space, which usually offers shorter terms than a conventional lease and provides furnished space ready to use.” (Wall Street Journal, subscription required)
Communal, Cozy and Connected: Hotels of the Future Break New Ground “Business travelers beware: hotels are redesigning room layouts. It's now 2017 — you work in coffee shops, your smartphone controls your home and car, and your business trips are short, two-day jaunts with a bit of leisure thrown in. Why can't your hotel be the same way? New hotels seek to capitalize on that question. Out are the large but dark rooms, the voluminous dressers and utilitarian corner gyms, replaced by cozier rooms, bright common spaces, natural lighting and centerpiece gyms.” (CNBC)
Is Dallas’ Housing Market Cooling Off? “They are workers relocating from Southern California, following employers like Toyota and Jacobs Engineering. They are college graduates moving from the Midwest to start careers in what is, reportedly, the country’s best city in which to find work. They are highly skilled immigrants from India capitalizing on a demand for tech workers. They are people from the East Coast who are simply tired of schlepping through slush every winter. They keep coming to Dallas, waves and waves of them, all looking for places to live. Looking and buying and boosting prices.” (D Magazine)
Jared Kushner Got $285 Million Loan from Deutsche Bank Ahead of Election Day “Evidence of wider ties between Deutsche Bank (DB) and President Donald Trump's family and businesses is emerging after a report that the German bank lent Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner $285 million ahead of the presidential election. Deutsche Bank finalized a $285 million loan to Kushner's real estate company a month ahead of Election Day, The Washington Post reported late Sunday. Part of a refinancing package for property near Times Square in Manhattan, the deal was struck as Kushner was propelling the Trump campaign to the finish line and Deutsche Bank was settling fraud cases with federal and state authorities.” (The Street)
Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Just Became One of the Largest Shareholders in an Obscure Real Estate Firm “Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway is investing more money in the real estate business. Store Capital announced on Monday that Berkshire invested $377 million in the company, which represents a 9.8 percent stake in the real estate investment trust. The company issued 18.6 million shares of Store Capital shares in a private placement to a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, National Indemnity Co., at $20.25 per share.” (CNBC)
Commercial, Multifamily Mortgage Originations in U.S. to Dip in 2017 “According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, commercial and multifamily mortgage originations in the U.S. will be down slightly in 2017, ending the year at $478 billion, a decrease of 3 percent from the 2016 volumes. Mortgage banker originations of just multifamily mortgages are forecast at $206 billion in 2017, with total multifamily lending at $245 billion.” (World Property Journal)
Hines Nabs Sacramento Office Tower in $120M Deal “Hines recently snapped up Park Tower, a trophy office property in Sacramento. The company purchased the asset from CIM Group in a transaction valued at, according to the Sacramento Business Journal, $120.5 million. The 25-story Park Tower, as Cameron Falconer, senior managing director with Hines, said in a prepared statement, is ‘a best-in-class office asset in a very desirable location.’” (Commercial Property Executive)
Staten Island Ferris Wheel Project is Spinning Out of Control “The giant Staten Island Ferris-wheel project is spinning out of control. The design team building the 630-foot-high New York Wheel on the borough’s north shore got into a bitter pay dispute with the developer — and walked off the job in late May. The developer then made desperate pleas to a federal judge to get the work started again, saying the revitalization of Staten Island’s waterfront was at stake.” (New York Post)
Is New York Real Estate Showing Symptoms of Distress? “For Hans Futterman, it was a dream defaulted. The developer assembled a vacant plot of land — formerly a Shell gas station and a parking lot — at Frederick Douglass Boulevard and West 122nd Street in Harlem over roughly four years, from 2011 to 2015. He then secured approvals to construct a 12-story, 127-unit residential building on the site, which offers 205,000 buildable square feet. But in June of last year, Futterman, who declined to comment for this story, defaulted on a $36 million loan from RWN Real Estate Partners, and five months later his development firm filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.” (The Real Deal)
NorthMarq Capital Buys SLC Mortgage Banking Firm “NorthMarq Capital has acquired Western Capital Realty Advisors, a leading commercial mortgage banking firm in Salt Lake City. The acquisition includes a $400 million loan servicing portfolio. John Bradshaw, Western Realty Capital’s founder, will join the company as managing director. Additionally, principals Nate Barnson, Larry Pinnock, and Dale Christiansen will come aboard NorthMarq as well as key employees Tara Jewkes and Tom Bradshaw.” (Commercial Property Executive)
Airline vet to lead Amtrak in a summer of repairs, reckoning — America's railroad is counting on an airline industry veteran to lead it through a summer of reckoning for congestion and crumbling infrastructure at its busiest station. Amtrak on Monday named former Delta chairman Richard Anderson as its new president and CEO. He'll take charge of the government-owned railroad July 12, as it rushes to make repairs at New York's Penn Station.
UK's May makes deal she needs to govern, but critics abound — British Prime Minister Theresa May has struck a deal with Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party Monday that is designed to give her minority government enough support in Parliament to endorse her legislative agenda this week. The move, made necessary by her Conservative Party's dismal performance in the June 8 election, came with a high cost: May's government agreed to a massive injection of funds into Northern Ireland in exchange for Democratic Unionist support.
Promised college loan forgiveness, borrowers wait and wait — New federal data suggest no new student loan forgiveness applications have been approved out of more than 64,000 pending applications. Thousands of former students of failed for-profit colleges were promised forgiveness by the Obama administration. Borrower advocates say the process to get loans canceled appears to have slowed since President Donald Trump took office.