Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

211–220 of 230 posts

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#211

Post by infecto »

IncreasePosts wrote: post #206
infecto wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hard to trust a talking head investor who is just advancing his position/holdings.

Sure, but at least remember that the position came after his beliefs on the market. He wasn't assigned a random position and then needs to sell it - this is what he believes, and he put his money where his mouth is.

I don't need to remember anything, he of course made those investments, if they exist at all. Everyone has an opinion, even for the individuals who have historically made lots of money, but they are often wrong. Lets not forget that.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#212

Post by harambae »

nerdponx wrote: post #12
andrewflnr wrote: post #11

Can any of these be turned into residences? I'm sure there's zoning and similar nonsense, but in the real world there's also problems like having enough water hookups.

How about temporary housing for immigrants and refugees?

Yes that’s already happening here in Boston

https://www.foxnews.com/us/trendy-boston-waterfront-district...

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#213

Post by Turing_Machine »

xionplean wrote: post #203
mguerville wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Europe a lot of old buildings do this conversion easily, it's really more a problem with modern construction (and hence most American buildings) where the entire design is extremely skewed towards one use case vs the other

In the US, the problem is we have built large offices around the idea of a central elevator shaft then the plumbing and bathrooms are running up and around the shaft. It makes perfect sense for a large multi story office. You would have to design these weird apartments though that are like a thinly sliced pizza with no central area. Just a long hall of connecting rooms. Or to retro fit all you have is the foundation…

> You would have to design these weird apartments though that are like a thinly sliced pizza with no central area.

Those used to be called "shotgun houses" (or, less euphemistically, "shotgun shacks") though they were rectangular, not pizza-shaped.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shotgun_house

Of course, people did live in them because they were cheap.

In overpriced urban areas, the "pizza slice" configuration might be tolerable to some, if it were cheap enough.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#214

Post by IncreasePosts »

infecto wrote: post #211
IncreasePosts wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but at least remember that the position came after his beliefs on the market. He wasn't assigned a random position and then needs to sell it - this is what he believes, and he put his money where his mouth is.

I don't need to remember anything, he of course made those investments, if they exist at all. Everyone has an opinion, even for the individuals who have historically made lots of money, but they are often wrong. Lets not forget that.

Of course they could be wrong - my point is that he isn't just trying to sell you something that he's been burdened with. No one said you need to believe him - I was merely pointing out that him having a position and talking about his belief in the position is quite different from a talking head.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#215

Post by nerdponx »

harambae wrote: post #212
nerdponx wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about temporary housing for immigrants and refugees?

Yes that’s already happening here in Boston https://www.foxnews.com/us/trendy-boston-waterfront-district...

I haven't been keeping up with the Roxbury shelter debacle, but this is a welcome change of strategy.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#216

Post by devilbunny »

packetlost wrote: post #154
danaris wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is an actual solution, at least for buildings that are large enough: Make the whole building mixed-use. Ring the outside with apartments, and keep the inside commercial. Make the whole thing a little community in itself. Just fill the whole center of it with cafés, bodegas, computer repair shops—the kinds of small, locally-owned shops you get in a (healthy) small town or a pre-modern-zoning city area.

I personally would love to live somewhere like that, but I don't see it working out in practice. For starters, discoverability for those interior businesses would be poor. Where would they put their names/signs?

In the lobby, by the elevators. Offices generally don’t rely on walk-in traffic the way that retail or food/drink do.

The biggest challenge I see is in how to segregate commercial and residential traffic. Residents will not mostly want to live somewhere that they encounter random strangers walking through their hallways all the time. A purpose-built residential tower can limit access per floor fairly easily. In low-rise buildings with living area above retail, you segregate at the door to the upper floors.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#217

Post by infecto »

IncreasePosts wrote: post #214
infecto wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't need to remember anything, he of course made those investments, if they exist at all. Everyone has an opinion, even for the individuals who have historically made lots of money, but they are often wrong. Lets not forget that.

Of course they could be wrong - my point is that he isn't just trying to sell you something that he's been burdened with. No one said you need to believe him - I was merely pointing out that him having a position and talking about his belief in the position is quite different from a talking head.

He is trying to sell you something though. That is my point. Maybe he is wanting to buy CRE at an ultra discount, maybe he is holding an inverse position. The only reason to be so public about bets is because you have some sort of angle not that you have conviction in your public statements/comments.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#218

Post by Suppafly »

reaperman wrote: post #210
Someone wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Office buildings have most of their floor plates not around windows That’s not the case everywhere. In ‘Europe’ (I don’t know what set of countries this applies to), workers must be able to get sufficient natural daylight. https://www.kingspan.com/ie/en/knowledge-articles/what-is-en... : “To comply with the minimum recommendations for indoor spaces lit with windows or curtain walling, over 50% of the space must ach…

USA has no natural light requirements. Completely windowless offices can easily meet the standards here with no additional considerations.

Generally when 'USA' doesn't have requirements, it's because those things are handled at the state and local level, not because they don't exist at all. Building codes are generally hyperlocal. This isn't even a concept that would make sense to exist at the federal level with how the US is setup.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#219

Post by Suppafly »

chollida1 wrote: post #120
keiferski wrote: post #15

Only speaking from my personal travel experiences, not any hard data, but: I feel like this issue is nearly non-existent in places with mixed use zoning. If the office values go down in a place with equal amounts of housing, they are repurposed as new apartments. The problem is when the office architecture isn’t interchangeable with apartment architecture, which usually happens because certain areas are zoned as offi…

THis is a nice thought but rarely happens regardless of zoning. Office buildings floor plates and residential floor plates aren't really compatable. Office buildings have most of their floor plates not around windows, where are residential needs some light. Also water, and sewer need to be retrofitted. The one building that was a successful conversion that I know of cut out the center of the building to create a ligh…

I think you're exaggerating how hard the retrofitting is to do. Office buildings tend to have tons of extra space for things like drop ceilings and utility chases that can be easily used to run plumbing and electrics. Natural lighting is a concern but these buildings also tend to have huge windows, that can light passively if the interior spaces that are being retrofitted in are designed correctly.

Re: Commercial property deals in the US are starting to pick up at deep discounts

#220

Post by k8svet »

from-nibly wrote: post #146
le-mark wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lowering inflation, strong gdp, and strong jobs growth seems to indicate they’re doing something right. Or did I miss the point (I don’t watch fox)?

Good for you for not watching the red version of the propaganda?

I know this is shocking to people but the people who.dont watch FOX probably don't watch the other crap either. you can leave the both-sides brainrot lie out.
Post reply on HN