The third class period consisted mostly of topics on technology and what has changed. The first topic we talked about dealt with retail markets and how they are changing. The retail market is shrinking because consumers are not wanting to spend as much. Also retail is shrinking because consumers are going virtual with online shopping. Mostly the middle income market are the ones that are hurting because they can be reproduced unlike a lot of the high end stores which are destination places. During the bad economic times many luxury stores closed because of their expensive rent. Their rent was expensive because they were in great locations with a lot of traffic. They have started to open these places up again after learning that even though they are expensive places that's where they are getting a lot of their revenue. If they moved to lesser expensive locations they were not getting as much traffic and therefore having a lower stream of revenue. Statistics show that some parts of retail have grown dramatically over the past 10 to 15 years. This part of retail is the restaurant and bar market. It is an element of replacing malls to spend time with one another (Ex: West 7th St. in Fort Worth). In this area there are more restaurants/bars than there are shopping. It is what has been demanded by the consumers.
The next topic we talked about was Internet Marketing. It is a big industry for businesses to get into, but they need to start controlling their digital footprint more on how negative or positive their business is being portrayed. Mobile marketing is a big part of marketing and is getting bigger every year. Such things as urban spoon or yelp help businesses thrive. Also dealing with mobile devices, we talked about the new iphone 4g which has video conferencing. This would be a big game changer for medical offices because they would be able to diagnose through video conferencing if both the office and patient have the phone. Video conferencing could also change the way retail is done by enhancing their services. They wouldn't have to have experts at every location. For example, a home improvement store would be able to see a part on the video conference and give help instead of having an expert in the store and the customer having to go to the store to fix their problem. In the future video conferencing will most likely continue to be used as a time saver and will add emotional value when making non face-to-face deals.
A big component of residential real estate sales are looked at on Realtor.com. At this website people can view almost all house in any given area and about 80-90% of all buyers look online first. This causes marketing prices for brokers and realtors to go down, but it also cuts into their earnings too.
There are a lot of real estate programs that are changing from having to be installed on each computer to being web based. This is called cloud computing. Many programs for home computers are starting to use the cloud as well. Even though this is happening, there are a few issues with the internet; it is not as perfect as it seems. You are still vulnerable on the internet and no online applications are fool proof.
One of the most interesting things I learned during this class period was that fiber optic lines are buried next to rail road tracks. There is a data center in Bryan, Texas because of this. A recent demand in the Real Estate Industry is the demand for data centers. These centers are very high tech pieces of property.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Thursday, June 17, 2010
June 17, 2010-Office Markets/Sustainability/Green Development Trends and Issues
Our second class started off talking about sustainably. Sustainability can be defined as many things including renewable and flexible. The dictionary describes sustainability as when something remains diverse and productive over time. The main words to describe it though are the 3 E's, efficiency, effectiveness, and equitable. Sustainability can also come down to what impact it has on the environment. Sometimes suburbia just builds and doesn't look at how sustainable the projects are really going to be. They just now that everyone has a car and can drive to the place they need to go.
Dr. Forgey told us a few quotes from Peter Drucker. "Doing the right thing" and "doing things right." Each of these represent different things. The first one represents effectiveness and leadership. The second one represents efficiency and management. Both are needed to have sustainability. These were just some examples on how to describe the different words that make up sustainability.
Our next discussion of the night was about office buildings. The first part of the conversation talked about what helps worker satisfaction and productivity when laying out a building. Many things were brought up such as lots of windows, good building amenities, good ventilation, or even giving employees comfortable chairs to sit in while working. Next we talked about flexibility in office space. To me this is very important because you are looking toward the future and what can be used in that space. A way this is happening now is that buildings are having less 4 walled rooms and having a lot more cubicles. Also buildings are being formatted so the tiles on the ground can be lifted up and wiring can be changed or plug ins can be put in different spots. Another thing about flexible space that is not thought about as much is financing maybe easier to come by and you might get better lease rates.
A long and very interesting trend we talked about was what is happening with regional malls. A lot of them have been shutting down. The question was asked why? A trend that has been seen in this real estate market is eye catching. While regional malls are trying to stay afloat a new type of shopping experience has popped up. It is called the town center. It has all the same stores as a mall, but has a little different atmosphere. At the town center you walk outside to get to each store unlike the the regional mall which is all air conditioned. The town center in a way is taking shopping back to the beginning where all shopping was downtown and you had to walk to every store. There are many views on why things are changing but one good answer was that the demographics are changing and are making shopping centers keep up with what the customers want.
A big development in real estate in just the past few years is LEED certification. It is changing the way things are constructed and remodeled. The different articles talked about during class touched on how big corporations are wanting these LEED certified buildings. Corporations want these buildings for two main reasons. A big one is the marketing aspect. It shows that the company cares about the environment and wants to do something to change the way business has been done. The other big reason for the demand of these buildings is it saves a lot of energy costs for the companies. Many energy companies in Houston are at the fore front of wanting these buildings. Many other companies are coming together in groups to have buildings that are LEED certified.
LEED certification is in such popular demand. LEED has come very far from where it started. A few years ago if you were LEED accredited, it was a luxury. These days to many people being LEED certified is a necessity. LEED increases its standards every year because the association looks at new technologies that come out. LEED is a big deal, even the Chinese have LEED and standards that they follow. That is just the tip of the iceberg of where LEED is going. The Chinese really had to do something because their air quality was so poor. Since they have realized that there are ways to be greener, they have been leaders in producing solar panels and windmills. A big road block for LEED certification is lenders. What needs to be done is that lenders need to be educated about why LEED is important.
The last conversation we talked about was about what extent should the United States government play in making the U.S. green. Much legislation has already been produced which are making people become greener. This is a very touchy subject because the government could get too big and not know where to stop. Many good things came out of our conversations that would be good for green such as having all business locations and their electric bills posted for people to see. Also, if you had something in your house that showed how much you were spending that minute, hour, day, etc. on electricity it would help people to probably conserve more.
Dr. Forgey told us a few quotes from Peter Drucker. "Doing the right thing" and "doing things right." Each of these represent different things. The first one represents effectiveness and leadership. The second one represents efficiency and management. Both are needed to have sustainability. These were just some examples on how to describe the different words that make up sustainability.
Our next discussion of the night was about office buildings. The first part of the conversation talked about what helps worker satisfaction and productivity when laying out a building. Many things were brought up such as lots of windows, good building amenities, good ventilation, or even giving employees comfortable chairs to sit in while working. Next we talked about flexibility in office space. To me this is very important because you are looking toward the future and what can be used in that space. A way this is happening now is that buildings are having less 4 walled rooms and having a lot more cubicles. Also buildings are being formatted so the tiles on the ground can be lifted up and wiring can be changed or plug ins can be put in different spots. Another thing about flexible space that is not thought about as much is financing maybe easier to come by and you might get better lease rates.
A long and very interesting trend we talked about was what is happening with regional malls. A lot of them have been shutting down. The question was asked why? A trend that has been seen in this real estate market is eye catching. While regional malls are trying to stay afloat a new type of shopping experience has popped up. It is called the town center. It has all the same stores as a mall, but has a little different atmosphere. At the town center you walk outside to get to each store unlike the the regional mall which is all air conditioned. The town center in a way is taking shopping back to the beginning where all shopping was downtown and you had to walk to every store. There are many views on why things are changing but one good answer was that the demographics are changing and are making shopping centers keep up with what the customers want.
A big development in real estate in just the past few years is LEED certification. It is changing the way things are constructed and remodeled. The different articles talked about during class touched on how big corporations are wanting these LEED certified buildings. Corporations want these buildings for two main reasons. A big one is the marketing aspect. It shows that the company cares about the environment and wants to do something to change the way business has been done. The other big reason for the demand of these buildings is it saves a lot of energy costs for the companies. Many energy companies in Houston are at the fore front of wanting these buildings. Many other companies are coming together in groups to have buildings that are LEED certified.
LEED certification is in such popular demand. LEED has come very far from where it started. A few years ago if you were LEED accredited, it was a luxury. These days to many people being LEED certified is a necessity. LEED increases its standards every year because the association looks at new technologies that come out. LEED is a big deal, even the Chinese have LEED and standards that they follow. That is just the tip of the iceberg of where LEED is going. The Chinese really had to do something because their air quality was so poor. Since they have realized that there are ways to be greener, they have been leaders in producing solar panels and windmills. A big road block for LEED certification is lenders. What needs to be done is that lenders need to be educated about why LEED is important.
The last conversation we talked about was about what extent should the United States government play in making the U.S. green. Much legislation has already been produced which are making people become greener. This is a very touchy subject because the government could get too big and not know where to stop. Many good things came out of our conversations that would be good for green such as having all business locations and their electric bills posted for people to see. Also, if you had something in your house that showed how much you were spending that minute, hour, day, etc. on electricity it would help people to probably conserve more.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
June 10, 2010 Educational/ Employment Trends and Issues
This is the first time we have met for class. Throughout the next 10 weeks the class is looking at existing trends and issues and looking into the future to where they will be. We started off the class by watching a video about the Sub Tropolis located in the Kansas City area. It is an underground complex that was previously used for limestone mining in the 1940's. Since the space had previously been mined, it reduced the cost of putting tenants in the space. The Sub Tropolis is filled with build to suit facilities. The tenants there now range from a book store to a church and many in between. Sub Tropolis has many great benefits that no other place can offer. The lease rates are 30-50% less than locations above ground. The utilities here are 50-70% lower other places. Also the temperature under the ground is always around 70 degrees so workers that work with equipment or do manual labor are more productive. This project is a great example of adaptive reuse and what creativity can help to achieve.
LEED is starting to change the way tenants look at leasing. Now they are looking towards LEED to market their company.
We then talked about educational trends after the videos. Today employers are looking for other skills in future employees that they don't have to teach or train to employees and they want more than just what students have learned during college. For example, they want graduates to understand certain computer programs and/or how the business works before we
get into the business. Looking at time, it shows that education like a four year degree does not mean as much as it did in the past. Blogging can now show students ability to write and think critically as well as let employers know what students have been exposed to; a "living resume" does this as well. Throughout the next 10 weeks the class is looking at existing trends and issues and looking into the future to where they will be.Another topic discussed was employment markets and the new branches associated with future demands. Loan modification, asset management, adaptive reuse were just a few mentioned in class. We talk about Dallas and how it is land locked. The future of it is going to be through adaptive reuse of buildings and more density ex. big 30 story apartment buildings. The United States is going to start to reuse and remodel buildings because space is becoming limited.
Office Hotelling was also another discussion point. For example, Ernst & Young going to not have cubicles for auditors or employees who are not in the office. For these individuals they have a corner office reserved to meet with clients or if they do need to do work they can reserve a cubicle. This can cause office space to become cheaper because companies won't need as much space. This could be the future of the way office space is managed
Senior housing is another big market up and coming because of baby boomers. This part of the market is very capital intensive when developing and running.
Dr. Forgey gave us some advice on how to find the best job for us and how to get businesses to offer us jobs.
1.To learn about what company or what type of business you like it is best to do an internship.
2.Job search front- go out and talk to those people and try to get internships.1.To learn about what company or what type of business you like it is best to do an internship.
The last discussion we had that night was Online education and the future of it and how it will effect the actual real estate on campuses. Generation changes have taken place and now kids and young adults are inside playing video games instead of outside playing sports like in the past. In this generation classes and degrees are changing to online classes and even online degrees. Is it changing the real estate of schools? Will the buildings be obsolete? It is not possible to have a real estate class online because participation is needed in class. There is not an answer right know but my opinion is the classroom cannot be substituted by anything. I believe taking a few classes online is okay, but for a masters degree or any major classes they need to be taught be a professor with experience in a classroom setting.The first night was very informative and I enjoyed very much learning about the the Sub Tropolis and the Bank of America building. I also liked hearing all the opinions on the online education topic.
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