Commercial Real Estate & Business News – November 13, 2014

While the rest of the country struggled to recover from the recession, the economy in Texas has been on fire. Thanks to a boom in horizontal drilling and fracking, the state’s oil output has more than doubled over the past three years to 3.18 million barrels per day—a level not seen since 1976. That’s sparked a surge in construction around the nation’s oil capital, Houston... Read more »

Scottsdale is becoming a hotspot for new condominium and townhouse projects, with three launched in the city since late October. Construction started today on a 27-townhouse development called Aerium in downtown Scottsdale. Prices for houses in the latest project, at Goldwater Boulevard and 70th Street, will start in the high $300,000s. Buyers can begin reserving lots for the townhouses, ranging in size from 1,414 to 1,830 square feet, on Nov. 15... Read more »

Zenefits, a fast-growing human resources tech company, has chosen Scottsdale as its first major expansion outside of its San Francisco headquarters, and plans to hire more than 1,300 employees in the Valley over the next three years. Zenefits is moving into a nearly 100,000 square-foot office space at the Galleria Corporate Centre in Old Town Scottsdale... Read more »

The idea of crowdfunding isn’t particularly new. In fact, it may be one of the oldest concepts in civilization. Think of crowdfunding a little like taxes, where individuals pay into a large managed pot for use towards the common good of the collective group. While crowdfunding is voluntary and taxes are compulsory, the concept is at least simple to understand... Read more »

Many of you have read about, and experienced, the current frenzy over multifamily investments as we continue to learn of new Class A developments on almost a daily basis. Clearly, the market for apartments has been on a very strong run, driven by the low cost of debt and the abundance of equity that prefers this product type. Most of the focus has been on well-located stabilized and value-add product in urban and suburban markets, with less attention focused on aging Class C product in the same locales... Read more »