DC Market Highlights
• Things are starting to open back up; Washington, DC is in Phase 2 of re-opening.
• Childcare for professionals returning to work remains an unanswered question.
• A lot of DC restaurants are opening up sidewalk seating.
• Washington, DC is adding 2 new Hospitals: One at St. Elizabeth’s and another at Howard University.
• Hotel occupancy at Northern Virginia 300 room business hotel are slowly increasing from 10 rooms a night, to 50 rooms a night moving to breakeven at 100 rooms.

Economic Highlights:
• Many businesses are still losing money even through the have reopened.
• The increase in residential title insurance volume has help off set commercial and NYC severe declines.
• Costar researchers are getting through to more real estate professionals for research.
• Activity on the Costar platform is at 90% of pre Covid.
• Costar is tracking 300,000 deals that are under contract.
• Resorts that are drivable have done better than expected.
• Small businesses have gone through revenue shock.
• Small business revenue shock was helped by the PPP program.
• Haves and Have Nots; Haves have survived well, Have Nots like retailers and restaurants are struggling.
• Have Nots are barely hanging on, reorganizing or closing down their business.
• 2020 is about surviving. 2121 is about reorganizing post Covid. 2022 is about making money again.
• Businesses are hiring the minimum. Everyone plans to be leaner.
• The economy bottomed out the middle of April. Business has steadily improved since the middle of April.
• Home sales are close to pre Covid levels.
• Retail sales and mortgages are V shaped recoveries most other are similar to horizontal check marks.
• Still at the end of the day demand is not going to come back completely and quickly, how many small business can last?
• The economic recovery depends on health policies, the spread of the Covid virus and the timing of the rollout of a vaccine.
• A lot of debt has been accrued. At some point the debt has to be paid back, which will impact capital expenditures and hiring.
• Manufacturing, construction and some other industries have been working through their back log but have limited new business pipelines.
• A decade of job growth was wiped out in 2 months.
• 45 million people have applied for unemployment during pandemic compared 662,000 being the previous high water mark.
• Expect a spike in unemployment when the PPP money runs out.