Pittsburgh November 2020 – Key Take-Aways

• General consensus is that retailers that were struggling pre-pandemic likely won’t survive; those that were doing well are still doing well.  C-stores, home improvement, grocers, dollar stores and QSR’s are all thriving.
• AdVenture Development reports their hotel is doing very well on weekends (tying into weekend weddings), and are at 50% occupancy during the week.
• The market was quiet for a few weeks leading up to the election, but is picking back up.
• Lot’s of new entries looking at Pittsburgh – coming in from other parts of the country.
• The office market is in a crunch and starting to have concessions by as much as 6 months of free rent inside the term.
• Desmone reports enjoying one of the best months of the year in October.  Several projects underway in almost every sector and chasing several others.
• CoStar shared data on the divergence of multi-family urban and suburban rents with urban rents trending down fairly dramatically.
• More and more interest is being seen in the suburbs, with multi-family following the industrial and logistics jobs.
• Franklin Interiors shared that they are helping their clients reshape their offices to allow for social distancing.  Seeing temporary clear partitions and pods coming into use.  While the office space has remained a challenge, the healthcare, education and multi-family sectors have remained reasonably active.
• PJ Dick also reports heavy activity in the multi-family and heavy industrial sectors, along with renewable energy.  Working with a number of clients on Development Assist work – including pre-con, budgeting, underwriting and construction.
• Acquisition activity is increasing – again in the multi-family and industrial sectors.  Single family development sites are also hot.
• There is also a lot of investment activity in the healthcare space.
• In the property management/facility management arena, there is a tremendous amount of focus on documenting all procedures and safety precautions related to Covid.