Chicago CRE professionals are nearly twice as gloomy about overall market conditions as they were last year, according to a new report finding just 4.4% are bullish on the state of the market.
Nearly 46% of real estate professionals say they are bearish on market conditions over the next six months, up from 23.7% a year ago. Including those describing themselves as bears, more than 82% said they were concerned, up from 65% last year, according to the 2023 Chicago Mid-Year Sentiment Report developed by the Real Estate Center at DePaul University and Urban Land Institute Chicago District Council.
The percentage of those…

Federal Reserve officials are debating how high to raise interest rates to fully wrangle inflation. The debate was in focus at their meeting last month.

With its acquisition of Erickson Wealth Management, Fortis now has over $500 million in assets under management.

Major stock indexes edged lower after the release of the Federal Reserve’s June meeting minutes and weak economic data out of China. 

Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust has been limiting redemptions for months, and while the withdrawal requests are still flowing in, the REIT suggests that the peak may have passed.
In June, BREIT received roughly $3.8B in withdrawal requests, which BREIT leadership said in a letter to shareholders is 29% off January’s peak request volume and is the lowest repurchase request amount so far this year. February requests totaled $3.9B, while requests for both March and April reached $4.5B. Requests in May totaled $4.4B. 
BREIT is fulfilling about $628M, or 17%, of the June requests, the letter said. The REIT has paid $8.1B to those…

Advertising tech firm MediaMath is shutting down, potentially leaving a nearly 100K SF hole in Lower Manhattan’s office market.
The advertising technology firm filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last week after its attempts to woo a buyer or investor failed, The Wall Street Journal first reported.
MediaMath signed a 106K SF, 15-year lease in 2014 with developer Silverstein Properties to anchor 4 World Trade Center. It owes Silverstein $2.5M in rent payments, according to its bankruptcy filing. As part of the proceedings, MediaMath asked a Delaware bankruptcy judge to reject the lease.
The company wrote in its request that it no longer occupies its office in the building…

Bain Capital is raising money for a third real estate fund with a $3.75B target, a goal that would surpass its prior fund by 25% even as fundraising activity is down across the market.  
The fund was registered last year, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing, and new details about its financial targets were revealed in a presentation last week to the New Mexico State Investment Council. 
At the meeting, the state’s main investment vehicle voted to approve a $150M investment in Bain’s third fund, according to an agenda summary first reported by IPE Real Assets. 
Investment strategy manager The Townsend Group, hired by the New Mexico Investment…

Several policy makers favored an increase because inflation and economic activity have proven resilient.

Federal Reserve officials are debating how high to raise interest rates to fully wrangle inflation. The debate was in focus at their meeting last month.

The biggest U.S. automaker sold more trucks and sport-utility vehicles as supply chain problems eased and demand remained strong.