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The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) recently announced the finalists for its 2010 “Best Tall Building” awards.  The annual awards recognize exceptional tall buildings from each of four geographical regions and are chosen for their design and technical innovations, sustainable attributes, and the enhancement they provide to their cities and the inhabitants. […]

Banks are starting to hire again as they return to structuring CMBS, a sign that the financial markets are gradually returning to normal.  “I see lots of friends who used to be employed, and weren’t for a while, and are now being rehired by institutions,” said Jonathan Strain, debt capital markets director at JPMorgan Chase’s […]

By 2050 – just 40 years from now — nearly 16 million Americans will be afflicted with Alzheimer’s Disease.  Surprisingly, there is not yet a national plan to deal with this looming crisis, although one has been proposed on Capitol Hill.  The National Alzheimer’s Project Act (NAPA) would establish an inter-agency advisory council to address […]

Jones Lang LaSalle and LaSalle Investment Management have noted reasonable improvement in global market transparency, according to their recently released 2010 Commercial Real Estate Transparency Index. According to the Index, Australia ranks as 2010’s most transparent market.  Canada is next in line, and improving markets include China, India, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Greece and Hungary.  Market […]

Three years after an EF5 tornado tore apart tiny Greensburg, KS, the town of approximately 900 is making a conscious effort to rebuild itself as a green community. City officials, residents and business owners are leading by example, making Greensburg a national model for environmentally conscious living. For example, a wind farm five miles south […]

A new accounting standard could alter the way tenants lease space, a move that carries serious implications for commercial real estate.  The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) has been cooperating with the International Accounting Standards Board to combine its generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) with international standards. According to Russell G. Golden, the FASB’s technical […]

Bank repossessions of homes rose 44 percent in May over the same month last year, reaching an all-time high and with increases occurring in every state as lenders stepped up the rate of seizures. Realty Trac, Inc., an Irvine, CA-based data company that tracks foreclosures, reports that bank repossessions totaled 93,777 in May, with filings […]

As global financial disparities start to wind down, China is likely to end up a winner because emerging-market economies have a definite advantage rooted in the way the global economy functions. Writing in the McKinsey Quarterly, Lowell Bryan, a director with McKinsey & Company, notes that “Saber-rattling Western trade negotiators frequently focus their attention on […]

Two of the nation’s leading billionaire philanthropists are joining forces to encourage others to donate as much as half of their wealth to charities.  Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett are teaming to create the Giving Pledge, “an effort to invite the wealthiest individuals and families in America to commit to […]

After nearly two years of waiting, watching and hoping, American commercial real estate is finally regaining strength. This is one conclusion of the Reuters Global Real Estate and Infrastructure Summit held recently in New York City.  Starting in the fall of 2008, real estate investors feared there would be a wide-ranging sell-off of debt-laden commercial […]