COMMERCIAL

Covid-19 hammered commercial real estate, specifically the office sector when in March 2020, employees (non-essential types) were ordered to work from home. Two years later in early 2022, the outdoor mask requirement expired. By May that year, people didn’t have to mask up indoors anymore. Still a lot of employees continued to work from home.

Some very public companies demanded employees return to the office, but commercial office space in all sectors including industrial, apartment, hotel, office and retail showed a decline in appreciation per the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries’ Q3 report 2023.

Downtown Denver has the highest vacancy rate in 3 decades with 35% vacancy.

We’re not seeing taxes come down. Eleven interest rate hikes since March 2022 boosted interest to the highest rate in more than 20 years. The net result is disruption of the commercial real estate. If you have a creative way to reposition commercial property or use it directly, that works best now.