Tacoma's Commercial Real Estate to Bust?
Just a month after CBS Moneywatch declares that we’re the best real estate market in the country, US News and World Reports has released a report that concludes Tacoma is on its way to a commercial real estate bust.
The worst of the housing bust might finally be over, but another real estate tsunami is about to swamp many American cities. This time, it will be office buildings and retail space going vacant and facing foreclosure.
And while we may have our commercial real estate issues, we’re not sure if the reasons cited here hit the mark:
Tacoma, Wash. Shipments are down at the city’s port, one of the nation’s biggest, which has left warehouses vacant and hammered the many area businesses that depend on trade. And many of the region’s most prominent companies, including Microsoft, Boeing, Starbucks, and Washington Mutual—taken over last year by JPMorgan Chase—have been laying off workers, helping push Tacoma’s unemployment rate higher than the state average.
Are we talking about Tacoma here? Does this description match what you see happening in town?
Link to US News & World Reports
Via the BE Daily
Filed under: General
11 comments
N Nick August 13, 2009
I commented on the BE post about this, basically thinking they have a good suggestion as to employers downsizing being the cause. It’s just that they point to the wrong employers. I can think of a few large employers that likely affect the Tacoma commercial real estate market a bit more than Microsoft or WaMu.
Also, the fact that the report doesn’t correctly identify our local employers suggests the rest of the report may not be too accurate. It seems much more likely that Seattle is going to experience a major bust in commercial real estate, given that Tacoma hasn’t really added to it’s office inventory much recently.
If we do see a bust, my bet is that it has more to do with the Russell, Columbia Bank, and Key Bank layoffs combined with the dump of supply the Pacific Plaza project will add.
T Thorax O'Tool August 13, 2009
Of course the impending commercial bust will hurt Tacoma.
But not nearly bad as it will Seattle and Bellevue. Last I checked, we don’t have 1+ million sq feet of new office space coming available and we don’t have empty skyscrapers without tenants.
6 6ther August 13, 2009
All this is to me is a weatherman telling me it’s going to rain, while it’s raining. Trade is down everywhere.
However, now would be a good time to put our port commissioners in the hot seat and ask them some important questions- like what kind of measures are you taking to ensure we remain a viable port in the coming years? Especially with the widening of the Panama Canal, thus making shipping cheaper and easier to go directly to east coast ports. I want to know what we are doing to bring the shipping lines here, besides simply making room for them.
But I’m not totally freaked out by one talking head’s point of view. He’s not telling us anything we don’t already know.
T Thorax O'Tool August 13, 2009
Anyone know what’s going on with Toyota?
I heard their lease in Portland is up soon and the Port has been actively courting them.
R RR Anderson August 13, 2009
Always bad news. what about the positive side? Like Tacoma’s booming for-profit prison industrial complex expanding like a bubonic plague lump in the armpit of the port?
Any attempts to stop the flow of illegal immigrants (aka below-minimum wage freedom fighters according to fredo) will hurt this plucky new Tacoma employer.
Are you doing your part to help?
A altered Chords August 13, 2009
Commercial R.E. vacancy huh? I guess we need to just let the Luzon fall down.
I hope McMenamins does not catch wind of this dire prediction. They may choose a new location in a rust belt city or even Las Vegas.
S snoopy August 13, 2009
There are a lot of vacancies downtown.
Maybe that certain, shrinking company in Federal Way will move back to Tacoma and find a smaller office building to fill some of these vacancies.
J Jim C August 14, 2009
I have no idea why anyone takes at face value anything a financial analyst representing an entertainment network has to say, especially given the recent derivatives fiasco. I guess the “why” would be a rhetorical question: Americans obviously put more faith in their commercial/entertainment complex than they do in their government. I would LOL is this weren’t so sad.
J Jim C August 14, 2009
/o__o\
I meant no offense to you, Derek, I apologize if I came off that way – keep up the good work, BTW, a link is a link, even if it gives a young old crank an ill-advised opportunity to vent.
Still, there must be a good sound-bite statistic somewhere about how a greater percentage of Americans trust Matt Lauer than President Obama…
M Morty August 17, 2009
I manage the Washington Building, we get smaller companies and there’s definitely a shortage of new or established bizs willing or able to move in to Downtown. Other owners reporting same tough times; It’s so bad I caught a employee of another building owner going door to door trying to get my tenants to move—pretty sleazy (or desperate) move. All agree bottom not reached.
M Morty August 17, 2009
I manage an office building on Pacific, we attract smaller companies and there’s definitely a shortage of new or established bizs willing or able to move in to Downtown. Other owners reporting same tough times; It’s so bad I caught a employee of another local building owner going door to door trying to get my tenants to move to their building—pretty sleazy (or desperate) move. All agree bottom not reached.