Who Wins in a Market Shift?

“Victory comes from finding opportunities in problems”

— Sun Tzu

By now, you’ve been inundated with countless emails, commercials and pop-ups about the current events. Forecasting changes daily, and if you don’t like what you read on one website, you can surf along to find an alternative perspective. As I wade through the data and talk with my real estate clients, I am asked about what I am seeing in the market:

E Commerce is the Global Economy’s Darling- and that’s not going to change anytime soon.

According to Rakuten Intelligence, order volume for online grocery retailers surged 210% from March 12 to 15, compared with the same period in 2019. Showing similar trends, NetElixir reported that online food sales surged 183% between March 1 and 25, vs. the same period last year. In a CivicScience poll of US adults and their digital grocery shopping habits, the percentage of those who said they increased their online grocery shopping jumped from 11% to 37% from March 1 to 22. And it's very likely that these behaviors will continue. Why? Because ecommerce habits tend to form during periods of intense activity, and when those habits already have momentum, they become even stickier. (emarketer.com article April 5, 2020)

Warehouse ownership decisions made now will leave a taste in occupiers’ mouths come renewal time. Tenants and buyers may be poised to get an upper hand after the pandemic fallout. 

One of the the largest logistics warehouse operators on the globe, with almost 1 billion square feet in industrial real estate, has so far granted 7% of the requests by tenants for rent relief and denied 70%,which cumulatively account for 4.3% of the company’s gross annual rent revenue, executives said during the company's first-quarter earnings conference call late Tuesday (Costar April 21, 2020). 

As you sift through the information, how are you positioning your business to not just survive, but THRIVE through the market shift? Every market has its own nuances, but in every market, there is a dynamic opportunity manifesting itself through industrial real estate. As industrial real estate specialists, we are your resource to assist you through this shifting landscape. In the last 10 days, we are seeing more activity- both on the listing of properties as well as the activity we are seeing on those listings.

Albert Einstein said, “In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity,” and we are confident your businesses will prove this true. 

Riding the Wave or Bracing for the Avalanche?

It began in June of 2016. An Atlanta broker and entrepreneur saw the opportunity to purchase a 220-acre site in Adairsville, GA from a distressed seller. After his purchase, he stated, “One of the most attractive aspects of Adairsville is that it is flat. There are no wetlands issues and it’s ready for development. “You could almost go out there with an axe and a weed eater and get it pad ready,” he said. “…This could be a big, big, deal.”

Three years later, we have at least 5 institutional developers with over 1,300 acres of controlled sites, over 1.2 million square feet of industrial distribution space slated to be delivered within the next 12 months, and over 8 million square feet of proposed space that could be available. Taking all of this in, I began to wonder: will developers be riding a “wave” of opportunity with the pent-up demand from occupiers or will we experience an “avalanche” of industrial product on the market at once?

The answer to that question may not be cut and dry; it really depends on a few of the buildings that are currently under construction. Occupiers will see availability ranging from approximately 200,000 SF to 760,000 SF within the next 12 months. Who will take the first building? Could it be an occupier taking down Ashley Capital’s entire +/- 760,000 SF distribution center? Could it be a local user who needs +/-200,000 SF of prime distribution space at Panattoni’s Georgia North Business Center? What if there is a big manufacturer in the mix? Where would the supporting warehouse suppliers go? You may be wondering those same things, and most importantly- how will this affect your business? Could there be an unknown outcome for your real estate costs?

Oxbow is watching these developments closely, and we know the market. Whoever occupies those buildings will determine if we will see the surfers or the snowboarders in the coming year.