Why Real Estate is Out of Breath

They came. They saw. They conquered. Yesterday, more than 250 people from five major real estate companies came together to conquer 260 flights of stairs in four buildings, all in support of United Way. (It's also a strenuous way of touring available space.)

Brookfield's Julie Thannickal, Alissa Rankin, Jamie Harkins, Monique Proulx, and Raquel Mendes, before heading over to the stairwell in First Canadian Place at 100 King St W. Brookfield Properties SVP Office Leasing Bob MacNicol says it all went well ("It was damn hard!") and that there were a lot of tired climbers at the Duke of Devon later on, "but the beer was nice and cold."

Brookfield, Cadillac Fairview, Dream, GWL Realty Advisors, and Oxford participated. The first annual event took place on staircases at First Canadian Place, TD Centre, TD Canada Trust Tower, and Commerce Court West. Dundee Realty Management opened up Scotia Plaza for a relay race up 60 floors. Snapped above are Brookfield employees entering the stairwell at First Canadian Place. There were 25 companies and 49 individual teams, doing everything from relay climbs to the four-building climb.

More than $73k was raised, exceeding the $60k target. Brookfield Canada Office Properties prez and CEO Jan Sucharda tells us the event started as part of Brookfield's fundraising but has spread through the real estate community: "We are hoping to make this an annual event and get twice as many teams out next year."

No Cracks in the Office Facade

We couldn't let Jan go without asking about the Toronto office market. Brookfield is well into the construction of the 44-storey, 980k SF Bay Adelaide Centre East Tower (image), coming late 2015. "Not a lot of difference between the last build cycle and this one," he says. We see "a reversal of the trend from 10 to 15 years ago, where certain offices moved to the 905. We are still seeing the live, work, play attitude."

More businesses are coming downtown to consolidate, Jan adds, taking advantage of centralization and infrastructure. Are we overheating amid an onslaught of new office tower builds in the core? Jan (middle) points to a market sitting at below 5% vacancy. "We have to be careful, though. It's like everything else, you have to watch... the global economy," he adds. And that new product isn't coming online until 2014-2017, he says, so there's a period of time for the market to grow into it. (Markets are like Christmas sweaters.)

Old Meets New at 134 Peter St

Here's a quick update on Allied's 134 Peter St project (check out the cool panorama image). Two of the three delta frames have been installed, director of development Hugh Clark tells us, a key moment because the delta frames are the three supports for the office tower that will rise up in the new office lobby. "We have reached a point where we will now be building the new state-of-the-art office floors," Hugh says. Old meets new: the original building is the 100-year-old Weston Bakery biscuit factory. (At this point, if you find any biscuits, they're probably better served as building material than food.) The new tower will climb up over the next six months.

ACC Sees Uptick in
Availability Rate

A rise in sublease space has dramatically pushed up the availability rate at the Airport Corporate Centre, the big suburban office park in Mississauga, according to Avison Young Toronto West's latest figures. Since Q2 2013, the total ACC availability rate has increased 580 bps to 19.8%. The ACC has the largest amount of available sublease space in Toronto West, due in large part to large parcels of space brought to market by large multinational corporations.

Why Real Estate is Out of Breath

No Cracks in the Office Facade

Old Meets New at 134 Peter St

ACC Sees Uptick in Availability Rate

ACC Sees Uptick in
Availability Rate