A local investment group is taking control of West Broad Village in western Henrico County. This shows the status of tenants in most of the commercial part of the 115-acre development. The planned residential part includes apartments over some retail stores and 525 single-family town houses to the south and west of the commercial area, only 15 percent of which have been built.

Scott & Stringfellow will move from East Main Street, where the venerable brokerage has been for 105 years, to Riverfront Plaza, taking blocks of empty space once occupied by Wachovia Securities.

Housing prices have stabilized and sales are rising, but the commercial real estate market is still deteriorating locally and nationally, experts said yesterday at Virginia Commonwealth University’s 19th annual Real Estate Trends Conference.

The commercial real estate market in the Richmond area continues to reel from the recession, with the office vacancy rate expected to climb to 21.4 percent in the next six months.

BRIAN GLASS Metro Business asked Brian Glass, senior vice president at Grubb & Ellis/Harrison & Bates Inc., about the status of the retail commercial real estate market: “With regards to leasing, we have seen rates drop in the past year approximately 11 percent. We’ve seen vacancy rates go up from 5.9 percent to 7 percent. And we’ve seen a lot of tenant lease renegotiations.

The fallout from GVA Advantis closing its local office continues. FirstService Real Estate Advisors, a commercial real estate firm that is part of Toronto-based FirstService Corp., has hired three former GVA Advantis brokers to open a Richmond-area office and increase business here. Vance Spilman, Andrew Ferguson and Muscoe Garnett are all directors of the local FirstService office in Henrico County. As part of a Global Workplace Solutions division, Spilman, Ferguson and Garnett will work with regional and national clients.

If you are on the transaction side of the commercial real estate business, you may feel as if you are an unwilling participant in a video of heavy metal band Quiet Riot’s “Bang your head” song where nonstop music streams to your ear in ever louder chords. Every day is similar to the last. Deals are few and far between, and they just don’t close.

Jones Lang LaSalle is expanding its commercial brokerage services in the Richmond region. The Chicago-based firm, which started operations locally in July, has hired 13 more people to its local team—all formerly with GVA Advantis. Jones Lang LaSalle was able to grow rapidly here because it took advantage of the closing of the local office of GVA Advantis, one of the largest commercial real estate companies in the Richmond area. GVA Advantis still has offices elsewhere in the country that remain open.

The retail portion of West Broad Village has struggled. Some retailers and restaurants have pulled out; others want to set up shop but not just yet. Still, HomeGoods, REI and other retailers plan to open stores there in the coming months.
  1. Day-care center (planned)
  2. Dave & Buster’s (open)
  3. Mimis Café (open)

The commercial real estate market in the Richmond area is ailing and likely to get worse, much like the rest of the country. Twenty-three properties here—ranging from hotels to mixed-used developments, apartments and shopping centers—are in financial distress, according to Real Capital Analytics, a commercial real estate research and consulting firm based in New York.

Even as the housing market starts to show signs of recovery, fortunes for commercial real estate are looking increasingly grim—and that could spell trouble for the fragile U.S. banking sector. The weak economy and rising unemployment have forced businesses to cut back on rental space, resulting in declining revenue for many landlords. And tighter underwriting standards and falling real estate values have made it much harder for them to refinance.

About 18 teenage girls were given the keys to several thousand square feet of prime retail property in the Miller & Rhoads building yesterday and told to turn it into a business. The high school graduates, all headed to college, were part of a program designed to encourage young women to consider commercial real estate as a career option.

Innsbrook area businesses hit Robert Davenport was stunned yesterday to see empty parking spaces and a few empty parking lots in the Innsbrook Corporate Center when he drove through the office park. “It used to be you couldn’t find a spot to park,“ said Davenport, an Henrico County resident. Even more parking in the western Henrico office park and nearby buildings will open up in the next six months.

Abluegrass tune “I ain’t broke, but I’m badly bent” recently recorded by The Dan Tyminski Band accurately describes both commercial real estate lenders and investors today. On the lender side, more focus is placed on managing current portfolios and avoiding substantial write-offs than on new business. New business for investors is limited to bargain-basement shopping. Most of their effort and time is spent on managing debt that is coming due and property level cash flows.

Owners of shopping malls, hotels and offices are defaulting on their loans at an alarming rate, and the commercial real estate market is not expected to hit bottom for three more years, industry experts warned yesterday. “The commercial real estate time bomb is ticking,“ said Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, D-N.Y., who heads the congressional Joint Economic Committee.