Shutdown Relief, Markets Exhale, and a Confidence Check for CRE

As the six-week federal shutdown finally comes to an end, markets exhaled from Wall Street to Main Street, easing travel worries ahead of Thanksgiving. But with October’s official jobs and inflation reports still on hold, visibility remains limited as the next Fed meeting approaches. What does that uncertainty mean for commercial real estate, and how confident is the market heading into year-end? 

This week, Manus Clancy and Dianne Crocker break down the post-shutdown landscape, from the shifting odds of a December rate cut to emerging signs of strength in CRE lending and deal activity. They unpack LightBox data showing steady momentum in October’s transactions, bright spots in bank lending as capital flows normalize, and whether that optimism can hold amid layoffs and softening business confidence. The discussion also highlights key industry stories, including Vornado and Rudin’s plan for a two-million-square-foot Park Avenue tower and a trio of data center deals in Northern Virginia and Phoenix that showcase the strength of digital infrastructure demand. The episode closes on a thoughtful Veterans Day note, spotlighting Cushman & Wakefield’s expanded hiring initiative for veterans and how firms are turning gratitude into opportunity.

A week of contrasts: steady transactions, strong bank lending, a dearth of economic data, and a market balancing caution with confidence. Tune in to hear the team's take on what it all means as 2025 draws to a close.

00:39 Economic Indicators and Job Market Concerns
06:20 AI's Impact on Employment and Corporate Layoff
10:45 Commercial Real Estate Deal Trends
15:10 Banking Reports and Lending Confidence
21:28 Development Projects and Market Confidence
24:30 Data Center Market Dynamics
31:11 Hotel Market Trends and Valuations

Have questions for the pod team? Send them to Podcast@LightBoxRE.com.

www.lightboxre.com

Transcript

The CRE Weekly Digest by LightBox

Episode 72: Shutdown Relief, Markets Exhale, and a Confidence Check for CRE

November 14, 2025

Alyssa Lewis: This is the CRE Weekly Digest by LightBox, a firm transforming the commercial real estate landscape by connecting every step of the CRE process with comprehensive tools and data. I'm Alyssa Lewis with our experts Manus Clancy and Dianne Crocker. Here's what made the headlines this week. US Equity Market soared on Monday as reports surfaced that the government shutdown was finally coming to an end. The process of reopening the federal government moved forward through the week, a welcome relief to many Americans and travelers ahead of Thanksgiving. Treasury yields continued to drift higher as investors try to figure out if a December rate cut is in the cards. The ADP jobs report showed more weakness in October, while small business optimism fell to a six month low. There's also more chatter about companies trimming staff in favor of AI, a trend that's getting harder to ignore. Finally some encouraging signs on the bank, lending front. Manus, with the shutdown finally over and markets reacting, what's your read on how this week's events are landing across the economy?

Manus Clancy: Certainly the big one was the end of the government shutdown. The rumors started on Sunday. There seemed to be more progress. On Monday, we finally came to a vote midweek, and the president signed it. I guess it was Wednesday night. To reopen the government. The markets, as you noted, really soared on Monday over the optimism that the shutdown would be ending, and I think people feel better now.

Otherwise, it was a pretty slow week with regard to data. We did see that a DP jobs number, which was weak, it was of a piece we've been talking about weak jobs, numbers. In June, July and August, we saw the challenge or layoffs. Tick up earlier this month. So all in all, I think that's one of the biggest concerns we're facing as a US economy, and that small business optimism number was disappointing.

So all in all, I'd say the glass half full picture is the government shutdown is over. The glass half empty picture is, we have a lot to worry about right now between the jobs market, the equity markets possibly being overvalued. Ever since that Monday rally stocks have been kind of. Up and down, kind of more down than up.

I think we have to see how the economy responds now that the markets and the US government are back open again and data starts flowing. 

Dianne Crocker: Yeah, I miss that data. Manus, I'll say definitely a sigh of relief that the shutdowns over for any of us hardy souls that are going over the river and through the woods for Thanksgiving, and certainly for the reasons that Alyssa just highlighted in the intro.

We're starting to see some. Optimism and activity kind of creeping back into Wall Street and Main Street in a way that we didn't see when the shutdown was still happening. But I, I think, you know, to your point, even with the optimism, we're still living with uncertainty and red flags. I, as a data junkie really miss the federal.

Market metrics deliveries, and I think I heard yesterday that the October jobs report may not even return to a regular schedule until December's report, which would come out in early January. So my mind kind of goes to the speculation about whether the Fed will deliver another leg in the easing cycle.

Its next meeting is December 10th. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell put it this way this week. He said, you know, what do you do when you're driving in a fog? You slow down. And if they don't have reliable data as they head into the December 10th meeting, I think there's more of a likelihood that they might just hold fast on rates.

And I think that's starting to show in an. The odds data, um, the odds of a December 10th rate cut have dropped to about 52% this week. So that's essentially a coin toss, and that's down from 95% a month ago and 65% a week ago. So I agree Mannis, I think. This week kind of felt like an exhale. We're all relieved that the shutdown is not dragging on.

Further, in some respects, the markets are rallying, but underneath certainly we have some questions about labor and questions about where rates will land, and those will all unfold in the coming weeks and months, and hopefully we'll have more data very soon. 

Manus Clancy: You can see the lack of conviction on where rates are going.

With the drift on long dated treasury yields, we hit that 3 95 rate a couple weeks ago. The rate shot up after Powell suggested that a December rate cut was no. Sure thing. We got as high as about four 15 or so a couple days ago. I think this morning we're down to four 10, but that momentum of things going below 4% has kind of stalled.

I think until we get more data, until we see what the Fed does in December, I think we will remain quite range bound. But for people who listen to us regularly, for most of the last three months, my biggest concern for the US economy had been some of the froth we've been seeing in valuations and this enthusiasm that lower rates.

We're somehow gonna justify higher asset values, whether it's crypto, stock markets, gold, et cetera. And I think I've pivoted in the last 10 days or so that my biggest concern right now is that jobs market that and, and some of this might be recency bias and sometimes it's anecdotal stories, but more and more I'm finding, I'm running into people in the grocery store or.

Uh, at a restaurant and they're talking about how hard it is for their recent graduate son or daughter to find a job or people are holding onto jobs. You know, they were looking for something new. But right now, one in the hand is worth two in the bush. Keeping that job right now at a time where there is so much uncertainty is the right strategy.

So I think that is now my biggest concern that we do see a labor triggered recession in 2026. I'm hoping that we don't, but it just seems like. The buzz from people that I know in my orbit that seems to be the biggest concern. 

Dianne Crocker: Agreed. You know, and we've talked in the past couple weeks on the podcast with kind of these early waves of corporate layoffs, and they're meaningful because they're big names.

You know, Amazon, I think all eyes are on that. You know, is that the tip of the iceberg? Or will we soon see other corporations also trimming their labor force, either because of AI or just cost cutting measures. So I agree it's, it's concerning and certainly something to watch because it could have longer term implications.

Manus Clancy: Barry Sternick of Starwood was on CNBC this week. He's on a lot and he is very opinionated and he, he's very forthcoming with his opinions whenever he is, whether it's at a conference or on CNBC, and he made this remark that his firm, Starwood will have to drop employees in favor of ai. I thought that was very interesting that when you think about the commercial real estate space, you think about boots on the ground.

You think about people who have to visit properties that have to kick the tires, that have to go into an ARGUS or some other software to kind of value a property to make their forecasts and so forth. And for somebody in an industry that's so labor intensive to make this admission. Makes me feel like maybe the cuts are coming sooner and deeper than maybe I previously anticipated.

Dianne Crocker: Well, in this instance, Manus, I hope that you're wrong. 

Manus Clancy: I certainly hope that I'm wrong and my own experience here at LightBox, just to kind of close the loop on it, and we talked about this a couple weeks ago, that we have been building at LightBox, AI driven extractions of financial documents, things like.

Rent rolls and appraisals and offering memorandums. The most progress we've made has been on the appraisal front, which we're now actually working with banks to have them extract all the data from their historical appraisals, and that's been very successful. But the point I wanna make with that is that there was a lot of human beings leaning in on this.

I think there's the myth and promise of ai, and there's the reality of it. And the myth and promise is you are gonna be able to just write a two sentence query into chat and get everything you want out of a document. And it's gonna be a hundred percent correct and people will no longer be reading these 150 or 200 page documents.

And the reality that we found was the amount of guardrails you have to build. The process of actually retrieving an appraisal, putting it on a conveyor belt, having it go through the extraction process, checking the data, seeing if the data is nonsense or not, right? If you see a cap rate north of 20%, chances are the AI got got it wrong or picked a wrong data point from within the document.

So while I do think that AI will lead to enormous advances. Just like the internet did in in the past. I do think that there's a lot of human beings employed in perfecting this process, and I do think that maybe it's just a, a, a trigger where certain types of employees find it harder to get a job, but others that can build guardrails and, and understand the process or thrive it, I think time will tell, but our experience has been.

There's been a lot more jobs created from what we're doing than jobs saved here at LightBox as we are really trying to perfect this process. 

Dianne Crocker: Yeah, that's a good point. And that is an incredible project. I'm glad that you, uh, you weighed in on that and I, I will say that, uh, Ryan Severino was interviewed this week by Globe Street, and he said something similar, you know, they're doing at.

Bentel, green Oak, amazing things. Putting more and more data into ai, coming out with, um, trends, analysis and forecasting. But like youIs, he really pointed to, look, it's not an either or situation. I'm sure machine learning is very, very good at identifying trends quickly, but you still need that human element looking and, and driving the.

This and making sure that the conclusions make sense and humans can do that better than any machine. So I, I think we're at this in-between place where we see where the chips land in terms of jobs. You know, some gained, some lost and we'll see where it shakes out. 

Alyssa Lewis: Dianne, I know you've been tracking the data flow closely.

What stood out to you? Now that things are opening back up and we're seeing some fresh numbers trickle in. 

Dianne Crocker: For this week, Alyssa, um, we're looking at October transactions, and I'll start off by saying Manus, that your team is absolutely amazing. They compile so many variables on deal closings month by month, day by day, and in total in October.

They compile data on 1,400 deal closings. Looking at the nine digit deals, the preliminary data for October show that 55 deals closed in October, and another 91 deals in the 52 $100 million range. And I'll say that these totals are all very, very closely in line with what we saw in September. So what that tells me is that despite everything happening in the news.

And even with the shutdown, there was very, very little change in terms of the pace of commercial real estate deal making in either direction in October. And I will add to that by saying that for any of our listeners who tuned in last week. You heard that our CRE activity index, which is a mix of pre-transaction activity and property listings and due diligence and in appraisals that in October the index took a slight dip, which we attributed to the shutdown.

But on the deal making side, we're seeing strong and steady. And this October data, Manus is really the first barometer that we have for Q4, and it's telling us that deal making is showing no signs of letting up. 

Manus Clancy: Kudos to you, Dianne, for bringing up my team. I don't mention them nearly enough that they do great, great work.

Our team is a combination of AI and sweat equity, and they are just. Relentless in looking for data, and we have some interesting tools coming out later this year and early next year that I think is gonna reveal a lot of this data, which we hope that our listeners will try out down the road. It's, it's really an exciting time for us, but to your point about the deal transaction remaining very high, it just feels like the ratio of good news to bad news in CRE is about 80 20.

Everybody seems to be talking about a decent amount of optimism for 2026. They're pointing out that lending volumes are up considerably year over year from 24 to 25. That transaction volume is up decently between 24 and 25, and the limitations that 20% that is negative is really quite contained. It's contained in the office segment where value is continue to bump along.

At the very bottom of the recent range that we're not seeing any real appreciation in older offices. Anything below the the re, the real class AAA office space and in that multi-family part of the segment where people just bought at really high prices and in some cases use floating rate debt. So I do feel like, I don't think people are overly exuberant, but the bias.

The tone of the market is certainly more positive than it is negative for CRE right now. 

Dianne Crocker: Here, here, and I will make a prediction. Manus, I think with your comments, talking about how AI and human abilities and capabilities are, are married and both are critical. I, I predict that you might be getting some resumes sent your way to, to join the LightBox staff after people like Barry let staff go 

Manus Clancy: bring it on.

You know, the, the other side to the, you know, the AI thing is, it probably does. No favors for office owners overall, right? If AI results in a conversion where you're hiring more data scientists, but fewer data analysts, you may see real tailwinds in tech centric markets like New York and San Francisco, but you could see that older workforce that is more data-centric, the people that.

Comb through servicing reports and appraisals and so forth, requiring less space, right? And fewer new hires and so forth. But time will tell and we will see. My thesis is that ai, at least in the short term, will not be a huge disruptor in terms of layoffs. Let's keep our fingers crossed on that. 

Alyssa Lewis: Alright, let's shift gears to this week's LightBox data dive.

Dianne, what are you and the team seeing in the October transaction data? 

Dianne Crocker: Thanks Alyssa. So for the dig, you know, I wanna stay on the topic of transactions, but just peel back a layer to geography. So focusing only on the nine digit deals, the really big ones, there were four states, Manus in your round of data, four states that accounted for two thirds of the biggest deals in October.

And you can probably guess which ones they were. It was New York, California, Florida, and Texas. All relatively big states. Sure and all. Do a quick side note as well. There's a report that I really love reading this time of year. It's the Emerging Trends in Real Estate report. It's a joint effort by the Urban Land Institute and PricewaterhouseCoopers, and it's a really broad based survey analysis.

I love reading every year as a data junkie. They pack so much into it, but my eyes always go first to what they identify as the top 10 metros to watch in the coming year. Based on investment, based on development prospects, and this is across all property types. So, uh, spoiler alert, Dallas-Fort Worth is at the top of their markets to watch list for the second year running and rounding out the top five are Jersey City, Miami.

Brooklyn and Houston, and those are all very similar to the hotspots that we're seeing in LightBox data. So I would say man is for any listeners that operate in those markets, I'd say they're pretty well positioned for next year, so they can be feeling pretty good about things. 

Alyssa Lewis: Speaking of momentum, two big banking reports caught our eye this week, both pointing to stronger CRE lending.

Dianne, what did you find in the data? 

Dianne Crocker: They did. Alyssa, we can put this on the side of the ledger that Manus just talked about, the 80% of good news. They were two reports. They were both pointing to the fact that lending has turned a corner. The first report is from Commercial Observer with reporting by Brian Paska, and it was about A-C-B-R-E report.

Found that firm originated, CRE loan closings across the US jumped 112% year over year in Q3. Those are levels that we've not seen since pre COVID, and the big driver was banks. Banks share of lending climbed from 18 to 31% as their commercial real estate originations. Surged by an incredible 167%. So I read that and think, you know, that's a major comeback after years of banks kind of taking a defensive stance.

They also pointed to average LTVs that they ticked up very slightly from 63.3 to 63.8, but that could. Be a shift that signals that, you know, maybe their risk tolerance is rising a little bit as competition for originations heat up and the cost of capital comes down and maybe a little bit of confidence returns.

And then the second report was similar. It was from the Mortgage Bankers Association, which just this week came up with their Q3 report. Commercial and multifamily borrowing rose 36% year on year and 18% above Q2. So their data's also pointing to strength, and this was five straight quarters of growth. So two signs that commercial real estate lending volume is improving as property values stabilize, and especially as all the loans we've talked about here, reaching maturity, look for refinancing, 

Manus Clancy: there really couldn't be too better.

Reports in terms of sizing up where the market is today, and I will take two parts of what you just said, Dianne, and try to synthesize them. Part number one, that inching up of LTV is incredibly healthy to me. Going up by only half a percentage point shows that banks, while they might be loosening the reins.

They're loosening, loosening them very slowly, and we're not seeing any of that froth that we've seen in past times, like 2006 and 2007. I think that's terrific. And for borrowers, for developers, for people that need to refinance. For people that don't wanna put shovels in the ground. The fact that they have so many options right now that banks are out there lending like they hadn't been in 2023, is just terrific.

And I come back to the word I use all the time. This is a confident market. Developers are confident that they're going to be able to execute on business plans and either convert properties or build them from the ground up and lease them successfully and make money out of them. And banks are confident that if they put money out to developers, they're gonna get rewarded with risk premiums and they'll get their money back.

So for right now, I feel like we are in this very sweet spot, not overly frothy. But very liquid. 

Dianne Crocker: Agreed. And, and maybe, you know, that's a case for, look, if, if Powell doesn't. Cut rates at the meeting in early December. That's not terrible. You know, rates didn't come down maybe as quickly as folks expected them to this year, but the market is still moving forward.

Whether there's a rate cut or not in December, we'll have a huge impact on what the pace of commercial real estate lending is. You know, I, I maybe would worry more if they were coming down too quickly. 

Manus Clancy: I agree. I think that the downside of coming down too fast, that may have triggered a higher level of froth than we saw.

The higher for longer had a silver lining, which was that it kept people from getting overly excited about value appreciation, and it leaves us, like I said, in this very, very nice, sweet spot and I hope it continues. Certainly, we love to see rates come down 50 basis points, get that 10 year down to 3 75, but to your point.

I'm not sure I wanna see a 2 75. That comes with some risks. It either means the, the US economy has just completely hit a dead spot and or it will trigger a new wave of investment that may make people regret what they're doing a couple years down the road. 

Dianne Crocker: Exactly. Slow and steady. So those were two good reports from MBA and CBRE that pointed to positive trends in the lending sector.

Alyssa Lewis: Happening on the development front, man. What new projects or headlines stood out to you this week? 

Manus Clancy: We had a couple of nice headlines this week. The first one, uh, and Rudin. Have filed construction plans for three 50 Park Avenue. This has been in, in the news for a long time, for at least several years, that these two developers plan to put up a 2 million square foot office tower at 49th and park.

They already have a tenant for that, that is Citadel, and they're going forward with this. Why did I bring this up? I bring it up because. Two or three years ago, this was a nice vote of confidence by Citadel taking more space in New York by Vernado deciding to go forward with this project at a time where there was a lot of uncertainty.

I bring it up only because developers sometimes change their stripes. They say, you know what? The market isn't as buoyant for New York office as it was three years ago. Let's put a timeout on this thing. Let's not go forward. So I think the fact that. And Rudin are going forward with, this is a renewed board of confidence for the New York City office market.

So I like that story that they are still on board. The second development story comes from a EG. Uh, this is shorthand for Anschutz Entertainment Group. They have filed an application to build a 49 story residential and hotel building in downtown la. It will include sports and entertainment features as well.

It'll be right next to LA Live, which a EG already. Owns and they are now looking to expand upon this investment. Uh, it will include 335 keys for a hotel and another 365 residential units. So here again, I'll use the term I used two minutes ago. Vote of confidence LA has had its share of quality of life issues we've seen office.

Attendance really down. We've seen office values just completely collapse, and yet here we have a EG leaning in and by the way, reporting there from Nick Romola of Commercial Observer. 

Dianne Crocker: The interesting thing about that second story, Manus, is. It's their third attempt to build a hotel on this property. But what I read is that what's different now is the timing that the LA City Council just approved a $2.6 billion expansion of the convention center.

And so this project feels like it's part of a coordinated push to reinvigorate that whole area. And this time it's not just a hotel. Proposal. It's a mixed use, so it's hotel like their previous two attempts, but they're also rolling in residential units and and entertainment spaces. So maybe the third time is the charm for them, 

Manus Clancy: them sticking with it is great and I think it'll be great for la ultimately more housing, more entertainment, and I hope they make a nice return on their money here.

The more money they make, the more likely the next guy comes in and tries to do more development. So, uh, good on a EG. 

Alyssa Lewis: Now let's talk data centers. This sector just keeps making headlines. What did you both see in the news this week? 

Manus Clancy: This was the week of data centers in a year that has been incredible for data centers, the amount of people leaning in, paying a lot of money.

If there's one area that does concern me in CRE that may not end well is this whole data center chasing of either land to build data centers or. Prices paid for existing properties to convert to data centers. The numbers just keep going up, parabolically, and it's incredible to see. The stories I think that we're gonna rattle off may kind of really blow people away.

The first one comes from. Michael Neubauer of the Washington Business Journal. He reported that in Leesburg, Virginia, a land parcel sold for $615 million. It's the first sale of this type to top $6 million per acre. The buyer was SDC capital. Now listen to these numbers. This is really incredible. The property sold in 2025 for $615 million.

That's up from just $57 million four years ago in 2021. So we're really talking about an 11 x. Increase in the price of land for data center in just four years. I don't know about you, Dianne, but if I were to be selling a house right now, the parenthetical on my brochure that I sent to my real estate broker would be at the bottom.

Perfect for data center conversion. Possibilities for data center conversion are endless. What do you think? 

Dianne Crocker: I don't know. That's a double-edged sword because there is a lot of community pushback on data center, so that might not work in your favor, but I mean, this story was definitely an eyebrow raise because of that.

Just a massive value leap from the original $57 million in 2021. And I think part of the reason that there was such a premium for this property is because. It's already zoned for five, two story data centers, totaling $1.6 million square feet. Leesburg is, it is such a beautiful town. I've been there many times, but it's in Northern Virginia's tech corridor, which they're now referring to as Data Center Alley, and there's major power and fiber infrastructure already in place.

So this is a rare site and the market, as you said, is, is really competitive. The fact that it already. Has approvals that really for the buyer, I would say substantially reduced their risk and, and that high price tag reflects that. 

Manus Clancy: We have two more to go through. I think they're equally eye-opening. The second one is also in that data center alley area.

Amazon paying $700 million for a Prince William County data Center site. This is called the Devlin Tech Park. This particular property. And by the way, reporting again by Michael Neubauer. Uh, he also reported on the prior one. Again, listen to this appreciation, 2025, $700 million, 20, 20 50 $1 million. Just an incredible uptick here.

The context, 270 acres zoned already for 3.5 million square feet of data space, and to Dianne's point. Somebody asked me this week, why is Northern Virginia the epicenter of data centers? I think your point is spot on. Amazon went there early, they set up shop, they got the regulatory boards in agreement with them to upgrade the infrastructure, and now everybody else is benefiting from the fact that, uh, regulation is favorable, the infrastructure is there, the grid has been upgraded.

That's the only real explanation I have for why so much development has been there. I'll throw one more in there. The last one in Chandler, Arizona, another area very hot. Four data centers. I would say that that along with the upper Midwest, the Chicago suburbs in Minneapolis are probably the the three biggest areas right now here.

Lincoln Property Company bought a Chandler Data Center for 130 million. The reporting there by Haley Menig of the Philadelphia Business Journal. 

Dianne Crocker: Know, it's interesting. I'll, I'll jump on first on the Prince William County story, Loudoun County and Prince William now hosts the largest concentration of corporate data centers on the planet.

And then Phoenix is the fourth largest data center market in the us. What was interesting to me about the data center in Chandler is that. They are transitioning the property. It's an example of a value add data center. It's not speculative ground up development, and they're, they wanna transition the facility from evaporative cooling to air cooled systems.

I don't even know what that means, but I did read that it could save up to 3 million gallons of water. A month. So in Arizona, when you pitch a project like that, that's really a big deal. So I think from the water efficiency angle, they're really hitting the right note with this one. 

Manus Clancy: I'm gonna take a a little bit of a detour before we move on to our next stories.

People ask me every now and then, why do we spend so much time talking about who did the reporting and naming people by name. Two reasons. I wanted to make sure I've been meaning to say this for a while. One is I do think that people that dig in and find these stories deserve to be recognized and recognized by name.

So I, I do like to make sure that they get credit where credit is due when they break stories like this. But the other thing I would say is I do believe we are in the golden era of commercial real estate reporting. There are so many people around the US in every market that. Do such great digging. Brian Bandel in South Florida.

Danny Ecker in Chicago. Nick Trala and others just really, really do terrific reporting and I love the fact that they just keep us so informed. It's, I, I really hope that AI never replaces these reporters because they will. AI will never do. Nearly the job that these guys do in, in terms of scratching beneath the surface.

Dianne Crocker: You're here, especially with the 1400 deals in October, you know, they drill into the good ones and tell a story for us to latch onto. 

Alyssa Lewis: Alright, let's move over to hotel deals. Dianne, what are you seeing in that space this week? 

Dianne Crocker: Yeah, we have an interesting story for our friends in Chicago. This is an investor K two Amin is going to buy a mag mile Westin Hotel for the bargain price of $72 million.

It's a 752 key Westin. Obviously that's a steep discount when you think of the current owner, which is Pebblebrook Hotel Trust acquired the West in in 2018 for 156 million, and as I said, it just went for 72 million. LaSalle bought it in 2006 for nearly 215 million. So those prices are all over the board.

It's a serious markdown, you know, business and convention travel in Chicago is improving. They're still not back to pre pandemic levels, and I think higher interest rates are really putting pressure on valuations. But I think Manus, you know, this deal fits a broader theme that we've been seeing and that we've been talking about where a local investor steps in, where institutional capital is starting to pull back.

Manus Clancy: That is true, and I do think that it has not been heavily reported, but I think it's very, very true that the hotel market is very much paralleling the office market in that. You don't see quite the number of negative headlines you see because you don't see as many hotels trade. But in cities where the quality of life has not been great, where the headlines nationally have been very negative about that particular city and where return to office has been weak, the rebound in the every man hotels that you see in those cities has been quite disappointing.

And this is in New York, I'm talking about. So the rebound has been very, very limited. The destruction of value has been severe. This doesn't really pertain in the same way. It doesn't pertain in office to the class. Aaa class. AA hotels in these cities still do very, very well. The boutique hotels have seen their values rebound, but you know, thes, thes, the Hiltons, those kind of.

Businessman, travelers that are not the high end have really struggled. And the Chicago story really underscores that. 

Dianne Crocker: Agreed. You know, and these are two aging towers that you could see them coming out of this rebranded, renovated Chicago will come back. I mean, that's such a big travel destination. So it's, it's on the curve and heading in the right direction.

And Manus, I will say that after those nice words that you had for reporters, I was remiss in not crediting Danny Ecker at Crane Chicago for that story. 

Manus Clancy: A lot of these guys have been doing it for a long time and they do it very, very well and we are the beneficiaries of of their hard work. 

Alyssa Lewis: And finally, time for our slice of life where we wrap things up with something a little different from the usual market talk as we mark Veterans Day.

It's great to see companies turning gratitude into action. Cushman and Wakefield is doing just that, expanding. Its better in hiring program and spotlighting how those who've served. Bring real value to CRE. Dianne, tell us more about that story. 

Dianne Crocker: I will say Alyssa, I have a really special place in my heart for veterans.

Um, Manus. My dad wore his Navy uniform proudly. That meant that when I was growing up, family vacations often involved tours of old war battleships and singing sea Chante in the station wagon when we as kids just wanted to be at the beach. His Navy tour was definitely a lifetime highlight and one my dad was really proud of.

So this Cushman story really, uh, it caught my attention because I, I love. To see an industry leader like Cushman and Wakefield that's supporting veterans, you know, and, and saying it's not just about saying thank you for your service, but, uh, creating lasting career pathways for them. 

Manus Clancy: Last week I made a mention of my gratitude for veterans and like you, I have a ve very special place in my heart for them to walk.

The walk of things like this takes active. Thinking and active participation. So somebody at each of these firms got up one morning and said, this is gonna be pro my priority and good on them for that. I wish I was more of that way that that's the first thing that popped into my mind in the morning because those kind of people really, really make a difference and, and great.

For you finding the story and great for them leaning in on this particular endeavor. 

Alyssa Lewis: And that's our wrap for this week's episode of the CRE Weekly Digest by LightBox. Thank thanks to Manus and Dianne for their insights and to our producer Josh Bruyning. Be sure to follow us wherever you get your podcast and send us your thoughts or questions to podcast@LightBoxre.com.

Thanks for listening. We'll see you next week. 

Manus Clancy: Let's go.