IPSO FACTO new partner in Brivia’s 1 Square Phillips

RENX  Residential  •  Apartments, Condominiums  •  Greater Montreal

IPSO FACTO Real Estate Fund is acquiring an interest in Brivia Group’s flagship 1 Square Phillips development, which includes what the builder calls the city’s tallest residential tower.

From design to development: Sherry Larjani’s Spotlight

RENX  Residential  •  Apartments, Condominiums, Homes  •  Toronto / GTA

Spotlight Development president Sherry Larjani had worked with two Toronto architectural firms when she realized she wanted to bring her designs to life and get into the development side of the industry.

eStruxture acquires Aptum’s eight data centres

Commercial  •  La Presse  •  Financial Post  •  Canada Newswire

eStruxture, the largest Canadian-owned cloud and carrier-neutral data centres provider, is acquiring all eight Canadian data centres from Aptum Technologies, a global hybrid multi-cloud managed service provider, along with all customers and employees associated with its colocation business.

Finding success for downtown office space after COVID-19

Simon O’Byrne: Senior Vice President of Community Development, Stantec

Vancouver office leasing starts to pick up: AY

Commercial  •  Business In Vancouver  •  Business In Vancouver  •  RENX

Downtown Vancouver office leasing decisions slowed to a trickle during the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s starting to change. Brokers, such as Avison Young principal Glenn Gardner, say activity has picked up in recent weeks.

Sponsored by Skyline Group of Companies One year into COVID-19, Skyline cites tenant support as major key to resilience

That was a hard lesson learned for many of us in 2020. That year is now done. We have not forgotten. It was a time for coming together as families and communities.

PCL CEO remains committed to Edmonton roots

Residential, Commercial  •  Edmonton Journal

CEO Dave Filipchuk says Edmonton offers many advantages for PCL Construction, Canada’s largest general construction company. “(Edmonton) has a very young population, well-educated population, hard-working,” the homegrown Edmontonian said. “You have a great quality of life in an affordable way.”

Fossil fuel fortunes burn Calgary office sector

Commercial  •  REMI Network

Fossil fuel fortunes continue to hold predominant sway in the Calgary office market. Executives with CBRE Calgary’s investment and advisory services fingered an economy tied to oil and gas for sinking the hesitant recovery that had appeared underway as 2020 began.

At last, real progress on Toronto’s waterfront

Residential, Commercial  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)

OPINION: Despite the doom-filled headlines, good things continue to happen in many parts of the world. One of them is the Toronto waterfront. The long-promised, often-delayed revival down there is well underway. The result promises to be quite wonderful.

Second Closet shifts strategy amid e-commerce surge

Commercial  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)

Toronto storage-and-logistics startup Second Closet is pausing its consumer self-storage services to focus on providing warehousing, delivery and supply-chain services to retailers selling products directly to consumers, as the pandemic accelerates retail’s shift to e-commerce.

Charges laid in alleged T.O. condos bid-rigging scheme

Residential  •  Toronto Star

Criminal charges have been laid against four companies and three individuals in connection with an alleged conspiracy to commit fraud and rig bids for condominium refurbishments in the Toronto area, the Competition Bureau Canada announced Monday.

Three trustees are buyers of Artis, yielding over 5%

Commercial  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)  •  RENX

Trustee Ben Rodney invested over $318,000 in units of Artis Real Estate Investment Trust (AX-UN-T). He bought a total of 30,000 units at an average cost per unit of roughly $10.62. Meanwhile, trustee Lis Wigmore acquired 14,000 units at an average price of approximately $10.74.

QuadReal, New Ease JV on $1B China logistics platform

Commercial  •  Mingtiandi  •  RENX

Vancouver-headquartered QuadReal has partnered with Warburg Pincus-backed logistics platform New Ease to invest in and develop logistics properties in Chinese cities, with a total equity commitment of up to $1 billion. The partnership will be seeded with a plot in Suzhou.

AIMCo JV secures financing to acquire U.K. industrial

Commercial  •  IPE Real Assets  •  RENX

Alberta Investment Management Corp. (AIMCo) and warehouse real estate manager Canmoor have secured $273.7 million Cdn worth of financing from Aviva Investors to support the acquisition of 16 U.K. industrial and logistics assets.

Office buildings being repurposed as warehouses: CBRE

Commercial  •  CNBC

The next big industrial warehouse might find itself on top of a former golf course, in an empty office building or in a vacated shopping mall as the race for warehouse space forces companies to seek creative alternatives, says CBRE.

Walmart creating a company town in Bentonville

Residential, Commercial  •  Jacobin Magazine

The Walton Family Foundation is converting small-town Bentonville, Ark., into a playground for Walmart’s management class and supply chain vendors, with expansion of the arts, foodie culture, education, transportation and mental and physical health associated with a professional-class labour force.

Greybrook invests $14.5M in Vaughan low-rise development

Residential  •  Globe Newswire  •  RENX

Greybrook Realty Partners announced an investment of $14,500,000 to acquire and oversee the development of a parcel of land in Vaughan. Greybrook and developer partner Treasure Hill will develop the property into a residential community consisting of 74 single detached estate homes.

Six-storey mixed-use building proposed for Ottawa

Residential, Commercial  •  Ottawa Business Journal

Ottawa Carleton Construction has submitted an application to construct a six-storey building with 30 residential suites and about 1,500 square feet of commercial space at 406 and 408 Bank St. in Ottawa’s Centretown neighbourhood. The builder is proposing only one parking spot.

Labour dispute plays role in GTA house shortage: BILD

Residential  •  Toronto Star  •  RENX

The sale of new homes across the Greater Toronto Area plunged in February, a drop BILD president David Wilkes blamed on supply chain issues and safety concerns due to the  pandemic, as well as a labour dispute over stucco workers.

Mtl., T.O. landlords pulling out all the stops to attract tenants

Residential  •  CTV

Paul Danison, content director at Rentals.ca, has seen landlords offering everything from “tickets for tandem skydiving and helicopter rides along with two months free rent . . . to a fully stocked wine fridge if you sign a lease for a year.”