Fronsac has built a ‘pandemic-resistant’ portfolio

RENX  Commercial  •  Retail  •  Ontario, Quebec, Atlantic Canada

Fronsac REIT (FRO-UN-X) has followed its 2019 growth with a strong Q1 2020 and is well-positioned to weather the COVID-19 storm, its CEO believes. “Without knowing it, we’ve built a kind of pandemic-resistant real estate portfolio,” CEO Jason Parravano said.

Firms face growing insurance premiums

Commercial  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)  •  The Guardian

Companies beginning to reopen across the country may face premium rate hikes for third-party liability insurance as Canadian insurers weigh the risks of novel coronavirus contagion in industries with higher levels of personal contact.

CMHC toughens underwriting criteria

Residential  •  Global News  •  Canada Newswire  •  Globe and Mail (Sub. required)

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) Thursday announced changes to its mortgage insurance. Homebuyers with less than 20% down should now expect lower debt service maximums, a more stringent credit quality check, and a ban on borrowing down payments.

Toronto college building mass timber, net-zero facility

Commercial  •  Sustainable Biz Canada

A $105-million mass timber, net-zero carbon facility is being built at Centennial College‘s campus in Toronto’s East End. “The students are going to love being in this space,” DIALOG Design founding principal Craig Applegath told SustainableBiz.

Office landlords aren’t panicking just yet

Commercial  •  Financial Post

For Canadian office markets as an aggregate, CoStar is forecasting an increase in vacancy rates from 6.2 per cent to 7.1 per cent a year from now. Local office markets present a mixed picture.

Michael Medline gets candid on COVID

Commercial  •  Canadian Grocer

“We never looked at ourselves as an essential service before . . . now suddenly it’s different and people’s health and perhaps lives are at stake and suddenly the stakes are higher,” said Empire CEO (EMP-A-T) Michael Medline.

DavidsTea evicted from Montreal, Ottawa buildings

Commercial  •  La Presse

A few days after being ousted from a building in Ottawa for non-payment of rent, DavidsTea has just suffered the same fate in Montreal, on Saint-Viateur Street. The tea retailer has also not reopened any of its stores in Canada.

Bestseller Canada, Comark file for bankruptcy

Commercial  •  Retail Insider

Montreal-based Bestseller Canada, which operates Jack & Jones and Vero Moda stores, filed for bankruptcy protection Tuesday. Mississauga-based Comark Holdings Inc., which operates Bootlegger, Ricki’s, and Cleo stores in Canada, also announced it had filed for bankruptcy protection.

Ottawa committee approves manufacturing plant

Commercial  •  Ottawa Business Journal

A city committee has given Ottawa homebuilder Caivan Communities the green light to construct a 137,000-square-foot manufacturing plant. The development would include a two-storey office building and a 100,000-square-foot facility for manufacturing “specialized and purpose-built housing components and materials.”

Canada adds 290,000 jobs on gradual reopening

Commercial  •  Financial Post  •  CBC  •  La Presse

Canada’s labour market unexpectedly strengthened after two months of record losses as the country gradually reopens from COVID-19 related restrictions. The country added 289,600 jobs, Statistics Canada said, but the unemployment rate also rose to 13.7 per cent in May.

Consumer, business bankruptcies plummet in April

Residential, Commercial  •  Toronto Star

Trustee purchases $2.3 million in Cominar units

Commercial  •  La Presse  •  RENX

An asset manager who is a member of the board of trustees of Quebec City-headquartered Cominar REIT (CUF-UN-T) has just acquired units of the REIT for more than $2.3 million. FrontFour Capital co-founder Zachary George acquired 300,000 shares last week.

Global real estate assets top $4.8T in 2019: Survey

Commercial  •  Pensions & Investments  •  Globest.com

Real estate assets under management totaled $4.8 trillion Cdn as of Dec. 31, an increase of 15.7 per cent year-over-year. Blackstone Group (BX-N) led the list with nearly $383 billion, followed by Brookfield Asset Management (BAM-A-T) at $275 billion and PGIM Real Estate at $243 billion.

Simon Property Group sues Gap over missed rent

Commercial  •  CNBC  •  Reuters

The biggest mall owner in the U.S., Simon Property Group (SPG-N), is suing one of its biggest tenants, Gap (GPS-N), saying it failed to pay more than $65.9 million in rent and other charges due during the coronavirus pandemic.

Augusta National acquires shopping centre

Commercial  •  Golf.com  •  GolfDigest.com

The Augusta National empire continues to grow. The Georgia golf club that has purchased adjacent land for decades has made its most expensive real estate purchase with the National Hills shopping centre across the street for $26 million US.

Education, healthcare could drive data centre demand

Commercial  •  National Real Estate Investor

Although the technology industry has taken the lead in moving data to cloud computing facilities, two other sectors seem set to increase their investment in data centre solutions: healthcare and education industries.

Artist rentals proposed next to future SkyTrain station

Residential  •  Daily Hive

A unique mixed-use redevelopment that caters to Vancouver’s artist community is proposed by local developer The Cape Group for a site just west of SkyTrain’s future Great Northern Way Station as a result of the Broadway Extension.

Ontario reopens short-term rentals

Residential  •  Ottawa Citizen

Ontario is lifting restrictions on short-term rentals today. Lodges, cabins, cottages, homes, condominiums and bed-and-breakfast rentals are all included in the reopening. Ontario’s tourism minister said Thursday the sector had been hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Montreal-area sales down 41% Y-O-Y

Residential  •  Globe Newswire

In total, 3,286 residential sales transactions were concluded in May 2020, a 41 per cent year-over-year decrease, according to the Quebec Professional Association of Real Estate Brokers‘ (QPAREB) most recent residential real estate market statistics for the Montreal Census Metropolitan Area (CMA).

Winnipeg housing sales down 19% Y-O-Y

Residential  •  CTV

Real estate sales are down by 19 per cent year-over-year for May 2020. According to a report by WinnipegREALTORS, the month saw 1,377 in sales.