Survey: Realtors feel Phoenix real estate market moving up
Nov 17, 2015, 4:44 PM
(AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, File)
(AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, File)
PHOENIX — The Phoenix real estate market is on solid ground, an Arizona State University survey of commercial brokers said.
Every participant in the Commercial Real Estate Broker Forum at ASU’s W.P. Carey School of Business believes the real estate market in Phoenix is moving up.
“Ninety percent of the respondents say that we are in an expansion mode,” Mark Stapp, director of the Master of Real Estate Development Program at the W.P. Carey School, said. “That’s up from 58 percent six months ago, so I think that’s very good. When asked in what direction Phoenix is moving, 100 percent of them said ‘upward.’”
Stapp said an increase in building and selling of commercial inventory that had been on the market for a while fueled the optimistic responses.
“For so long, we’ve had no new construction in the commercial segment,” he said. “As the economy has continued to improve, we’ve eaten away at some of the inventory.”
Stapp said there are still some soft spots, like big box stores built in the 1990s that are sitting empty.
“There’s some Class C and B commercial space that’s not as desirable that’s probably never going to be leased,” he said.
Despite the optimistic outlook, 82 percent of respondents think there is some uncertainty in the market because of the federal government.
“Some of that has to do with interest rate changes,” Stapp said. “All of us are in kind of a waiting game to see what the fed does and when it does it.”
