Once a small commercial real estate market with an equally small cadre of brokers, Austin is now a magnet for young professionals learning the biz. There are still a few long-serving experts who understand how Austin became Austin, and how it can continue its successful upward trajectory.

Mike Kennedy of Avison Young, as such, may be the dean of brokerage in Austin, having moved here in 1985 from Houston where he learned the business in tandem with being an attorney.

“I went to law school because I always had an interest in being a professional, and I felt like being a lawyer would put me in that category. It provided a good business education as well, and it’s proven to be very helpful over the years,” Kennedy said.

Click to read more at Austin Business Journal.

Austin’s red-hot commercial real estate market means office tenants are paying rental rates similar to those found in some of the country’s priciest cities.

That’s according to new research on the cost of office space from CommercialCafe, a real estate research firm.

A tenant spending $5,000 per month for Class A office space can get 1,087 square feet in Austin.

That trails only Boston (where you could afford 1,006 square feet); Washington, D.C. (849 square feet); San Francisco (803 square feet); and New York City (703 square feet).

Click to read more at Austin Business Journal. 

Our annual list of the largest multi-tenant office buildings in Austin is out, and downtown skyscrapers continue to tower over the competition.

You can see photos and key statistics for the top 10 via the slideshow on this page. ABJ subscribers can dive into more data about the top 25 office buildings in the area here. We also have a new list of the 25 largest multi-tenant office parks in Central Texas.

Click to read more at Austin Business Journal.

Seattle has edged out Austin as the best city for commercial real estate investment in the “Emerging Trends in Real Estate 2018” study, conducted by accounting and consulting giant PwC. The annual ranking is distributed by the Urban Land Institute at its fall meeting — being held Oct. 23-26 in Los Angeles.

Last year, Austin ranked No. 1, but the slippage probably has nothing to do with economic performance. Seattle merely received a few more top scores from the people surveyed — a spectrum of people with an interest and expertise in real estate.

Mitch Roschelle, author of the report and a partner with PwC, said Austin leads the way when it comes to delivering a strong, young, skilled workforce — who are ready, willing and able to embrace the work of the future.

“Austin’s secret sauce is that the workers are there,” Roschelle told me.

Click to read more at Austin Business Journal.