Kirksey Architecture announced the groundbreaking of a 23-acre mixed-use master-planned development in the fast-growing town of Fulshear, Texas.

The development, owned and managed by Janapriya Upscale, is located on a greenfield site bordered on the north by F.M. 1093 (future extension of the Westpark Tollway) and to the south by McKinnon Road. The team held a groundbreaking ceremony on-site on July 25. Several attendees traveled from India for the event, including Ravinder Reddy, Founder and Chairman of Janapriya Group, and Kranti Kiran Reddy, CEO and Managing Director. Don McCoy, Mayor of the City of Fulshear, was also in attendance.

Designed as a pedestrian-oriented complex, the project consists of single-story retail along F.M. 1093 and one- and two-story retail/office condominium buildings grouped around a “Town Square” green space in the center. An open-air pavilion and a coffee/ice cream shop anchor each end of the green with a large lake, providing a beautifully landscaped, walkable environment.

The general contractor is Alpha Bravo Construction. Completion is slated for early 2026.

Stream Realty Partners acquired a 17-acre site in Northwest Houston to develop a Class-A industrial facility.

The forthcoming project will feature a 300,000-square-foot cross-dock warehouse designed to accommodate tenants ranging from 75,000 square feet to full-building users. Construction is scheduled to begin in the first quarter of 2026, with substantial completion anticipated for the fourth quarter of the same year.

Located off West 43^rd Streetbetween Hempstead Highway and Highway 290, the site sits in the heart of northwest Houston’s infill industrial corridor, an area known for its accessibility and strong demand. The building design is being finalized in collaboration with Seeberger Architecture, with Kimley-Horn providing civil engineering services. With the land acquisition complete, Stream is moving swiftly to finalize the construction documents, secure permits, and prepare for groundbreaking.

Stream is developing the project through its Investment Management platform, with Stream’s Industrial Development Services team overseeing execution. The project team includes Justin Robinson, Director Craig McKenna, Senior Director Tyler Wellborn, and Associate Director Kristina Gibson. Additional team members from Stream’s Investment Management group include Chief Investment Officer Adam Jackson, Portfolio Manager Mustafa Ali, Managing Director Scott Thetford, and Associate Tricia Larsen.

Technology companies are strategically optimizing their real estate portfolios to free up capital for artificial intelligence investments while simultaneously enhancing workplace effectiveness, according to JLL.

JLL’s 2025 Technology Spaces Report explores how technology organizations are using data-driven strategies to balance cost optimization with innovation demands across office and specialized research spaces.

“The race to lead in artificial intelligence is driving technology companies to innovate faster and to increase investment by driving revenue growth and cutting costs,” said Rob Kolar, Global Division President, Technology, JLL Work Dynamics. “Technology companies are taking a more strategic approach to their real estate, focusing on both optimization and innovation to support rapid AI growth while maximizing the effectiveness of their office environments.”

While many technology companies maintain hybrid work policies, they are increasingly focused on boosting office attendance and effectiveness. Insights from JLL’s 2025 Global Occupancy Planning Benchmark Report reveals that 56% of technology organizations reduced space in the last year to increase utilization, with 73% having added collaboration space to support hybrid work programs. However, enforcement of in-office policies remains inconsistent, with 24% not enforcing requirements and 45% relying on individual managers to implement attendance on their teams.

Lab and R&D spaces, representing approximately 10% of technology companies’ real estate portfolios, are becoming increasingly important for AI innovation. Despite this growing significance, these specialized spaces lag behind in utilization tracking and data-driven design, with 47% of companies that have lab spaces not currently tracking their utilization.

“To maximize space effectiveness, technology companies need a smart, goal-driven data strategy,” noted Kari Beets, Senior Manager, Technology Research, JLL. “Quality data is paramount in making impactful decisions, but it’s essential to streamline what metrics are collected and presented in light of overall strategy to trim costs and lead to more optimized space.”

Looking ahead, JLL forecasts four key ways technology workspaces will transform in the next 3-5 years:

1. The learning workplace: Agentic AI will create workplaces that adapt automatically to improve efficiency and human experience
2. Innovation-driven investment: Increased spending on AI compute, lab spaces and R&D facilities to support innovation
3. Collaboration over cubicles: Greater emphasis on human collaboration and AI-supported work environments
4. Energy-conscious design: Technology companies will increasingly focus on clean power and energy efficiency to support AI computing demands

The technology workplace of the future will be a learning workspace that is innovation-driven, collaborative – between humans and with machines – and energy-conscious. JLL’s research indicates that 82% of technology real estate leaders believe AI can help solve major CRE challenges.

“To prepare for the future, corporate real estate teams must establish a clear vision that’s aligned with business goals and flexible enough to respond to rapid change,” added Nick LiVigne, Managing Director, Consulting Lead, Technology, JLL. “This means building strong data capabilities to be more predictive, applying AI to the right business problems, and having a test and learn approach to how the teams operate.”

Marcus & Millichap brokered the sale of Keller Springs Village, a 17-suite retail property in Carrollton, Texas. 

Philip Levy, investment specialist in Marcus & Millichap’s Dallas office, had the exclusive listing to market the property on behalf of the seller and procured the buyer. 

Keller Springs Village, located at 2155 Marsh Lane, is a 39,618-square-foot retail center situated on 3.22 acres at the signalized intersection of Marsh Lane and Keller Springs Road. The property is 100% leased to a mix of service-oriented tenants and benefits from strong area demographics, including a population of more than 358,000 residents within a five-mile radius. Positioned near Addison Airport and a major retail corridor along Dallas North Tollway, the center experiences traffic counts of nearly 60,000 vehicles per day. 

The multifamily real estate sector sends mixed signals as we cross the halfway mark of 2025. Activity has slowed but not stopped, and market conditions are neither recessionary nor red-hot. It’s a year of recalibration, not retreat.

For developers, investors, and capital partners, this is a moment to reassess and not react impulsively but plan strategically for what comes next. While economic uncertainty and capital constraints persist, the long-term outlook for multifamily remains sound. The fundamentals haven’t changed, but the playbook has.

Bryan Lamb, executive vice president, Ryan Companies

Capital Markets: Still the Primary Headwind

The capital markets environment continues to weigh down multifamily deal flow. Elevated interest rates remain the most significant drag on investment and development activity. As of Q1 2025, the average interest rate for permanent multifamily loans hovers around 6.1%, according to Newmark, up from sub-4% just three years ago.

The result is persistent negative leverage, where borrowing costs exceed unlevered yields. This dynamic has discouraged transactions and kept both buyers and sellers sidelined. Buyers aren’t willing to pay premium prices in today’s financing climate, and sellers are reluctant to realize losses after years of cap rate expansion[BL1] .

A related ripple effect is limited liquidity. Many LPs are still waiting for capital to be returned from previous investments before committing to new ones. The development spread, the yield differential between new builds and stabilized asset cap rates, looks relatively more attractive, especially compared to value-add acquisitions, but few are willing to act until the capital bottleneck clears.

Demand Remains Strong, But Supply Can’t Catch Up

Here lies the paradox: demand is not the problem. Demographic and economic conditions continue to support strong demand. Homeownership remains out of reach for many Americans, with mortgage rates above 6.5% and home prices near record highs. Meanwhile, new household formation has increased in many markets, especially among millennials and Gen Z renters.

According to Newmark data, national occupancy rates remain stable at around 94.5%, and effective rents increased slightly in Q1 2025, especially in suburban and Sunbelt markets.

What’s missing is new supply. According to FRED, construction starts remain well below pre-slowdown levels, down more than 30% compared to Q1 2023. While there was an 8% uptick from Q1 2024, it’s more of a modest rebound than a proper recovery. Many projects expected to break ground in early 2025 are still sitting on the sidelines. Permits may be in hand, and designs may be complete, but those developments have been shelved or delayed indefinitely without viable capital structures and unnecessary uncertainty on labor and tariff policy, which can dramatically impact construction costs.  Roughly speaking, labor and materials each represent about 50% of direct construction costs. With both sides of that equation being challenged, construction cost relief would defy basic economic theory. The result? We’re simply not adding enough new inventory to meet long-term housing demand.

Strategic Shifts: Developers Adapt to Meet the Market

The smartest players aren’t standing still. They’re retooling strategies to match the moment.

One major shift is product type. Developers are moving away from urban high-rise luxury towers in favor of suburban, low-to-mid-density wood-frame products. These communities are less expensive to build, faster to deliver, and more aligned with where today’s renters want to live.

There’s also a growing emphasis on attainability, targeting renters earning 80–120% of the area median income (AMI). It’s not “affordable housing” in the regulatory sense, but it is affordable by design: modest unit sizes, practical finishes, and reasonable common-area amenities. States like Florida are leaning into this model with programs like the “Live Local Act,” which offers tax incentives for mixed-income projects built “by right” in commercial zones.

Developers, especially those with integrated architecture and construction teams like ours at Ryan, can use typology and unit prototyping to streamline design, lower costs, and increase construction cost predictability.

Regional Priorities: Where Development Is Still Happening

While many projects are paused, development hasn’t disappeared entirely and remains attractive where fundamentals are strong and capital confidence is higher.

For example:

• Dallas and Tampa continue to attract development interest due to population and job growth, business-friendly climates, and deeper institutional buyer pools.
• San Diego and Seattle remain appealing as high-barrier markets with long-term rent growth potential, even if entry is more difficult.
• Key indicators guiding development decisions include job growth, employment diversity, housing supply pipelines, and infrastructure investment.

The Rest of 2025: What Could Shift the Market

While the current slowdown feels prolonged, most industry leaders see this as a cyclical pause, not a structural decline.

Multifamily’s underlying strengths: short lease durations, dynamic rent pricing, and essential housing utility, make it historically resilient during recessionary times. The market recovered faster than any other asset class post-2008 and during the COVID bounce-back.

What will it take to reignite activity?

• Rate cuts from the Federal Reserve, projected to begin in late 2025, could tip the balance back toward neutral or even positive leverage.
• Geopolitical stability, including easing tensions in the Middle East and more clarity on tariff policies, would also improve market confidence.
• Stabilized inflation and better construction cost predictability could restore underwriting confidence. Thoughtful labor and immigration policy could go a long way on this front. Until then, most developers plan for 2026 as the more likely window for new starts.

Final Thought: Quietly Building for What’s Next

Multifamily may be in neutral, but developers with a long-term vision are not standing still. They’re using this time to assemble land, refine products, optimize cost structures, and deepen relationships with capital.

When the market turns, and it will, those with thoughtful discipline and pre-positioned projects will lead the next growth cycle.

Bryan Lamb is executive vice president – multifamily sector leader with Minneapolis-based Ryan Companies.