by Freedonia Industry Studies
December 2, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic has hit the commercial real estate market hard, with stores closing as businesses retrench or outright go out of business and companies with suddenly large remote workforces looking to minimize their costs for space they are not using. This, in turn, has hampered commercial construction spending as companies look for further signs of economic stabilization, and a lack of new tenants keeps landlords from remodeling.
However, some companies are using the current downturn to either find new space under better conditions or to buy property outright. While this represents a painful reality for the commercial real estate market since most of these are at sharp discounts and historic low prices, it offers some hope for the commercial construction industry as companies revamp their new locations to suit their needs.
The greatest opportunities are in grocery, home improvement, discount shopping, and pet supplies – all areas where retail traffic has been sustained or increased during the pandemic period. Repurposing is another possibility as restaurants are being reworked as ghost kitchens for carryout and delivery orders and some retail space is being converted to dark stores, eschewing in-store sales for curbside pickup and delivery from e-commerce orders.
For more information and discussion of opportunities, see The Freedonia Group’s extensive collection of off-the-shelf research, particularly in Construction and Building Products, including Global Insulation; Drain, Waste & Vent Pipe; Global Siding (Cladding); Global Elevators; Global Engineered Stone Countertops; and Global Countertops. Freedonia also offers an expanding catalog of COVID-19 Economic Impact reports, which highlight how various industries are responding to the current crisis with a comparison to recent recessions. Freedonia Custom Research is also available for questions requiring tailored market intelligence.