Downtown Office Market Bests Southfield

[Eric_c]

http://www.freep.com/story/money/bus...ield/21891663/

[313WX]

In a way, it's sad that this is big news...

[gameguy56]

http://www.freep.com/story/money/bus...ield/21891663/

Next up -- Troy? Auburn Hills? Novi?

[Scottathew]

Next up -- Troy? Auburn Hills? Novi?

My job has me working in the Tower Drive office park on occasion, and I can tell you it seems to be doing alright. There's a couple of floors in one of the towers being ripped apart and built out by contractors after being abandoned by EDS who knows how long ago.

In a way, it's sad that this is big news...

I don't feel that way.

Detroit has been down for so long that now its starting to rise from the ashes, and take its rightful place as the leader in the region.

If regional businesses want to be where "it's happening", they'll need to be in Downtown Detroit. On top of that, they'll be able to draw people from all over the region with the more central location.

[boater4life]

Why would this be sad news? Everyone knows the story of Detroit over the last 20 years, theres been nothing. Its good to see it start to revitalize.

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

This improving market is what makes deals like the Marquette Building - covered on another recent thread, possible - since that building is reported to be only 5% occupied and is to be renovated and kept as office space.

[Detroit500]

This is a hugely positive sign for the region. This generation is going to be about downtown Detroit, midtown and anything off of Woodward to maple. Very exciting times.

[313WX]

Why would this be sad news?

In that the region's "urban core" even has to compete with suburban town centers for largest office market share...

[canuck]

This is a hugely positive sign for the region. This generation is going to be about downtown Detroit, midtown and anything off of Woodward to maple. Very exciting times.

Yes. That is what we want to hear from all if us. That is the reason Lowell entitled this site Detroityes. It wasn't about suburban bashing anymore than inner city crucifixion, I like to think. I do believe the restoration of the core's preeminence points the way to regional welfare. Intermunicipal competition is normal but when the center of business and the Arts is shunted, it amounts to shooting the region in the foot. The future looks brighter because more folks believe in it.

[Danny]

When Dan Gilbert created Gilberttown Real Estate in Detroit, corporate folks the will suburbs follow. I'm sorry that once sparkling skyscrapers in Downtown Southfield is slowly dying out like Northland Mall, but business folks must follow the money and capital properties. Southfield today is becoming an instant ghetto and L.B. Patterson his doing his Coleman Young reverse comments 'blame black people'.

Gilberttown Detroit is here, now and hopefully forever! He's trumping the city like Gordon Gekko!

[SpartanDawg]

my my how the tables have turned...

RE: Covisint moving from detroit to southfield

"Covisint reported that its yearly rent costs will drop from $2 million to $565,000 while it also reduces the amount of space it leases.Additionally, the company will get a free year of rent with its new 11-year lease, tax breaks from the city of Southfield worth an estimated $271,161, plus a $1.5-million performance-based grant from the Michigan Economic Development Corp."

RE: fifth third moving from southfield to detroit
"The bank is making the move without any tax breaks or deal sweeteners from the local government. Real estate insiders say that enticing such a big corporate move to Detroit likely would have required generous incentives five years ago, before downtown's resurgence.

[Bham1982]

Boosters like to tell themselves that Southfield's decline, which is directly tied to Detroit's decline, is actually evidence of revival of the core.

Southfield's decline is due to further sprawl, not because of any urban turnaround. It's basically the cancer of decay leaking northwest from the ghettos.

In metro areas with healthy cores, the most valuable suburban markets are those closest to the urban core. Southfield and Dearborn and Warren should be the strongest suburban markets, not the weakest.

[Eric_c]

You're crazy! Lol!

[mwilbert]

Boosters like to tell themselves that Southfield's decline, which is directly tied to Detroit's decline, is actually evidence of revival of the core.

Southfield's decline is due to further sprawl, not because of any urban turnaround. It's basically the cancer of decay leaking northwest from the ghettos.

In metro areas with healthy cores, the most valuable suburban markets are those closest to the urban core. Southfield and Dearborn and Warren should be the strongest suburban markets, not the weakest.

Southfield's decline is certainly related to Detroit's decline, but what it seems to me that what we are seeing is that Southfield is now not only losing office share to other suburban markets but also to downtown. I think that is probably evidence of a revival in the core.

[animatedmartian]

I think Southfield was overbuilt to begin with. At whatever point downtown Detroit would become even the least bit desirable, it was pretty inevitable for it to have an effect on Southfield.

[nain rouge]

In metro areas with healthy cores, the most valuable suburban markets are those closest to the urban core. Southfield and Dearborn and Warren should be the strongest suburban markets, not the weakest.

Yeah, well it doesn't help when people like you are slamming cities like Ferndale. You're part of the problem, man.

[313WX]

Yeah, well it doesn't help when people like you are slamming cities like Ferndale. You're part of the problem, man.[/COLOR]

I don't think people are slamming cities like Ferndale because they have some personal vendetta against them.

But understandably, people realize that the ghetto/trailer trash culture that permeates South Warren, Hazel Park and Detroit are beginning to bleed into their adjacent cities [[such as Ferndale, Oak Park, Eastpointe, Harper Woods, etc.) , and decent/well-off people want to keep themselves and their families as far away from this as possible.

Granted, the aforementioned is merely a symptom of the bigger problems facing Metro Detroit [[that is poor planning in terms of infrastructure as well as economic development).

[hybridy]

I don't think people are slamming cities like Ferndale because they have some personal vendetta against them.

But understandably, people realize that the ghetto/trailer trash culture that permeates South Warren, Hazel Park and Detroit are beginning to bleed into their adjacent cities [[such as Ferndale, Oak Park, Eastpointe, Harper Woods, etc.) , and decent/well-off people want to keep themselves and their families as far away from this as possible.

Granted, the aforementioned is merely a symptom of the bigger problems facing Metro Detroit [[that is poor planning in terms of infrastructure as well as economic development).

as someone house hunting in/around the woodward corridor i can tell you ferndale, royal oak berkely are not being permeated by any 'undesirables'. in fact they're priced out as these communities have reinvigorated their downtowns and homes are bought and torn down for mcmansion infill. and what nice exisiting stock available is snapped up quickly or flipped by contractors.
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/32...05026657_zpid/
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/60...04176939_zpid/
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/70...04686492_zpid/
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/71...24624293_zpid/
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/52...24635209_zpid/
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/33...24640691_zpid/
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/33...24640722_zpid/

hazel park and oak park...can't speak for them

[Khorasaurus]

as someone housing hunting in/around the woodward corridor i can tell you ferndale, royal oak berkely are not being permeated by any 'undesirables'. in fact they're priced out as these communities have reinvigorated their downtowns and homes are bought and torn down for mcmansion infill. and what nice exisiting stock available is snapped up quickly or flipped by contractors.

hazel park and oak park...can't speak for them

Yeah, as a Ferndale resident and homeowner, I have absolutely no idea where the notion that Ferndale is declining or being invaded by "ghetto and trailer trash culture" is coming from. It's now appeared in multiple threads here, and it makes absolutely no sense.

If anything, Ferndale is going in the opposite direction - becoming more yuppified and less hipster. There are tons of babies and small children here, and home prices are shooting up.

[nain rouge]

Some people here don't understand how quick urban neighborhoods can improve once you reach a tipping point. It's not like the extremely suburban Warren, where change moves at a glacial pace. In today's real estate market, if an urban neighborhood can prove it's safe and has decent schools, the sky is the limit.

One big problem in Metro Detroit is that people are convinced that while bad spreads, good almost never does. If anything, I could see Ferndale measurably improving real estate values in Hazel Park and parts of Oak Park in the not so distant future. Imagine that. If Metro Detroit can get some people moving back in [[that's key) and Woodward in Detroit continues to improve, Ferndale could reach Birmingham levels.

I think the suburban market in Metro Detroit is saturated. There are more suburbs than the region will need for a long time. If you want growth, it'll happen by improving the urban areas.

[CrashDummy]

Boosters like to tell themselves that Southfield's decline, which is directly tied to Detroit's decline, is actually evidence of revival of the core.

Southfield's decline is due to further sprawl, not because of any urban turnaround. It's basically the cancer of decay leaking northwest from the ghettos.

Friedman's 3rd quarter report seems to suggest the opposite.
http://www.friedmanrealestate.com/brochure/Friedman_3Q_2014_Detroit_Office_Market_Report.pdf

It shows growth in the largest office markets of Detroit, Southfield, and Troy, with contraction in the Auburn Hills, Macomb, and Western Wayne County markets.

[Bham1982]

Parts of Ferndale are dong well, other parts not so much. West of Woodward has some nice housing stock, east of Woodward has always been more Hazel Park-ish, with lots of Appalachian whites.

Ferndale is a perfectly fine place to live, but not a place where families live with school-age children. As the data show, the schools are miserable, and the students attending are mostly from poor families. The hipsters you see in Ferndale move out once kids reach school age, or they use alternatives [[school choice, parochial schools, etc.).

Anecdotally, the two families with kids I know in Ferndale both moved out before their first attended kindergarden. One family, with tight finances, moved into that sliver of Oak Park that attends Berkley schools. The other family, with somewhat more flexible finances, moved to Troy.

Both families would fit the Ferndale hipster stereotype, and only moved for schools, no other reason. In fact the Oak Park home and neighborhood is a serious downgrade, but Berkley schools are pretty good.

[Mind field]

What are the chances that Google would move from Ann Arbor to downtown Detroit?

http://www.wxyz.com/news/region/wash...pace-for-lease

[Khorasaurus]

Parts of Ferndale are dong well, other parts not so much. West of Woodward has some nice housing stock, east of Woodward has always been more Hazel Park-ish, with lots of Appalachian whites.

I'd draw the line at the railroad tracks, not at Woodward. East of the railroad tracks, the neighborhoods connect physically to Hazel Park and a good chunk of that is Hazel Park schools. That part of Ferndale is certainly less desirable than the rest.

Between Woodward and the railroad tracks, the houses are smaller than west of Woodward, but it's not a bad area by any stretch of the imagination. And the trend arrow is up.

Ferndale Schools are making a big push to get the affluent families in the district to send their kids to school there. Notice all of the "Eagle Pride" banners and signs around town, including in the yards of families with kids in FPS. That, combined with the large number of young [[straight!) couples and babies/toddlers/preschoolers in town, and FPS could see a substantial turnaround.

I know quite a few families that have decided to send their kids to FPS and are happy with the decision. I also know some Ferndale families that send their kids to Shrine and other private schools. I don't know any personally who have moved out of Ferndale when their kids hit school age, but I don't deny that that happens.

Regardless, I think the demographics for a quality school district exist within the Ferndale PS boundaries.

[iheartthed]

I think Southfield was overbuilt to begin with. At whatever point downtown Detroit would become even the least bit desirable, it was pretty inevitable for it to have an effect on Southfield.

Probably. There were more skyscrapers built in Southfield since 1980 than in downtown Detroit.