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ULI recently published Greening Buildings for Healthier People: Optimizing Climate Mitigation, Resilience, and Health Co-Benefits in Real Estate, which includes strategies for promoting access to nature at the property scale and describes the wide-ranging benefits of doing so. Although the report focuses on these strategies’ benefits to tenants, communities, and project success, “greening” the building—both inside and throughout the site—also help to shape the larger urban environment.

Sponsored Content:HRP’s Chicago transformation is an environmental feat. Now they want to make sustainability an industry standard.

How digital technology can play a key role in the housing experience and close the digital divide.

Real estate investors need to factor in the human side of climate change and take a long-term view of their investments.

Ten landscaped open spaces give communities some breathing room.

During the 2022 ULI Housing Opportunity Conference, a panel discussion on “Getting Residential to Net Zero” began with real estate professionals sharing profiles of net zero projects, followed by a passionate discussion on the urgency to get real estate to net zero.

As reported by the Wall Street Journal, solar-power company Altus Power and commercial real-estate developer Trammell Crow have reached a $600 million deal to install solar panels on U.S. industrial properties. The deal will create 300 megawatts of capacity and is Altus’ largest to date.

When U.S. pandemic lockdowns were underway about two years ago, many people—especially those who could work from home—drastically reduced their driving and transit use. Although this contributed to a short-term reduction in carbon emissions, energy use has since rebounded, and some people continue to avoid public transportation in favor of less sustainable options like driving. These trends reflect larger issues around land use and mobility in cities, according to Greening Buildings for Healthier People: Optimizing Climate Mitigation, Resilience, and Health Co-Benefits in Real Estate, a new ULI report.

Applications for U.S. apartments from renters of all generations increased by an average of 10 percent year over year from 2.9 million applications in 2020 to 3.2 million in 2021, according to Yardi’s RentCafe. The increase in activity was mainly driven by the youngest renter group, the oldest of whom are 25 years old.

ULI’s new report Greening Buildings for Healthier People: Optimizing Climate Mitigation, Resilience, and Health Co-Benefits in Real Estateidentifies building-scale opportunities to simultaneously and cost-effectively accelerate action on climate change and health, maximize their co-benefits, and manage any tensions between them.

Ensuring inclusion and access to all, embodying Hong Kong’s societal values and global identity, safeguarding Hong Kong’s heritage for future generations, and committing to sustainability are among some of the ideas suggested in a new ULI report on how a Hong Kong harbor development can best serve the local community.

ULI MEMBER–ONLY CONTENT: With a growing risk of recession in the next 18 months, U.S. commercial real estate faces uncertainty but remains attractive to investors seeking yield and stability, two experts said during a recent ULI webinar.

Investors who specialize in “deconverting” condo properties back into rentals are finding opportunities. But the deals take patience and fortitude.

Amazon has announced plans to provide more than $124.4 million to build 1,060 affordable homes near four public transit sites while working in partnership with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority and Sound Transit to complete the developments. This is part of Amazon’s $300 million transit commitment from 2021 to create 3,000 new affordable homes in collaboration with the transit agencies in each region.

An increasing number of U.S. office workers, ranging from the federal government to small businesses, are now saying that it is time for employees to return to the office.

Tenants directly account for over 50 percent of building energy usage (and thus, a significant portion of building carbon emissions), but owners are often held responsible for whole building energy consumption. How can owners address the tenant’s portion of this? Enter two impactful solutions: green leases and sustainable tenant fitouts.  

One year ago, Building Small: A Toolkit for Real Estate Entrepreneurs, Civic Leaders, and Great Communitieswas published by ULI. So with 12 months behind us, what has been the response to Building Small? “The response has been overwhelmingly positive,” says author Jim Heid.

In the context of an economic shock from the outbreak of war in Ukraine and continuing inflationary concerns, Emerging Trends in Real Estate ^® Global Outlook 2022focuses on the global outlook for the real estate industry increasing pressure for finance to support the decarbonization of real estate. The industry challenges lenders and their regulators to provide debt for the retrofit of existing buildings and the scale-up of the “climate tech” needed.

On March 29, ULI Los Angeles will host Urban Marketplace 2022: Advancing Equity Through Infrastructure, as it continues celebrating the event’s 22nd anniversary. Founded by Michael Banner, president and CEO of Los Angeles LDC, and other leaders of ULI Los Angeles in 2000, Urban Marketplace soon became the district council’s signature annual event, with a focus on underserved and underinvested communities.

At the 2022 ULI Housing Opportunity Conference, a session looked at the high cost of the gap between U.S. population and job growth and the creation of housing where people want to live.

The Dodge Momentum Index, a leading indicator for U.S. commercial real estate activity, increased 4 percent in February to 158.2, from the revised January reading of 151.9. In February, institutional planning rose 9 percent, and commercial planning moved 1 percent higher.

BREEAM, the sustainability assessment method developed by BRE Global (‘BRE’), has announced that Mountain Technology Center—MetLife Investment Management’s development featuring five state-of-the-art manufacturing warehouses in Tracy, California—is the first U.S. development to earn BREEAM International New Construction (‘INC’) certification.

Washington, D.C.–area real estate investment trust JBG Smith has broken ground on two new outdoor placemaking destinations in Northern Virginia’s National Landing. The area will eventually be home to Amazon’s HQ2.

Fast Companyhas released the magazine’s annual Most Innovative Companies list for 2022 across 52 categories. ULI member firm Avison Young was named in the category of urban development.

Rooftops designed to facilitate drone deliveries, whole floors in residential blocks dedicated to coworking or community spaces, and mobile supermarkets were among the futuristic concepts discussed at the 2022 ULI Singapore Annual Conference.

In February, Waterfront Toronto announced the winning submission for a new vision to transform a 12-acre (4.9 hectare) site into a community for residents and visitors to live, work and play.

ULI MEMBER–ONLY CONTENT: Members of ULI’s Public/Private Partnership Councils discuss how public/private collaborations are evolving; the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic; project types with strong potential for public/private partnerships in the coming year; ways to better incorporate provisions for sustainability, resilience, and equity; and other trends.

At the 2021 ULI Fall Meeting, the Redevelopment and Reuse Product Council hosted a panel discussion of Englewood Connect, a project that is part of Chicago’s Invest South/West initiative on the South Side.

Since 2019, Toronto’s Housing Now initiative has activated city-owned sites for the development of affordable housing within mixed-income, mixed-use, and transit-oriented communities.

Opening doors to help diversify the industry is a goal of the WLI Prologis Achievement Award. The annual awards are given to women who are ULI members with at least seven years of real estate experience. They must have exhibited leadership in their district councils or on the national or global level to be selected for the award, which funds the winner’s participation at the ULI Fall and Spring Meetings.