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Jürgen Fenk, member of the Group Executive Board of SIGNA Group, has been named the new chair of ULI Europe. Fenk, who succeeds Jon Zehner, global head of the client capital group for LaSalle Investment Management, will serve on a voluntary basis for a two-year term. A member of ULI for over a decade, Fenk has just completed a four-year term as chair of ULI Germany, ULI’s second largest national council in Europe. He is also currently a Global Governing Trustee, a member of ULI Europe’s Executive Committee, and serves on ULI’s Global Board of Directors.

Two architects address ten common concerns about shrinking parking requirements.

Florida remains one of the healthiest worldwide hospitality centers. Hotel occupancy in Miami-Dade rose to 87.9 percent in March from 85.7 percent in the same month last year, and the average daily room rate in was also up. At a panel discussion during ULI’s 2018 Florida Summit, two hotel developers shared how their decision to lean into the evolving trends within hospitality and tourism have bred overwhelming success.

“Human capital is the bedrock for municipal success,” Edward Glaeser, professor of economics at Harvard University and a ULI trustee, said in his keynote at ULI Netherlands’ Annual Conference in Amsterdam in May. His discussion focused on the key challenges and opportunities cities face, and how those affect regeneration.

Everyone thought they knew what millennials and their parents, the baby boomers, wanted in housing and lifestyle, but the two largest demographic groups in U.S. history are not behaving as many prognosticators thought they would.

Hong Kong’s former chief executive, C.Y. Leung, now a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, an important political advisory body, said the development of the broader region could be a significant driver of growth and relieve stress on the core market for new construction.

Panelists speaking at the 2018 ULI U.K. Annual Conference said that disruptive change—ranging from the safe use of autonomous vehicles to greater energy efficiency districts to rethinking city governments outside London—requires public engagement, forethought, and transparency.

Seoul’s Bukchon Hanok Village is a 600-year-old traditional settlement located in the southern part of the city that was once home to the aristocratic families of Korea’s Joseon dynasty. Although many of the area’s historic hanok homes have disappeared over the centuries, rebuilding work during the 1930s ensured some 1,200 traditional homes still exist in the area.

A new report, Supporting Smart Urban Development: Successful Investing in Density, is the result of collaboration between a powerful group of innovative real estate investors and developers that are actively building the cities of the future. Collectively, this group owns or manages over US $300 billion worth of real estate assets worldwide.

Just as millennials are belatedly entering the housing market in greater numbers, developers face a daunting array of challenges that they did not have when they erected starter homes for previous generations, compelling innovation.

Prices are high but opportunities abound in China’s growing real estate market, especially in its first-tier cities, a panel of experts and investors said at the 2018 ULI Asia Pacific Summit in Hong Kong.

Land use and urban planning experts representing ULI will be making recommendations to the Virgin Islands Housing Authority on creating a long-term plan for rebuilding the territory’s St. Croix district to increase the resilience of the built environment, revive the district’s economy, and reinforce its appeal to residents as well as visitors.

The population of urban neighborhoods in many metropolitan areas is growing as quickly or nearly as quickly as that of suburban neighborhoods, reflecting ongoing consumer demand—particularly among younger households—for walkable living environments that are convenient to jobs, transit, and urban amenities, according to new research published by ULI and RCLCO.

Retail developers who gathered at the 2018 ULI Florida Summit talked about what is working and what isn’t, as they shift their focus to more entertainment and dining amenities combined with mixed use from the traditional strip centers of the recent past.

From macro-economic forces to social, environmental, technological, and political disruption, property and the wider built environment are facing change on a scale not seen for decades, said panelists speaking at the 2018 ULI U.K. National Conference in London, including increased migration, ongoing low interest rates, and increased political discord.

We are late in the current cycle, and real estate investors are focusing on the potential risks as much as, if not more than, the rewards on offer, according to investors and investment managers discussing global capital markets at the 2018 ULI Asia Pacific Summit in Hong Kong.

With property in high demand in Berlin—it had the largest year-over-year real estate price increase of any city in the world last year—it makes more sense than ever to look up for new opportunities. A number of developers have found success (or are hoping for a top return) from add-on projects atop existing structures in Germany’s capital.

At a ULI Triangle event in April, representatives of North Carolina’s Capitol Broadcasting Company shared the firm’s plans to redevelop a historic cotton mill, ultimately shifting the fortunes of the town of Rocky Mount.

One of ULI’s longest serving Life Trustees and renowned industry expert Stan Ross, Chairman Emeritus of the University of Southern California’s Lusk Center for Real Estate and Distinguished Fellow of the university’s School of Policy, Planning & Development, passed away June 10. He was 82.

Growing cities such as Hong Kong are at the epicenter of what Richard Florida has dubbed “the new urban crisis,” with the city’s success sending house prices soaring out of reach of the average resident. The author and urbanist, who is director of cities at the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto, spoke at the 2018 ULI Asia Pacific Summit in Hong Kong.

The Dodge Momentum Index eked out a small gain in May, moving 1.8 percent higher to 167.8 (2,000=100) from the revised April reading of 164.9. May’s gain was the result of a 4.7 percent increase by the commercial component of the Momentum Index, while the institutional component fell 2.4 percent.

Disruptive technology—and the need to embrace it—will continue to influence office and retail tenants, as well as developers, panelists said at the ULI U.K. Annual Conference, held in early June in London.

Nestled in a relatively quiet East Amsterdam neighborhood, a new kind of hotel has been racking up occupancy rates topping 90 percent for the past two years. Zoku is a modern take on the extended-stay hotel, where the visitors stay in fully outfitted micro-hotel rooms of 260 or 320 square feet (24 or 30 sq m) and relax and connect in the common areas on the top floor.

Hundreds of millions of dollars are pouring into plans to help incubate and retain life-science startups in New York City, panelists said at a ULI New York event in May. Locating in Manhattan offers the benefit of a variety of possible partners, including universities, hospitals, and other technology firms, as well as the presence of investors and potential employees, they said.

W. Edward “Ed” Walter, a widely renowned real estate industry leader and most recently the Steers Chair in Real Estate at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, is the Institute’s new global chief executive officer. Walter brings to ULI more than 35 years of management experience in the real estate profession across a variety of disciplines including hotels, multifamily, and land development, with a strong emphasis on capital markets and investments.

London-based investors have been less active internationally in recent months for a variety of reasons, including where the global economy is in the business cycle and the implications of the Brexit vote, said panelists discussing capital market trends at a ULI U.K. conference.

If smart cities are to serve their populations, the human element must remain crucial for their designers and developers, attendees at the 2018 ULI Asia Pacific Summit were told. A panel of developers, designers, and planners mulled over the development of the smart city in Asia during the summit, held in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong’s land supply problem is not attributable to a lack of money, but rather is an issue of finding the physical space for development, as well as a matter of perception, said the chief executive of the Hong Kong SAR, speaking at a ULI event.

How can the real estate industry do a better job of meeting the needs of middle-income renters and buyers?

Important tax credits were preserved in the new federal tax law, but lower corporate rates shrink their value.