2016 has certainly been an exciting year with the Summer Olympics in Brazil to BREXIT and the U.S. Presidential Elections just being some of the more captivating headlines, some other important events in this great year have been:
- The Wild Tiger population increased for the first time in a century
- Love it or hate it, Pokémon Go got people out of their chairs and out moving in the fresh air (albeit, with eyes glued to their phones, but you’ve got to start somewhere)
- Spacecraft Juno reached Jupiter (a 1.7 billion mile, 5 year trip)
- July 11, 2016 was, according to the Bank of America, “the day that the greatest bull market ever in the bond market ended”
- The plane Solar Impulse 2, completed its journey around the globe without using any fuel
2016 has also been a great year for Shindico and the commercial real estate industry. There has been lots of growth and it’s all great news for economy. In 2016 our head office received two prestigious awards: the BOMA TOBY (The Building of the Year) for best office building under 100,000 SF and the 2016 Earth Award for best office building under 100,000 SF. I was also greatly honoured to receive the Susan J. Groenveld, CCIM, Visionary award. We’re also very proud to have played a part in finding some great locations for local businesses such as Oh Doughnuts, Orangetheory Fitness and Forth Projects.
What has happened this year in Winnipeg?
Many of the Target boxes got absorbed and they got absorbed at typically much higher rates than the contracted Target stores. Landlords made some major investments which is job creating, and brought rejuvenation to a lot of those malls, because as it turns out, Target didn’t bring anymore traffic than the Zeller’s boxes that they replaced and in some cases even less.
Save on Foods opened in Winnipeg. Three stores have opened so far and it’s been suggested that they would like to have a few more, so that will be a little bit of a disruptor.
Industrial sector is booming. Centreport Canada is coming along nicely. Our industrial team has been selling a lot of industrial land this year. The new buildings in Brookside Business Park, especially the new Fedex building has got us quite excited.
Residential development is growing. A lot of land has been bought by developers this year for new residential development, some of it outside the city, with the plans of building new single and multi-family communities. Shindico made the commitment to dive much deeper into residential and mixed-use development in 2016. We hope to be in the ground in 2017 with the first of what could be a couple thousand rental units.
Interest in suburban office is increasing. There is obviously going to be a shifting in the downtown, as new projects come onstream, leaving some backfill space, but those buildings are in strong hands and we don’t see a lot of discounting going on. The major investment being made at 360 Main Street is very interesting with a new curtain wall and residential building.
People are interested in infill development as we have been for decades. We are very proud our infill sites, Grant Park Pavilions and Grant Park Festival, underutilized forgotten lands brought onstream. We were able to do the same a few years back at St. Vital Festival where Home Depot went in and anchored a new development. Coming on stream in 2017 is The Shops of Kildonan Mile, an infill development across from Kildonan Place Shopping Centre where we put in 4 lanes of concrete road and services that will help with the drainage in the West Transcona area.
2016 has been a fantastic year and it looks like 2017 is going to be a great year as well. We have the greatest group of folks in my 40 years of business at Shindico. I am very proud of our cohesive team, people working together, people succeeding by helping others succeed. We will be adding to our team in the future and I think that will create a very positive 2017 going forward.
Enjoy the holiday season and here’s to a healthy and prosperous new year! Cheers!
Sandy G. Shindleman, CCIM, SIOR, FRICS
President & CEO
