At the Fuse Alliance annual conference, Mark Bischoff, senior vice president healthcare and senior living at Mohawk Group, provided members with a helpful list of research sources and economic indicators that his team uses to help project where to invest their resources. The same data points may be helpful to commercial flooring businesses who want some fresh perspective for their strategic planning.
One of his first tips is to plan for sector rotation based on the cycles. The investment management firm Jones Lang LaSalle (us.jll.com) has a savvy set of charts called property clocks that show which markets are rising, falling or somewhere in between. The clocks cover five sectors, including office, industrial, multifamily, retail and skyline. A market’s position on the clock is determined by a combination of vacancy, demand, construction and rental rates. The left side is favorable with higher supply and demand, while the right side indicates markets where demand is waning. The office property clock is showing opportunity in 2018 for office properties in New Jersey, Cincinnati, Cleveland and Detroit, which are on the rise, while Houston’s office market is beginning to bottom. “We watch this pretty closely, and it’s actionable by market,” Bischoff said.