Alter NOW
By The Alter Group
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Podcast Description
Tune in to hear your host, Tom Silva, Vice President at The Alter Group, brings you exclusive interviews with some of real estate's high level experts and C-Suite executives. A strategic, enterprise level look at the financial, regulatory and macroeconomic challenges facing corporate real estate executives today, you will gain a 30,000 foot perspective of the current recession, the recovery and the long term prospects for the industry.
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1 |
Amy Dean On Do Unions Matter? | America is obsessed with the issue of trade unions again.nbsp; Labor unions have gained new prominence as Democratic legislators from Wisconsin and Indiana have left their states for the greener pastures of Illinois to avoid participating in votes to cut back or eliminate collective bargaining rights for public employees.nbsp; Thousands of protestors have taken up residence in the Wisconsin State Capitol to voice their anger at Republican Governor Scott Walker's attempts to break the state's unions. Are labor unions relevant in the 21st century?nbsp; Amy Dean, an author, activist and social entrepreneur whose roots are in the American labor movement and who served 10 years as the President and CEO of the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council in the Silicon Valley, says the answer is a resounding "yes".nbsp; Dean is also co-author of the new book, "A New New Deal: How Regional Activism Will Reshape the American Labor Movement."nbsp; During her tenure with the AFL-CIO, Dean represented 90 separate unions with more than 110,000 members. Dean points out that before President Ronald Reagan famously busted the air traffic controllers' union in 1981, there was strong bipartisan support for organized labor.nbsp; Even Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower acknowledged the impact of unions and said the interests of employers and employees were about mutual prosperity.nbsp; According to Dean, things have changed because the post World War II economy consisted of industries that were dedicated to building the nation's base to assure this prosperity.nbsp; Unfortunately, that consensus started to break down by the mid-1970s until today, we have no agreement about how our economy should grow, what our obligations are to one another, and how we can compete optimally in a global economy. In a recent interview for the Alter NOW Podcasts, Dean says that the building trades and entertainment industry are good models to look at for the next generation of employee organization.nbsp; In this system, as people move from job to job, they have a base wage through union membership.nbsp; Built into that base wage are healthcare insurance and a pension, again enabled by membership in a labor union. Also, Dean asserts that unions are not the reason for outsourcing and that corporations are motivated by other issues.nbsp; In today's economy, capital wants to locate where land-use policy is predictable, thanks to proactive regional efforts.nbsp; Companies want to be in areas that have good K-12 schools, open spaces, a high quality of life, decent affordable housing, a functional mass transit system, proximity to a world-class airport and the kind of knowledge workers that companies need to succeed.nbsp; Unfortunately, Dean says, unless Americans are prepared to deal with the issue of tax reform, there will be little conversation in America about any social agenda. In today's economy, capital wants to locate where land-use policy is predictable, thanks to proactive regional efforts.nbsp; Companies want to be in areas that have good K-12 schools, open spaces, a high quality of life, decent affordable housing, a functional mass transit system, proximity to a world-class airport and the kind of knowledge workers that companies need to succeed.nbsp; Unfortunately, Dean says, unless Americans are prepared to deal with the issue of tax reform, there will be little conversation in America about any social agenda,nbsp; Yet, these are the things that capital needs to be successful. Read James Surowiecki's take on the current state of labor unions in The NewYorker. To listen to Amy Dean's full interview on why unions matter, click here. | 3/8/11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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Robert Knakal on the Bulls vs. the Bears – Who Do You Trust? | Who is correct ndash; the bears or the bulls? Listen to Robert Knakal examine both sides of important economic issues such as the GDP; the Federal Reserversquo;s actions to jump start the economy; the availability of capital; how banks are faring; the housing market; the direction of interest rates; and job growth potential. | 10/18/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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Anthony Downs On Financial Reform | The nation's financial system needs significantly more regulation than exists now. nbsp;The lack of tough regulatory powers strongly impacted the recent financial crash and the Great Recession that ensued.nbsp; The good news is that the Obama administration is moving firmly in this direction with financial reform legislation a critical item on its agenda.nbsp; This is the opinion of Anthony Downs,nbsp; a senior fellow with the Brookings Institution and former President of the Real Estate Research Corporation.nbsp; In a recent interview for the Alter NOW Podcasts, Downs said that between 1980 and 2007, the value of international capital markets - including bank deposits, assets, equities, public and private debt - quadrupled relative to the world's GDP, lifting millions of people out of poverty.nbsp; Although unprecedented, this growth relied heavily on borrowed money to finance higher living standards and highly leveraged loans with limited reserves backing them.nbsp; In the end, the growth was unable to be sustained. The financial reform legislation currently undergoing reconciliation by a Senate-House conference committee is not a reinstatement of the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act - which separated investment and commercial banking -- because banks will still be allowed to deal with securities.nbsp; Under the new law, banks will have to register derivatives with some type of formal exchange and maintain records on who is borrowing money and under what terms.nbsp; This marks a significant change from before the Great Recession, when derivatives were traded with virtually no oversight. Downs believes that former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan contributed to the financial crisis in two ways.nbsp; In 2001, when Greenspan was informed that there was fraud in the subprime housing market and that he should do something about it, he refused to take action because he didn't believe in regulation.nbsp; According to Downs, "that was a terrible mistake and meant that all the horrible loans made in the subprime market could continue unchecked."nbsp; Greenspan's second error was to maintain low interest rates for as long as he did at a time when an enormous amount of capital was coming into the United States economy from overseas.nbsp; Because investors were avoiding the stock market, they put their money into real estate.nbsp; That drove the price of properties sky high and destroyed the concept of intelligent underwriting and evaluating the risk before approving the loan. | 8/31/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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John Vivadelli: The Real Estate Perfect Storm | Commercial real estate is currently experiencing a perfect storm, one that will utterly change the way corporations utilize their office space in the future.nbsp; This is the opinion of John Vivadelli, CEO and founder of AgilQuest Corporation and a well respected industry expert in the fields of alternative office environments; real estate metrics and cost management; and business continuity. Prior to founding AgilQuest, Vivadelli was instrumental in developing IBM's workplace management system in the 1990s to support the company's transformational workforce mobility program, creating their "office of the future".nbsp; This new workplace strategy resulted in reconfiguring the technology giant's real estate footprint by shedding millions of square feet that saved hundreds of millions of dollars annually. AgilQuest provides the services and systems necessary for companies and governments to achieve similar results. According to Vivadelli, this perfect storm is impacting both the supply and demand sides of commercial real estate. On the supply side, the United States has approximately 12.5 billion sq. ft. of commercial office space, which carry an estimated $1.2 to $1.4 billion in loans that will come due in the next two years. Many of these loans will not qualify under new reserve requirements.nbsp; While the average base vacancy rate is currently 17 percent nationally; that statistic does not include shadow space - square feet that are paid for but not occupied - which adds another 5 to 20% to the overall vacancy rate.nbsp; Additionally, with the upcoming implementation of FASB Rule 13, both owned and leased properties will have to be reported on corporations' balance sheets.nbsp; Off-balance-sheet leasing will no longer be an option. On the demand side, he sees a fundamental shift downward in real estate absorption.nbsp; The nation's unemployment rate is approximately 10 percent, with an additional seven percent who have opted out of looking for a job. Some of these jobs will never return.nbsp; Add to that the number of workers who perform their jobs remotely and stay connected to the office via PDA, cell phone and laptop, and the average actual occupancy rate between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. is between 30 and 50%.nbsp; That means over half of all office space across Corporate America is vacant on any given day.nbsp; Considering that an average of $60 is allocated per sq.ft., that adds up to $360 billion that companies are paying to landlords for office space that is empty and they don't need.nbsp; This wastes 1.5 quads of energy and results in 40 million metric tons of unnecessary carbon released every year.nbsp; As companies recognize the scale of the problem, the real estate industry will see a profound shift in how we use space. | 7/27/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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A. J. Robinson: 10 Minutes on Revitalizing Downtowns | Downtowns should be healthy vibrant, urban cores that are treasured and taken care of because they represent the heart of the city. Under A. J. Robinsonrsquo;s leadership, Central Atlanta Progress has been stressing block-by-block revitalization and community improvement districts to make the city a better place to live. | 5/24/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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Jon Levy: European Real Estate Opportunities | Jon Levy is a European Union analyst with Eurasia Group and a frequent commentator on European issues, appearing on CNN, CNBC and NPR. He was previously director of national security policy for John Kerry's presidential campaign. | 4/26/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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Rick Mattoon: Is the Recession Over? | Economic indicators show that the recession is over.nbsp; This is the opinion of Rick Mattoon, a senior economist and advisor in the economic research department of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago and a lecturer at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.nbsp; Rick's primary research focuses on issues facing the Midwest regional economy. In a recent interview for the Alter NOW Podcasts, Mattoon warned that most people probably don't feel like the nation is coming out of a recession because there are few signs of job creation or easier access to credit.nbsp; One of the major concerns economists have is that this will be a double-dip "W-shaped" recession because once the bump from the $787 billion stimulus ends, there will be scant pent-up consumer demand for products and services to take the place of government spending. One positive sign is an uptick in hiring by temporary employment agencies, which usually is considered to be a good harbinger of what future demand will be.nbsp; Another interesting theory about this particular recession in terms of jobs is the idea that companies adjusted their employee levels much more aggressively at the beginning of this cycle.nbsp; As a result, they are operating at extremely lean levels and so may hire earlier rather than later. One problem is that there is a skills mismatch in the economy.nbsp; Many people who have lost their jobs don't possess the right skills to find employment in growth industries such as clean energy or healthcare.nbsp; The challenge is training these individuals to bring their skills up to par. | 3/8/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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Jafer Hasnain: Solving the Foreclosure Crisis | Foreclosure is mutually destructive for all parties and something should be done about it.nbsp; That's the opinion of Jafer Hasnain, Managing Principal of Lifeline Assets, the first large-scale institutional investment fund targeted toward acquiring single-family homes that are in financial distress.nbsp; The firm's business model aligns the interests of distressed homeowners, banks, investors and American taxpayers.nbsp; Lifeline Assets is a socially responsible fund that plans to invest more than $1 billion in distressed homes through short sales. In a recent interview for the Alter NOW Podcasts, Hasnain said that the real problem shaking the economy is on the residential side.nbsp; At present, the $15 trillion American mortgage market is seeing 1.4 percent of loans in foreclosure, with another nine percent past due.nbsp; Hasnain, who had a front-row seat when the Resolution Trust Corporation spent $125 billion to relieve financial institutions of their distressed real estate in the 1990s, is providing a private sector solution to the housing crisis that relieves the taxpayers of that burden. Hasnain has built one of the first institutional-scale single-family residential investment funds in the United States and created a price discovery mechanism that is an objective and sensible way to learn how much to pay for a house whose mortgage is in distress.nbsp; This way, a family in a home that has gone in default agrees to stay in the house, pay rent and maintain the property until they have the financial ability to re-purchase their home.nbsp; Lifeline Assets' offer to purchase each house is contingent on the resident's willingness to continue living there. | 2/9/10 | Free | View In iTunes |
| Total: 8 Episodes |
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