The Dealmaker: 12/09/2016

Major housing project may replace Mesa light rail park-and-ride lot. Councilman Dennis Kavanaugh: “This [21-acre] project [by Miravista Holdings at Main and Sycamore] provides some new housing options [600 residential units, 80 townhouses!] for people who may get jobs there or work there, and then you combine it all with the intensifying development in the Asian business sector with the restaurants and stores and retail, you’re really creating an interesting combination…” (IDEA: Someone should open a Chinese-food joint nearby and call it “Chow Main & Sycamore” — they’d make a fortune!) Further details and rendering at AZCentral. http://bit.ly/2gJEtsB

Developer loves historic angle of Ben U dorm project. “Lorenzo Perez, one of the owners of Venue Projects, describes his company’s renovation project at the historic Alhambra Hotel as ‘not for the faint of heart.’ Once finished, the building will be leased to Benedictine University for student housing.” East Valley Tribune looks into Perez’s “love [for] downtown Mesa and its buildings,” his company’s design and amenity plans for the ‘new’ Alhambra, and how the “$3.5 million” renovation for the “122-year-old building” came to be. http://bit.ly/2gJKWE0

Real estate experts: Infill hitting wall, new realities for apartments, home buying. “Infill could be running out of spaces and deals that pencil out…. [R]ising interest rates could cut down deals and new [apartment] construction…. [W]omen and immigrants are key to rekindling home buying… Those were some of the key projections and analyses from the Metro Phoenix Land & Housing Forecast hosted by Land Advisors Organization and its CEO Greg Vogel.” Check out Mike Sunnucks’ recap of this recently held forum — in Phoenix Business Journal. http://bit.ly/2glj6lq

PUMPING UP THE VOLUME – Home construction loan volume picks up the pace. “The latest quarterly data… shows that the volume of outstanding loans increased by 4.8% in the third quarter…. That marks 14 consecutive quarters of growth for such loans.” However, as reported in this Wall Street Journal piece: “While the environment for construction loans is improving, builders say they have faced persistent difficulties in getting loans to acquire and develop land on which to build.” Find out why—> http://bit.ly/2gljhgA

Back in a big way: U.S. home prices surpass 2006 peaks. In Clare Trapasso’s piece at Realtor.com, “Taimur Khan, a senior research analyst at Knight Frank,” sheds light on what’s been driving “[a] lot of [this home price] recovery,” while chief economist Jonathan Smoke has a cloudier   assessment, observing that “[p]rices may be up nationally, but they’re ‘not recovered on a real or inflation-adjusted basis,’ nor have they “fully recovered” in “every housing market” — Phoenix being one. http://bit.ly/2hffuym

Brokers share their 2017 outlook. “Top real estate executives are feeling less bullish about the coming year… Their concerns are growing over agent productivity and they’re feeling more pressure surrounding profitability prospects, according to the latest Imprev Thought Leader Real Estate Confidence study….” For study results and the reason why “broker confidence is more subdued” click to REALTORMag. http://bit.ly/2gt3bzQ

Here’s the real danger to the recovering housing market. HousingWire’s Kelsey Ramirez explores the “new danger” — how it could result in “greater demand than ever,” but also why it could keep “existing home owners” from “supply[ing] their homes to the market for that potential first-time homebuyer to buy.“ http://bit.ly/2hfib2Z

Cameron’s $5M + deals of the day – http://bit.ly/2hu4JY1