Philadelphia Metropolitan Area Real Estate Law Blog

Real estate developers, homebuilders and realtors have had a pretty rough decade, and new potential problems seem always to be on the horizon. The foreclosure crisis sent new housing starts plummeting — and the apartment industry booming. Climate change threatens to alter entire coastlines — or at least to create new design and insurance challenges. Now, an entire generation of Americans may have given up on homeownership.

Real estate investor Howard Lutnick, known for rebuilding Cantor Fitzgerald after his brother’s death in the 2001 World Trade Center attack, has reportedly been doing a lot of investing in commercial real estate lately, betting that the slow economy will not prevent property deal from thriving on low-interest money.

A small number of investment groups are taking advantage of the high demand but low competition in the area of charter school development. One such group, a joint venture of Canyon Capital Realty Advisors LLC and former tennis champion Andre Agassi, has taken on projects in Philadelphia and Milwaukee, and is currently considering similar projects in other cities, including New York and Houston.