CRE This Week - What's impacting the United States market?
September 7, 2026 - US commercial real estate news, macroeconomic indicators and market analysis.
Week of September 7, 2026
Welcome to the latest edition of CRE This Week, curated by Altus Group’s US research team.
Our team has handpicked pertinent and noteworthy market indicators, articles, original research, and significant industry dates that are critical to the US commercial real estate sector. We understand that your time is valuable, so we're excited to deliver research that helps you stay informed and saves you some time each Monday morning.
For more key economic indicators that matter to commercial real estate, see Top Indicators by Major Asset Type.
Economic print
Macro economic factors impacting CRE
The Census Bureau released the Value of Construction Put in Place report for July on September 1. Total construction spending came in at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $2,157.6 billion, down 0.5% (±0.8%) from the revised June estimate and 3.8% (±1.5%) below July 2025. Private construction fell 0.5% to $1,614.2 billion, with residential down 1.3% (±1.3%, not statistically significant) to $859.0 billion while nonresidential rose 0.4% to $755.2 billion. Within nonresidential, office spending climbed 3.3% month over month and 21.3% year over year, while manufacturing fell 0.8% on the month and remains down 21.7% annually. Public construction slipped 0.2% to $543.4 billion. Year to date, total spending is running 3.5% (±1.0%) below 2025.
Office construction is now the standout in an otherwise contracting nonresidential pipeline, pointing to continued capital concentration in high-quality space rather than a broad recovery. Manufacturing's steep annual decline confirms the unwinding of the IRA and CHIPS-driven building boom, easing competition for labor and materials in industrial markets. Data center shell construction jumped to an annualized rate of more than $75 billion in July, up roughly 60% year over year, reinforcing the "Power" category's 6.5% annual gain within nonresidential and underscoring data centers as the clearest source of demand in the construction pipeline. Residential spending fell both monthly and annually, though the monthly move was within the margin of error; tight new-home supply should still support multifamily demand at the margin.
The Federal Reserve released the G.19 report for July on September 8, showing total consumer credit rose at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.2 percent, decelerating from 6.0 percent in June. Nonrevolving credit, covering auto and student loans, accelerated to 4.8 percent from 2.5 percent, while revolving credit, largely credit cards, decelerated to 2.5 percent from 6.0 percent. Total balances outstanding reached $5.186 trillion. Quarterly growth has held in a narrow 2 to 3 percent annualized band since Q4 2025, well below the 5 percent-plus pace common in the 2010s.
For the broader economy, the deceleration in headline credit growth points to a consumer still borrowing but without a durable acceleration in spending appetite, with the rotation toward nonrevolving and away from revolving credit suggesting households are financing larger purchases like autos while pulling back on card-based discretionary spending. For CRE, that mix favors necessity and auto-related retail over discretionary categories like apparel and dining, while credit card rates near 21 percent continue to limit remaining borrowing capacity for discretionary purchases.
Labor Market (JOLTS, ADP, Employment Situation)
BLS released July JOLTS data on September 1, showing job openings little changed at 7.3 million (4.4%), with hires down 188,000 in professional and business services. ADP reported on September 3 that private employers added just 38,000 jobs in August, the slowest pace since January, with professional services, manufacturing, and information all shedding jobs while education, health care, and hospitality led gains. Two days later, BLS reported nonfarm payrolls rose 162,000 in August, above the 31,000 average monthly gain over the prior year, with unemployment unchanged at 4.1%. Food services (+59,000) and local government education (+42,000) drove the headline number; information lost 23,000 jobs. June and July payrolls were revised up a combined 55,000.
All three reports flag the same soft spot: professional and business services, a core driver of office demand, which lost ground in both the JOLTS hires data and ADP's August read. That is a more direct signal for office leasing than the BLS headline, since the payroll beat was concentrated in food services and local government education, sectors with minimal footprint in office-using space. Manufacturing sent conflicting signals, up in the establishment survey but down in ADP, leaving industrial demand implications unclear for the month. Taken together, unemployment holding at 4.1% and the upward revisions to June and July argue against a broad labor market deterioration, but the consistent weakness in professional services hiring points to continued caution in office absorption rather than a turn toward reacceleration.
News
News to know
25 Years After the Sept. 11 Attacks, Lower Manhattan Is Thriving (Wall Street Journal, 2026-09-07)
Lower Manhattan's population has roughly tripled since the September 11 attacks, with more than 230,000 people now working there, nearly matching pre-attack levels. Office-to-residential conversions have driven much of the turnaround, with 23 projects planned or under construction and total downtown apartment inventory reaching more than 37,000 units by early 2026, up from roughly 13,000 in 2000. The tenant base has diversified, with financial and real estate firms now accounting for roughly a third of downtown employment, down from about two-thirds a quarter-century ago, as media and tech companies have moved in, including American Express's July groundbreaking on a new 55-story headquarters at the World Trade Center site. The recovery remains uneven: downtown's office vacancy rate stood at 22% in July versus about 18% in Midtown, according to Cushman & Wakefield, and the former Deutsche Bank site across from the World Trade Center remains undeveloped.
GoDocs Sees Rise in Multifamily Lending Volume, Loan Size (Connect CRE, 2026-09-08)
Commercial loan document automation platform GoDocs reported a 17.2% year-over-year increase in multifamily commercial loans processed through its platform in the first half of 2026, alongside an 8.3% increase in average loan size and a 23.3% increase in mean loan size as growth skewed toward larger deals. The trend aligns with broader market data, as Newmark reported a 26% year-over-year increase in multifamily debt originations over the same period alongside historically strong apartment demand. GoDocs volume grew 52.9% year-over-year in the first quarter before slowing to a 3.3% year-over-year decline in the second quarter, though H1 volume overall remained up 17.2% from a year earlier.
San Francisco Centre, once the city's largest mall at 1.5 million square feet, is back on the market after a proposed sale collapsed in July, with bids due this week and brokers expecting no more than $130 million against a $1.2 billion valuation a decade ago. The mall was 93% vacant before closing this year, following Nordstrom's 2023 departure and owner Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield handing the property to lenders owed $558 million. A prior deal fell through over complications tied to the mall's fragmented ownership, including a Macy's-owned former Bloomingdale's space and school district-owned land beneath the property. Surrounding retail on Market Street is recovering, and mall values nationally are up 13% over the past year as investor sentiment toward the sector improves.
MISMO, the real estate finance industry's standards organization, launched two AI governance certifications last month that establish benchmarks for risk oversight, decision-making influence and source-data documentation in automated underwriting systems. The certifications mark a shift from AI tools focused on generating content, such as lease summaries and investment memos, toward requiring auditability once those outputs reach institutional credit committees. The piece argues this will create an "auditability spread" over the next 12 to 18 months, with firms using certified, deterministic software seeing faster deal closings and lower transaction friction, while those relying on unverified black-box outputs face longer credit reviews and higher cost of capital. It also points to a shift away from general-purpose AI tools toward domain-specific architectures that break underwriting into narrow, testable checks, such as document versioning, formula integrity and general ledger cross-referencing, each producing an auditable trail.
Data Center Demand Has Made IOS An Institutional Capital Playground (Bisnow, 2026-09-09)
Institutional capital is deepening its push into industrial outdoor storage as data center construction drives demand even as trucking, IOS's traditional tenant base, weathers a downturn tied to labor shortages and high diesel costs. IOS investment reached $14 billion to $16 billion in 2025, up 15% year over year, with institutional capital now 45% of investment activity versus 30% four years ago, per Matthews data. A record $672 million refinancing between Realterm and Starwood Property Trust in August covered a 78-property, 830-acre portfolio across 33 markets. Nationwide IOS rents hit $11.07 per square foot per month in the second quarter, up 1.6% year over year, with vacancy at 3.6% versus 6.5% for industrial overall, per CBRE. Data center developers now account for about 20% of new IOS demand, using lots for construction staging and equipment storage.
Apartment Demand Loses Momentum as Hiring and Immigration Slow (GlobeSt, 2026-09-10)
Multifamily demand is losing steam as hiring cools and immigration collapses, per a Marcus & Millichap brief. Employers cut 23,000 jobs in July with downward revisions to prior months, though the latest national jobs report showed a 162,000 rebound. Net international migration fell 82%, from 2.3 million in 2024 to 410,000 in 2025, per the CBO, with only a partial rebound to 570,000 projected for 2026. The 30-year mortgage averaged 6.65% on August 20, extending renter tenure but raising acquisition and refinancing costs. Marcus & Millichap favors Class B assets, which combine a lower cost basis than Class A with a steadier renter base than Class C and led transaction velocity gains over the year through August. Supply is retreating too: completions fell 16.8% year over year in July, multifamily deliveries dropped over 25%, and units under construction at midyear were roughly half the early-2023 peak of 1.1 million. Construction material costs rose about 7.5% in the first half of 2026, well above the decade average near 5%. Concessions eased to 15.8% of units in July from a five-year high of 17%.
NYC Mulls Property-Tax Break for $2.7 Billion Hudson Yards Tower (Bloomberg, 2026-09-10)
New York's Industrial Development Agency is set to vote September 15 on a $100 million property tax break for 99 Hudson Boulevard, a proposed 48-story, 1.3 million square foot office tower in Hudson Yards. The $2.7 billion project is scheduled to begin construction in January and open in 2030, and would mark the largest economic subsidy since Mayor Zohran Mamdani took office. The IDA estimates the benefits will cost the city $92.2 million while generating almost $860 million in direct and indirect tax revenue. The developer's prior Hudson Yards tower, The Spiral, houses Pfizer's headquarters along with HSBC, AllianceBernstein and Marshall Wace. A 2018 New School report pegged total taxpayer costs for the broader Hudson Yards redevelopment at $2.2 billion, though the Hudson Yards Infrastructure Corp has since transferred roughly $2 billion in surplus developer revenue back to the city.
INSIGHTS Spotlight
Catch the latest research and insights from Altus
Article | US commercial real estate transaction analysis – Q2 2026
In this analysis, we dig into the data from our Q2 US CRE Investment and Transactions Quarterly report, covering national transaction volume and pricing trends across major property sectors, shifts in the median age of transacted properties, and the growing concentration of deal value in transactions exceeding $10 million.
Report | Q2 2026 US CRE investment and transactions quarterly
US CRE transaction activity gained momentum in Q2, with total dollars transacted up 11.3% quarter-over-quarter and 9.4% year-over-year, and square footage transacted growing 10.3% QoQ. Median price per square foot for single-property transactions climbed 8.6% annually, with industrial leading every sector at 13.2% and storage leading every subtype at 24.0% YoY.
Important dates
Upcoming data releases and events
Data releases (Times in EDT)
Monday, September 15
8:30AM: Empire State Manufacturing Survey (Sep)
Wednesday, September 17
8:30AM: Retail Sales (Aug)
8:30AM: Import Prices (Aug)
10:00AM: Manufacturing & Trade Inventories (Jul)
10:00AM: NAHB Housing Market Index (Sep)
2:00PM: Federal Reserve Economic Projections
2:00PM: U.S. Interest Rate Decision
Thursday, September 18
8:30AM: Housing Starts (Aug)
8:30AM: Philadelphia Fed Business Outlook Survey (Sep)
8:30AM: Weekly Jobless Claims (Sep 12)
10:00AM: Pending Home Sales Index (Aug)
Friday, September 19
9:15AM: Industrial Production (Aug)
9:15AM: Capacity Utilization (Aug)
10:00AM: Leading Indicators (Aug)
Upcoming Industry Events
September 15–17: AFIRE Annual Member Meeting (New York, NY)
September 23–26: CORFAC Fall Summit 2026 (Chicago, IL)
About our research team
Omar Eltorai
Senior Director of Research
Altus Group
Omar Eltorai is a Research Director at Altus Group. With more than a decade of experience in the industry in investment management and financing roles,
Omar's focus is on macro, capital and market trends affecting the US CRE market. Beyond regularly authoring articles and reports, his commentary and analysis has been featured in various media publications, including: Wall Street Journal, Globe Street, and Yahoo! Finance.
Cole Perry
Associate Director of Research
Altus Group
Cole Perry is a Associate Director of Research with Altus Group's Research team. In this role, Cole delivers key insights into macroeconomics, capital markets, and the broader commercial real estate sector.
Cole boasts a rich background in Commercial Real Estate analytics with previous roles at CompStak and Brixmor Property Group. He holds dual M.S. degrees from Columbia University in Urban Planning and Real Estate Development.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this newsletter are solely those of the authors and are not endorsed by Altus Group Limited, its affiliates and its related entities (collectively “Altus Group”). This publication has been prepared for general guidance on matters of interest only and does not constitute professional advice or services of Altus Group. You should not act upon the information contained in this publication without obtaining specific professional advice. No representation or warranty (express or implied) is given as to the accuracy, completeness or reliability of the information contained in this publication, or the suitability of the information for a particular purpose. To the extent permitted by law, Altus Group does not accept or assume any liability, responsibility or duty of care for any consequences of you or anyone else acting, or refraining to act, in reliance on the information contained in this publication or for any decision based on it. The distribution of this publication to you does not create, extend or revive a client relationship between Altus Group and you or any other person or entity. This publication, or any part thereof, may not be reproduced or distributed in any form for any purpose without the express written consent of Altus Group.
Resources
Latest insights
Sep 10, 2026
Labor data diverges, data centers dominate Beige Book, CRE implications from bond rout
