Reprint from NY Times

OWINGS MILLS, Md. — Inside the gleaming mall here on the Sunday before Christmas, just one thing was missing: shoppers.

The upbeat music of “Jingle Bell Rock” bounced off the tiles, and the smell of teriyaki chicken drifted from the food court, but only a handful of stores were open at the sprawling enclosed shopping center. A few visitors walked down the long hallways and peered through locked metal gates into vacant spaces once home to retailers like H&M, Wet Seal and Kay Jewelers.

Across America, the Dead Malls Are Growing

“It’s depressing,” Jill Kalata, 46, said as she tried on a few of the last sneakers for sale at the Athlete’s Foot, scheduled to close in a few weeks. “This place used to be packed. And Christmas, the lines were out the door. Now I’m surprised anything is still open.”

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As 2014 comes to a close, organizations are often left with some tough budget decisions. ‘Use it or lose it’ decisions are common in corporate budgeting. Since you do not want to ‘lose’ your budget and risk facing 2015 with less capital resources, what can you do to maximize your money spent while making a worthwhile investment? Just look around…the answer is in your facilities.

Many building owners and property managers forget about winterizing a building until they are scraping snow off of their car windshield. This might be too late, as pipes may have frozen. Similarly, cold weather conditions may not permit the proper repair of critical building components. Consider addressing these seasonal activities so you do not have surprises in the dead of winter. Don’t forget about snow removal as well.

Also, consider using your budgeted dollars on property improvements that could help your off-line units sell or lease faster. Here’s a list of ideas to help preserve and prepare property for its next intended use:

•  Sprucing up the exterior, parking lot, or landscaping helps make your vacant property more attractive to buyers or potential tenants
• Consider white boxing your vacant unit to make it more user friendly for a potential tenant
• De-image properties by removing your existing name or color scheme, especially if the property has been sitting idle for an extended period of time. Taking this step removes the negative stigma associated with ownership of a vacant building
• Complete minor repairs that if not addressed could lead to a larger issue or a citation
• Protect copper wires (HVAC, plumbing, etc.)
• Install fencing around structures in at risk areas
• Property demolition can remove unwanted cost and liability from the books in the coming year

Use the remaining weeks of 2014 to your advantage and invest in your best asset. Commercial Asset Preservation provides national property maintenance, inspection and day porter services. To put them on your team, contact Marc at insulm@commercialpreservation.com or call (800) 445-0640.

Reprinted from Columbus Business First

Automall wouldn’t be a misnomer for the new Lindsay Honda.

The east-side dealership is renovating the old Scarborough Mall off Brice Road into what will become a 15-acre, 150,000-square-foot home for the state’s top Honda dealer, which sold more than 4,800 new Hondas in 2013.

“We needed a facility to handle that (volume),” Steve Lindsay told me.

The new building is going to handle that and then some. The current dealership, just across Scarborough Boulevard from the mall, is a comparatively tiny 20,000 square feet.

There will be 1,000 cars on the lot and as many as 150 cars inside the building, with 40 of those in the showroom.

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(Reprinted from StarTribune Business)

The ubiquitous big-box concept has reached middle age, but many of the stores never had much of a life.

Bankruptcies, downsizing and changing needs among retailers resulted in thousands of closures nationwide. But fortunately, some of these dormant spaces have entered inventive second acts, with Minnesota now home to some of the more unusual examples of big-box reuse.

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NOTE: Commercial Asset Preservation has the ability to work with salvage operations on commercial buildings to reclaim materials that can be re-purposed.

Reptinted from NEXTCity.org

Salvaging historical materials from blighted houses set for demolition has long been an urban pastime, but now, the city of Detroit wants to get in the game as part of Mayor Mike Duggan’s blight removal strategy.

The initiative, which they hope will launch next month, is part of the Mayor’s broader blight strategy, now with an eye on preservation as opposed to straight-up demolition.

Reclamation isn’t anything new. Practically every city in America — from New York City to Minneapolis — has reclamation shops ready to sell you a piece of old bowling lane you can turn into a kitchen countertop. But what is new is having the city take the lead and mandate salvage as part of a blight clearance program.

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