With nearly 1,000 apartments under construction and some 2,000 more in its pipeline, Capodagli Property Co. is preparing for the next phase of its growth by launching a new hospitality platform that will bring cafés and restaurants to its future developments.
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In Hackensack, a proving ground for Cap Hospitality
In crafting the design of the new Cap Diner, Nicolas Geeraerts said he wanted to “bring a little bit” of New York and Brooklyn, while also staying true to New Jersey. He also aims to create a younger, millennial vibe that is also going to attract families. The overall objective is to create a place “that is approachable, pricewise, for everybody (and) … where a community can get together without one person being better than the next,” said Geeraerts, who oversaw the development of a high-end food hall above New York Penn Station.
Office market conundrum: improving economic indicators amidst minimal absorption
Experts see a significant conundrum in the office market, as every economic indicator used to forecast absorption performed at or above the forecast level. Further, closely related macroeconomic variables — such as office-using employment — grew steadily, meaning that more office employees were added without much corresponding space leased over the previous six months. While the first quarter reading of just 1.3 million square feet absorbed may be a one-time anomaly, it cannot be ruled out that a structural shift in the office space market has occurred or is occurring.
Hard Rock CEO Allen hopes new hotel, casino will strike a different tone in Atlantic City
The new Hard Rock Hotel & Casino will open June 28, with a model that aims to set a new standard in Atlantic City. For one thing, the resort will have an added emphasis on entertainment, leveraging Hard Rock’s own vast network of performers to help program the venue and bolster other nongaming revenue streams such as meeting business and hotel stays. But its owners have sought to be different from past generations of New Jersey casinos in another way, focusing on community outreach that they say will continue well past the grand opening.
From the publisher: The strength of a few, a missed opportunity for many
Aside from a handful of top players who dominate the business, there is a noticeable lack of commercial mortgage brokers and mortgage banking firms that are based here in the Garden State. How can that be, in a state that has billions of dollars in mortgages to originate and billions more to refinance?
Editor’s note: Mastering the middle
Even before I started covering commercial real estate full-time, I still came across development stories during my earlier days as a metro reporter in Central Jersey. One of those stories came when I was covering Bound Brook, a borough in Somerset County that had a tired downtown and a history of being battered by flooding from the Raritan River. But in early 2011, we learned that a developer named George Capodagli was interested in building the type of new apartments that were starting to crop up elsewhere in the state.
