It is always great to go to a conference and see colleagues and friends from around the country. This year, the CCIM Live 2012 was in Las Vegas, NV. After a flurry of business meetings and board meetings, the conference was kicked off by the Mayor of Las Vegas, Mayor Carolyn Goodman.
Mayor Goodman did a great job of kicking off the event with a where has Vegas been the past few years and the optimistic outlook on where they are now and where they are going.
The next session discussed CityCenter, the new development project by MGM Resorts. Jim Murren did a great job talking about the project. Some of the key takeways from this session:
-MGM Resorts owns 740 Acres along Las Vegas Blvd
-MGM owns about 42,000 rooms in Las Vegas
-City Center is Gold LEED certification – the energy savings could power 50,000 homes
-Crystals at City Center is about 500,000 SF of Retail and currently doing over $1,000/SF in Sales
In regards to the Commercial Financing Session, the biggest concerns for the panelist were the loans that are coming due in 2016. They estimate that those are the properties that have maturities that were financed at the peak of the market and currently overleveraged. One of the panelists made a comment that this feels like the big anticipation that was in 2000 for the Y2K computer issue. In his opinion, he believes that it will work itself out.
Overall, the conference was great! It is always good to see fellow CCIMs from around the world and talk about what is going on in their markets.
If you attended CCIM Live, what did you think?