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Briefly Noted

ICSC continues Holiday Watch

As in previous years, ICSC is now issuing its Holiday Watch, which tracks regional mall specialty-store sales throughout the holiday season. The Watch, which began with reports of sales over Thanksgiving weekend, will issue updates each Monday evening on the previous week’s sales through Dec. 27. Information can be found on ICSC’s Website, .

Let the good times roll

Will a real estate downturn come? If so, no one agrees on when. Some institutional real estate investors believe the current economic cycle could shift in six to 12 months, according to Real Estate Outlook, a semiannual survey produced by Cushman & Wakefield and the Appraisal Institute. While a majority (60%) of respondents said that the market was in the middle of the current cycle, a total of 57% of the survey’s respondents said they thought that a shift could take place within one year. However, 39% believed it would take more than one year for the market to shift, while 17% believe that a shift won’t happen for more than two years. (For more on financing trends, see “Finance in the Millennium,” an SCT supplement in this issue.)

Windy City cools a bit

Vacancies in unanchored strip centers led to a slight increase in Chicago-area vacancy rates, according to a CB Richard Ellis survey of properties 50,000 square feet or more. The overall vacancy rate increased slightly during the third quarter, from 8.0% to 8.1% compared with the previous quarter. The slight hike was the second in a row for the region, which had experienced two years of declines. Vacancies in power centers remained steady at 1.3%, while community and neighborhood centers saw vacancies decline from 8.1% to 8.0%.

Halloween scares up holiday sales

Halloween is now the second largest holiday for retailers after Christmas, and The Macerich Co. spent its holiday tracking sales rather than ghosts. A continuation of the Santa Monica, Calif.-based developer’s Maxi-winning “Holidayology” campaign of 1998, the “Boo-ology” survey noted that 85% of the 4,000 shoppers surveyed planned on trick-or-treating this year, while a comparable number (86%) planned on decorating or carving a pumpkin. Shoppers planned to do the bulk of their shopping (largely for costumes, candy, decorations, entertainment and greeting cards) in early to mid-October. Customers were surveyed in mid-September at Macerich malls.

Ringing in the millennium

Looking forward, new millennia call for new clothes, at least according to a survey of Taubman Centers shoppers. More than one out of every three shoppers in the continental United States plans to buy something new to wear to ring in 2000, based on a survey of 4,300 adults in 28 malls coast to coast. In addition, half of the partyers plan to spend more than usual simply because of Y2K. Women plan to spend an average of $254, while men will spend $306. And nearly one in four shoppers plans to buy themed merchandise, ranging from chocolate-filled champagne flutes to Millennium Barbie.

Boom times for Phoenix

Despite a building boom, Phoenix has posted its lowest retail vacancy rate (5.5%) in more than a decade, according to the local office of CB Richard Ellis. Nearby Tempe, Ariz., is doing even better, with a vacancy rate of just 4.9%, the real estate services firm reports.