According to the professionals at CBRE in El Paso, the number of “active users” seeking space in the Ciudad Juarez real-estate market has seen a significant rise in recent years.

Tecma Group of Companies:

Hello. Welcome to another installation of Tecma Talk Podcasts. These are recorded conversations during which we discuss issues that have to do with manufacturing in Mexico, and related topics. Today we have the incredible pleasure of having two fine gentlemen with us. They happen to work for CBRE, which is a company that operates in the Ciudad Juarez commercial real-estate market, as well as others. We have with us Pedro Nino, Jr. and Andres Sandoval. Gentlemen, how are you today?

CBRE:

We are doing well. Thank you for having us. Thank you again for the invitation.

Tecma Group of Companies:

Either Pedro or Andres, could you tell us a little bit about CBRE, before we move on to questions about the commercial real-estate market in Ciudad Juarez?

CBRE:

Absolutely, this is Pedro. CBRE is a global, full service real-estate company. We handle everything from leases and purchases to financing. A to Z is our line in terms of commercial and industrial real-estate in Ciudad Juarez, and worldwide. We have over fifty thousand employees all over the globe. Our office in El Paso is a little smaller, but we are focused on both sides of the border, this being El Paso and Ciudad Juarez. We also handle the Rio Grande Valley in McAllen and Reynosa. More recently, we have also been very active in Chihuahua City, so the border demographic is our focus here out of El Paso with CBRE.

Tecma Group of Companies:

Thank you for that overview of CBRE. Now, to start things off, let’s concentrate on taking a look at a 30,000 foot overview, and a snapshot of the market for industrial real-estate in Ciudad Juarez. Please give us a bird’s eye view of what is happening there now.

CBRE:

This is Andres. The Ciudad Juarez industrial market is measured in square feet. It is about a 64.5 million square foot market, which consists of about five hundred and fifty industrial buildings. If the El Paso industrial real-estate market is added to that, the two markets combined are about one hundred and twenty million square feet.

Of course, Ciudad Juarez is known as the “birthplace” of the maquiladora industry. Things got started in the late 1960s. Today Ciudad Juarez has the largest industrial real-estate market on the US-Mexico border. This is both in terms of square footage and employees. As you know, the Ciudad Juarez area has a strong presence of a diversity of industries. These include automotive manufacturers, makers of medical devices and electronics, and appliances. There are manufacturers that are in the Ciudad Juarez industrial real-estate market that are from all over the world. They are mainly from the United States, but we also have companies from places like Japan, Taiwan, Germany, Sweden, Italy, and France. So, it’s a very diverse market, and, of course, it is a very important part of North America’s manufacturing base because of labor costs and location on the US border. Also, we have a very sophisticated industrial real-estate market in terms of both developers and owners of real-estate, as well as contractors and construction companies.

Tecma Group of Companies:

Thank you. That was a fairly comprehensive overview. Let’s start the questions regarding the Ciudad Juarez industrial market by first taking a look back and then, a look forward. We would like to hear your expert opinion on the topic of what we can expect to see going forward, but first what about 2015? At the end of the year, when you reviewed your information what did you see in terms of vacancy rates, for example, net absorption, and the cost of renting. What kind of things were being developed? Was there a lot of construction going on?

CBRE:

If you recall, the last time we did a similar podcast, we were praising the market for the tu[...]