7. Assessing CRE Risk, The Next Steps for Hotel Loans, The Future of Retail and the Amazon Effect

More than half of the states are now moving toward a reopening, but we’re still dealing with news of increased infections and economic data that tells us we have a long way to go toward a recovery. Jobless claims fell slightly to 3.2 million last week and the markets reacted positively to that slight decline. In all, more than 33 million are out of work and with lockdowns lifted, all eyes in the CRE world are on retail and lodging  performance. In this week’s episode, we discuss how we assess CRE risk moving forward, the next steps in the recovery for hotels, the future of retail and the Amazon effect, takeaways from Warren Buffett and Sam Zell, performance in the corporate loan market and more. Episode Notes: Takeaways from this week’s macroeconomic data (0:55) Words of wisdom from the Oracle of Omaha Warren Buffett and Sam Zell (4:03) Retailer bankruptcies keep coming (8:13) How can brick and mortar continue to compete with Amazon? (10:51) Hotel performance and what happens next? (16:58) Assessing CRE risk moving forward (23:17) Looking at performance in the corporate loan market (30:15) The human impact of the COVID-19 crisis (35:04) Coping in our work from home environments (38:44)