Category Archive : Investing

LAS VEGAS, NV – Businesswoman, writer, and famed television personality Martha Stewart has announced that she will be opening a restaurant at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel and Casino, which is planning to demolish part of the existing building to make room to accommodate the new eatery.

The information for the new venture was obtained via paperwork for a construction permit for the facility, which is currently named simply “Martha Stewart Restaurant,” but will most likely obtain a more colorful moniker later on. The restaurant is slated to take the place of the recently-closed Martorano’s, a South Philadelphia-inspired eatery.

Stewart will not be the only celebrity to have a restaurant at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel and Casino; instead, she will find herself in the company of Gordon Ramsay Steak – an ultramodern spot serving dishes such as beef Wellington in a “boisterous British setting” – and Brioche by Guy Savoy, a sweet and savory grab-and-go brioche shop offering delectable flaky French pastries.

In addition, this winter will see Paris Las Vegas also open the Vanderpump à Paris, a cocktail bar by British restaurateur, designer, television personality Lisa Vanderpump.

Stewart’s previous attempt at entering the restaurant field was in New York City when she opened the Martha Stewart Café in 2015, which permanently closed its doors for business in 2019.

Caesars Entertainment – the owner of Paris Las Vegas – has yet to officially announce Stewart’s restaurant, nor have any announcements been made in regards to the type of cuisine the establishment plans to serve or its anticipated opening date, but word will likely come soon as construction permits have already been applied for.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – The Southwest Las Vegas Valley will be seeing a new $500 million mixed-use campus being constructed in the near future, situated upon an area that was previously home to an aborted attempt at development after the mid-2000’s economy crash that has sat vacant ever since.

The project, dubbed Evora, is slated to be developed by Joe Sorge, whose resume features ownership of a gene analysis company and a producer’s credit on a Netflix comedy – unusual credits for someone looking to develop a mixed-use real estate venture – and will feature apartments, office space, and restaurants.

Evora will be located on a 42-acre plot of property on Buffalo Drive between Post Road and Patrick Lane, and construction is already in the works. Once completed – which Sorge has stated will take approximately five years – the campus will boast an apartment complex with 1,343 units, 240,000 square feet of commercial space, and underground parking garage.

Sorge indeed possesses experience in the apartment complex development game; he previously was responsible for building Evo, a luxury apartment complex that he sold for over $100 million prior to the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic.

With the demand for rental properties ever-increasing in Las Vegas as the city’s economy continues to recover from both the recession and the pandemic, more and more developers are getting in on mixed-use projects; UnCommons, also being constructed in the southwest valley, will offer 40 acres of apartments, restaurants, and office space.

However, despite the recent increase in investment in mixed-use properties in Las Vegas, these ventures are typically more difficult to acquire funding for, Sorge said, and there are other hurdles to overcome as well once the project has been completed, including difficulty leasing units if the economy hasn’t recovered causing tenants to go bankrupt and not pay rent.

However, Sorge is forging ahead despite the risks, and has noted that Evora will offer a “resort lifestyle” for tenants, with apartments from 700 to 1,500 square feet and rents from $1,600 to $3,200 a month and numerous amenities that will include a 1-mile perimeter walking trail, saunas and steam rooms, pickleball and tennis courts, and a yoga studio.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – The housing market in Las Vegas has been setting records for months, thanks in part to cheap money in the form of low-interest mortgages and a serious increase in buyers from out of state – many from California, who are looking for investment opportunities, and when you put those two factors together, you get a town that is on-course to becoming the house-flipping capital of the country.

Southern Nevada has been described by experts as an “extreme seller’s market” as of late, so when it comes to flipping a home – that is, buying it, renovating it, and then selling it for a profit – competition can be fierce for buyers; however, when it comes to selling, these homes are often going for more than their asking prices.

The demand for housing in Las Vegas –  and indeed, across the United States – is such that it has given birth to a new flipping phenomenon known as “iBuyers,” or “instant buyers,” which are people who will buy a home, make “light repairs,” and then “quickly resell” them for a profit. Oftentimes a buyer will have offers within 24 hours of listing a property, reports say, and often they will be in the form of cash due to the influx of wealthy out-of-state investors.

Investors have been snapping up homes across the country in recent months, but the focus as of late appears to specifically be Southern Nevada. Reports say that residential real estate investors purchased 3,043 homes in the Las Vegas area in the second quarter of 2021, which represents a whopping increase of 279 percent from the second quarter of 2020 – the highest year-over-year increase nationally – when the market was being negatively impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nearly 23 percent of all homes bought in Southern Nevada during the first quarter of 2021 were by investors, reports say, and the region was ranked fifth nationally among 41 metro areas in the number of investor purchases.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – The Blackstone Group, an investment management company based in New York City, is reportedly going to be putting the Cosmopolitan resort of Las Vegas up for sale, and their hefty asking price is said to be at least $5 billion, if not more.

Two years ago, Blackstone had attempted to sell the Cosmopolitan for a $4 billion asking price, but at the time found no takers, yet as time went by and the COVID-19 pandemic took hold of the country, prices of casinos have nonetheless continued to rise as investment firms have often bought them and then split the costs with management firms they bring in to run things.

Some real estate experts have speculated that a potential taker for Blackstone’s offer may be Apollo Global Management Inc., which has been purchasing casinos globally; MGM Resorts International is also being talked about as a possible partner and property manager, although there have been no official statements from either organization confirming this.

The Cosmopolitan, which encountered financial difficulty during its $3.9 billion construction phase due to the mid-2000’s recession, finally opened its doors for business in 2010; it was later sold by owner Deutsche Bank AG who would then sell the resort for $1.73 billion to Blackstone in 2014.

The Cosmopolitan is located just south of the Bellagio on the west side of Las Vegas Boulevard, between CityCenter and the Blackstone-owned Bellagio casino. The resort consists of two high-rise towers – the Boulevard Tower and the Chelsea Tower – and features 3,027 rooms, a 110,000 square-foot casino, 300,000 square-feet of retail and restaurant space, a spa and fitness facility, a 3,200-seat theater, and 150,000 square-feet of meeting and convention space.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – A real estate firm from Atlanta, Georgia has gotten into the highly competitive Southern Nevada rental marketplace with the recent announcement they have purchased two large apartment complexes located in the east-side of the Las Vegas Valley.

The firm, known as Carroll, noted that they had acquired the Emerald Springs, a 436-unit complex, in addition to The Meadows, a 383-unit building situated only three miles away and located on the very same road, which is Nellis Boulevard; Emerald Springs is near Bonanza Road, and The Meadows is near Desert Inn Road.

While Carroll did not mention the amount the firm paid for the two apartment complexes, public records from Clark County reveal that the properties sold for a combined total of $163.25 million.

Investors have been buying rental properties in Las Vegas in droves as of late, fueled by low borrowing costs and a demand from consumers moving to the city for its flourishing job market and relatively low cost of living. Records indicate that 10,424 Las Vegas apartments were purchased by investors in 2021 through the month of July, in comparison with the same period of time in 2020, was only 3,065 acquired. 

David Perez, Carroll’s chief operating officer, confirmed in a statement to media that both Emerald Springs and The Meadows are currently 96 percent occupied when the purchases took place, ending a three or four-year quest on the part of the firm to find the right rental space in the Las Vegas area to invest in.

Carroll also has rental holdings in the western region of the U.S. and that Las Vegas has proved an especially attractive city to invest in as its economy is still in the process of recovering from the pandemic and tourists – which are a driving force of Vegas’ financial well-being – are finally starting to coming back.

Also, in contrast to the rising rent rates in Vegas as of late – the average rent jumped 22.7% year over year in July – Perez noted that while maintenance will be improved at the two properties, the firm is not looking to raise rates for tenants in an effort to provide affordable housing.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – Right before the COVID-19 pandemic hit and turned everything upside down, health and fitness company Life Time Inc. had purchased a large empty pit in Las Vegas – right next to Ikea – with plans of transforming the holdover from the mid-2000’s recession into a high-end health club.

However, the pandemic – with its subsequent lockdowns and other health-related restrictions – effectively put a wrench into the works, but Life Time has recently announced that plans for the health club are still going forward.

A Life Time spokeswoman has confirmed – but also noted that plans could still change – that construction on the oft-delayed project is slated to finally begin in the spring of 2022, with hopes of a late 2023 opening for the health club.

The 15-acre plot, located at the southeast corner of Sunset Road and Durango Drive, would take the form of a 60 foot-tall, three-story “athletic resort destination” coming in at a sizable 125,500 square feet. Amenities for club members would include weightlifting, indoor and outdoor pools, fitness classes, sport courts, spa and salon services, and more, according to documents originally submitted to Clark County in 2020 for Life Time’s Southwest Valley Club.

The site of the project was originally planned to have been utilized by a different developer for a high-rise apartment complex in the mid-2000’s, but the burst of the housing bubble derailed those plans and the property – located in a rapidly-goring section of Vegas between Summerlin and Henderson –  has sat vacant ever since.

Health clubs have been one of the more financially beleaguered industries during the pandemic due to government-mandated lockdown orders issued to curb the spread of COVID-19. Even after gyms were allowed to reopen, mandated mask policies and other health requirements resulted in many club members remaining leery about returning there to work out.

However, a Time Life spokesperson has noted that the company has seen “solid consumer demand for our offerings” and is “very pleased as we’ve emerged from the past 17 months.”

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – Last week, the United States Supreme Court’s decision to overrule the Biden Administration’s latest eviction moratorium – originally enacted to avoid homelessness in the midst of the COVUD-19 pandemic – is nonetheless a prime example of being far too little in the face of far too much, reports say.

The Supreme Court found that the decision of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to enact a new eviction ban during the COVID-19 pandemic without the express approval of congressional legislation was essentially illegal, despite its well-meaning intentions of avoiding homelessness that could contribute to additional spikes in infections due to the new Delta COVID variant.

However, while eviction cases that have been held in limbo will now be allowed to finally continue, multiple landlords are saying that – due to myriad eviction bans that have allowed some tenants to live rent-free in their homes for over a year – the Supreme Court’s decision may essentially amount to too little, too late.

The majority of landlords in the United States are not large corporate entities, but small mom-and-pop originations that relied on their rental incomes to support their retirements; but after a year of no income and requirements that nonetheless forced them to provide upkeep without any return, many of them are facing financial ruin regardless of the Supreme Court decision.

James Bathgate, a landlord in California, notes that federal rent relief funds have been trickling out ineffectually over the last few months, and will likely never fully cover the immense losses that they have faced due to draconian eviction moratoriums over the past year.

“We had to sell the property because I couldn’t afford it every month, not getting any income from rent and being forced to take $3,000 a month expenses on the property,” Bathgate said. “Is the government going to now pay me $70,000 that they stole from me? I doubt it.”

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – It seems that that real estate in Las Vegas is getting so in-demand that even the shell of a burnt-out house will sell in near record-setting time. A scorched and gutted one-story home, located off Cheyenne Avenue east of Interstate 15,  features numerous boarded-up windows and no roof, back door, or many walls to speak of, but that didn’t stop a buyer from swooping right on in and picking it up as if it was a brand-new luxury condo.

After the (former) residence was listed on the open market on July 22, six buyers almost immediately submitted offers for it, and while four of them attempted to low-ball the owner – who listed the property as an “investment opportunity” – two agreed to his asking price of $90,000 for the burnt-out wreck of a house. Currently, the owner is under contract to sell to one of the investors.

Thanks to low interest rate home loans, investors have been snapping up homes in the Southern Nevada region for months, with 3,000 having been sold in the second quarter of 2021; this represents a whopping increase of 280 percent from the second quarter of 2020, when sales dropped during the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The owner of the burnt-out house, which was constructed in 1963, had originally acquired the property last September several months after it had burnt down due to a fire. Originally, the man planned on using the remains of the home – which are still in usable condition, and building a new home upon them. However, the owner said he found himself with too many other projects at the time, coupled with the fact that contractors are in high demand right now.

Finding himself on a waiting list for rebuilding the home that could have taken months, he instead decided to take his chances on listing it in hopes that individuals who specialize in rebuilding homes would be interested in picking it up, which is exactly what happened.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NY – Tower 16 Capital Partners, a real estate investment and management company based out of San Diego, has recently sold a three-property group of apartment buildings located in Las Vegas for the whopping total of $182 million, according to reports.

The three apartment buildings in question include Accent on Rainbow, a 540-unit complex located at 6666 W. Washington Avenue; Accent on Decatur, a 313-unit complex at 2950 S. Decatur Boulevard; and Accent on Sahara, a 312-unit complex at 4801 E. Sahara Avenue.

All three buildings are multifamily communities with each having multiple resident amenities, including pools, a workout gym, a clubhouse and more. In addition, Accent on Sahara also features a children’s play area and a dog park.

Tower 16 originally bought all three properties over two years ago for a total of $112 million, and then invested an additional $10.3 million in renovations across all three buildings, including improvements made to leasing offices, adding amenities, and upgrading approximately 40 percent of the apartment units. The undisclosed buyer will be continuing to invest into the renovation efforts of all three properties, according to reports.

Tyler Pruett, a Tower 16 co-founder, noted that the three properties needed some TLC to get them into proper shape for a sale.

“We are excited to announce the successful sale of our Las Vegas portfolio to a very strong and reputable buyer,” he said. “Upon our acquisition, all three assets needed significant physical and management improvement, which we quickly implemented at all three properties. The result was an extraordinary execution, far surpassing our goals for the properties.”

Mike Farley, another Tower 16 co-founder, said that Las Vegas is an ideal city to invest in multifamily rental properties, and that his company would continue to do so in the future.

“Las Vegas has proven to be a very strong market for multifamily, especially in the workforce housing space,” he said. “We remain enthusiastic about the future of Las Vegas and will continue to look for new acquisition opportunities in the marketplace.”

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

NORTH LAS VEGAS, NV – Reports indicate that a prominent real estate developer that specializes in warehouses has purchased a huge stretch of land in North Las Vegas with plans to develop a large-scale industrial park for use by e-commerce firms and other companies.

350 acres were bought for $44.75 million by VanTrust Real Estate, which noted in a press release announcing the deal that was the one of the largest in recent years by a private developer in the Southern Nevada region.

The property was sold by Southern Nevada land investor and broker Mason Harvey, and according to property records the sale closed on March 31.

Work on the project’s initial infrastructure phase is slated to commence this fall and will make up approximately 1.5 million square feet; this phase of construction is expected to be completed in 2023, at which point the second phase will begin.

Currently, the final completion date for the industrial park has yet to be announced.

In recent years, the industrial component of Las Vegas’ construction has been expanding and increasing, with many developers concentrating on building warehouses that end up housing businesses such as distribution centers for e-commerce firms. The allure of developing these projects in Southern Nevada is due to the large amounts of land available and the low prices and cost of living when compared to many other regions of the United States.

VanTrust has completed several such warehouse facilities in North Las Vegas in recent years, with big companies such as Amazon, The Honest Company, Sephora, and Fanatics among those that have moved in to establish distribution centers there.

VanTrust’s overall construction in North Las Vegas is comprised of 5.5 million square feet, all of which has been quickly sold, with their most recent sale being the $110 million sale of an 855,000-square-foot Amazon warehouse to an investment firm in Los Angeles.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV –  The single most significant purchase one may make in their lifetime is a home. With that being the case, it may seem unusual that often times, this purchase will be made without ever setting foot inside the property, but in today’s “new normal” ushered in by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, it’s something more and more people are doing.

According to Las Vegas Weekly, in 2020, 63 percent of the homes sold in the United States were sold without the buyers ever having seen them in-person, which represents a unique development in the real estate industry; generally, this is attributed to random instances such as buyers from outside the region. However, more and more Las Vegas real estate agents are giving prospective buyers tours of properties via video; some of them are forced to do so out of heath COVID-related worries, but many are also due to the popularity of Southern Nevada real estate with those looking to take advantage of its affordability.

For example, one real estate agent recently gave a video tour of a Vegas home to a military couple stationed in the Middle East who were hoping to secure a residence in anticipation of returning to the United States.

It continues to be a “seller’s market” in Las Vegas, despite the pandemic and its resultant recession; the reason for this is low interest rates on home loans combined with and affordable cost of living and a small amount of inventory on the open market. The result is a competitive marketplace for properties – with regularly raising prices – that people are willing to circumvent conventional real estate processes for.

That said, buyers should be reminded to not rush into a perceived good deal too quickly; be judgmental of any and all pictures you may be presented with, and always question anything you may be wary of; it’s better to get these potential issue settled in the here and now than saddle yourself with a home you may regret for the next decade.

Always remember – it’s expected to remain a competitive “seller’s market” in Las Vegas in 2021, and with desirable properties getting purchased fast, it still makes sense to learn everything you can about a property – even if it’s virtually, before quickly snapping it up.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.

LAS VEGAS, NV – According to reports, while Las Vegas has been making waves in the real estate world for its steadily rising home prices despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic – raising concerns over affordability if they continue to go up – prices are nonetheless rising much faster in many other cities, highlighting the current low cost of living in Southern Nevada.

Prices of homes in Las Vegas have gone up 6.8 percent from November 2010 to November 2020, which while an impressive feat, nonetheless falls well below the national year-over-year average of 9.5 percent, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller index released by S&P Dow Jones Indices.

Indeed, among the 19 markets examined for the index, Phoenix, Arizona was the region with the fastest-rising home prices, and has steadfastly held that position for the past 18 months; in contrast, Las Vegas’ growth – while still very healthy, especially given the financial impact of the pandemic – was the market with the slowest-rising prices in the index.

Experts say the reason Las Vegas is not higher on that list is due to the fact that the city’s main industry is tourism, which has been devastated by the pandemic; jobs related to that industry have experienced huge losses.

However, despite the economic turmoil that Vegas has experienced, pace of its home price increases have broken several records over the course of the past year due to demand, low mortgage rates, and the overall low cost of living. Reports indicate that numerous home-buyers, many from out of state, have swooped into Southern Nevada to take advantage, and that the intense competition for homes is not expected to slow down any time soon.

The median sales price for homes in Las Vegas was an all-time record high $345,000 for both November and December 2020, which represents a 10.2 percent from the same period of time in 2019.

Shelter Realty is a Real Estate and Property Management Company specializing in the areas of Henderson, Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, NV. Feel free to give us a call at 702.376.7379 so we can answer any questions you may have.