News from the Chicago Chapter

The Year Ahead – Forecast On 2021

Steve Schimmel, CPM®
IREM Chicago 2021 President

Commercial properties are going to have a period of “leveling” next year from the whiplash brought on by the uncertainty resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Many mom and pop landlords will struggle to recover from the financial losses resulting from tenants that went out of business. 

Backfilling these spaces will be difficult with the large number of small businesses that have failed -- and are expected to fail -- in the coming months and into 2021. Continued restrictions on business activities will produce additional business failures, reduced values, loan defaults, and rising unemployment. To prepare for the challenges ahead, property owners and managers and businessmen and women must all pivot in their thinking and approach to get through the pandemic.

IREM Chicago is over 600 property managers strong, and this network of professionals representing major asset classes has value.  Each of these mangers has been impacted in a different way -- especially since the start of the pandemic in March.  Each manager has had to find efficiencies and learn to work in new ways that they were not accustomed to in the past. 

This forced growth that each us has undertaken is valuable knowledge that can be positioned to benefit members, the profession, and the assets we are charged with managing.  We want to engage our membership in new ways that will allow us to connect better and share our experiences and expertise with each other so that we all can benefit and succeed. 

Now onto a different topic. We all can use some diversion these days, some way to recharge and re-energize. To break away from increased work responsibilities brought on by the pandemic, I take to the sky. I am a commercial rated pilot and love to be anywhere in the mountains or near a lake.