Global Site Selection: Beyond the US, Europe or Japan
Is institutional capital shifting focus globally away from traditional office buildings to more resilient property types, such as industrial (warehouses, logistics), residential, data centers, and life sciences facilities — which are better aligned with economic and demographic trends.
Or is it rather an internal US trend?
3,100+ projects landed in 2025 in the 30 US metros listed among the Top 10 by total projects in each of three population tiers. With 600+ corporate end-user facility projects qualified for Site Selection’s Conway Projects Database in 2025, Chicagoland again ranked #1 in the United States, just ahead of Greater Houston (590 projects) and Dallas-Fort Worth (410).
Asset Repurposing: After years of “pretend and extend” strategies following the pandemic, US-focused lenders and owners are now selling through foreclosures and bankruptcies, recognizing that a full return to office occupancy is unlikely. The low purchase prices are finally making large-scale redevelopment financially viable. Developers are acquiring these distressed towers to convert them into residential units, urban farms, or educational facilities.
When selecting sites in the world’s fastest-growing cities, population-wise (e.g., Lagos, Mumbai, Ho Chi Minh City, Dar es Salaam), the framework shifts.
Magnetism Saturation: A city like Bengaluru (Projected population 18M+ by 2030) attracts massive foreign direct investment ($76B Greenfield FDI in India in 2024). This is Magnetism. Contrast this with Lagos, where growth is massive but FDI is often stymied by currency volatility — growth without magnetism.
Conversion Velocity: In distressed US markets, the $4M office building is a “zombie asset” until zoning permits change. In high-magnetism hubs like Ho Chi Minh City, the pivot from labor-intensive manufacturing to high-tech logistics is happening at 2.5x the speed of many US regulatory cycles.
Why US Project Count Growth Loses to Global Population Magnets
The headlines celebrate “3,100 projects” across US metros, but the raw project count is a vanity metric. To understand where the next decade of value will be created, we have to look past the number of ribbons cut and analyze the source of the check.
Asset Repurposed: A $170M Lesson
The US office market is no longer in a “slump”; it is in a terminal liquidation.
Chicago: A 485,000-square-foot office building recently sold for $4 million — a staggering 94% drop from its $68.1 million sale price a decade ago.
Denver: The Denver Energy Center, a two-building complex, changed hands for just $5.3 million — more than 90% below its 2013 purchase price of $176 million.
Washington, DC: The federal government sold a 940,000-square-foot vacant building to a developer for $24 million.
The “pretend and extend” era is dead. Institutional capital is fleeing these “zombie towers” and moving toward resilient infra (data centers, industrial logistics, and life sciences). But the real story isn’t just what they are buying — it’s where the “fresh” capital is and will be landing.
Global Magnetism vs. Domestic Churn
While Chicagoland leads the US with 600+ projects, and Houston follows with 590, these are largely domestic plays. Contrast this with the ecosystem magnetism of the world’s fastest-growing population hubs:
Bengaluru/Hyderabad: India attracted $76B in greenfield FDI in 2024, surpassing the UK and Germany. This isn’t just “growth” — it’s global capital betting on IP and high-tech manufacturing.
Dubai: Logged 1,491 greenfield FDI projects in 2025. More “new” international entry than the top three US metros combined.
Ho Chi Minh City: FDI reached $8.37B in 2025 (up 24%). Crucially, the capital is shifting from “cheap labor” to digital infrastructure in Vietnam, including a recent $2B data center partnership.
Your site selection framework going forward?
- In the US, a lot of you folks are playing a game of asset repurposing — turning $4M zombie towers into urban farms or residential units. Globally, you would be playing a game of ecosystem magnetism — entering markets where international capital is creating new infrastructure from the ground up.
- In many US metros, the cost of bringing the building to code for residential use often exceeds the cost of new construction. The $4M price tag isn’t a deal; it’s the market’s way of saying the building is a Net Present Value Negative asset.
- Cities like Kinshasa and Lagos are growing faster than Bangalore but still have a fraction of the FDI magnetism. Needless to say, population without policy fluidity is a liability, not an asset.
Are you attracted to Project Counts or Capital Intensity?
