A panel of top metro Milwaukee commercial real estate industry experts will participate in a free-wheeling discussion about crucial local development sites, projects and issues during BizTimes Media’s annual Commercial Real Estate and Development Conference.

The event will be held on Wednesday, Nov. 19, from 3 p.m. to 6:30 p.m., at the Brookfield Conference Center.

The panelists participating in the discussion will include:

• Linda Gorens-Levey, partner of General Capital Group
• Jeff Hoffman, principal for Cushman & Wakefield | Boerke
• Josh Jeffers, founder and CEO of J. Jeffers & Co.
• Matt Moroney, CEO of Wangard Partners Inc.
• Bruce Westling, managing director for Newmark
• Johnny Vassallo, developer and restaurateur 

Andy Hunt, executive director of the Vieth Institute for Real Estate Leadership at Marquette University will moderate the panel discussion.

The event will also include a presentation of the results of BizTimes Media’s annual survey of members of the Commercial Association of Realtors Wisconsin, by CARW president and CEO Tracy Johnson.

In this year’s survey, area brokers expressed slightly higher sentiment about current market conditions but less optimism looking forward.

Of those surveyed, 48.4% said they see the local commercial real estate market improving, up from 44.3% of those surveyed last year. That’s the highest level since 2021 when 69.1% of those surveyed said the market was improving.

This year, 84.6% of CARW members surveyed said they expect the region’s commercial real estate market to improve in 2026. That’s down from the 91.8% who last year said they expected the market to improve this year.

More CARW members are seeing improvement in the capital markets. This year nearly 44% of those surveyed said the capital markets for commercial real estate are improving, up from 37.7% last year.

Brokers are less impressed this year with the region’s traditionally strong industrial real estate market, which had a third quarter vacancy rate of 5.7%, according to CARW. Only 37.4% of those surveyed said the local industrial market is improving, down from 49.2% last year. This year 57.1% of those surveyed termed the local industrial market as “flat.”

The local office real estate market remains in the doldrums, with vacancy at about 20%, but CARW members are feeling better about it this year. Of those surveyed, 26.4% said the area’s office market is improving, up from 19.7% a year ago. Last year, 29.5% of CARW members said the local office market was declining, compared to 25.3% this year.

Sentiment for the local retail real estate market dipped considerably this year with only 38.5% of CARW members describing it as improving, down from 54.1% last year. CARW says the area’s retail market had a 6.2% vacancy rate in the third quarter.

Brokers are growing increasingly concerned that the metro Milwaukee apartment market is overdeveloped. When asked which sector of the area’s commercial real estate market is most in danger of being overdeveloped, 53.9% of CARW members this year picked apartments, up from 39.4% a year ago.

“In the apartment sector rents are going flat and or trending down,” one survey respondent said.

The second-highest choice of CARW members for overdeveloped local commercial real estate sector remains office space, with 15.4% this year, but that’s down from 24.6% last year.

Of those surveyed this year, 11% said hotels and 7.7% said industrial space.

CARW members’ impression of CRE market conditions

“The concern about overdevelopment in Wisconsin is valid in Racine and Kenosha counties, but it is specific to Class A bulk storage,” one survey respondent said. “Vacancy is significant in spaces over 150,000 square feet. However, even in this region, small-bay facilities are not at risk of overdevelopment. In Waukesha County, demand for space is so strong and opportunities so limited that companies are being pushed into secondary and even tertiary markets.”

Some CARW members expressed concern about the impact of tariffs on the commercial real estate market.

“The U.S. tariffs are a strong wall of cost increases to many development projects, now halting construction projects in Wisconsin,” one survey respondent said.

“Land development has been very challenging due to the capital markets and the uncertainty surrounding the impact of tariffs,” another said.

Sponsors for the Commercial Real Estate and Development Conference include Building Advantage, Husch Blackwell and Johnson Financial Group.

Marquette University’s Vieth Institute for Real Estate Leadership and CARW are event partners.