City Spotlights: Houston, TX
Welcome back to our City Spotlight series, where we highlight the retail market and demographics in cities where we’ve worked for clients. This month, we want to examine the ever-expanding market of Houston, TX, where we’re helping two clients continue growing in the city’s suburbs.
Why Houston?
Like many cities, Houston has been in a slow recovery from the pandemic. The beginning of 2024 promised vacancies and low expansion. According to a story from ConnectCRE, Houston’s vacancies were mostly from failed chains or stores in the process of closing, like Conn’s, Party City, and Big Lots.
However, even with these worries, occupancy has increased to 95.5 percent, with prospective businesses scooping up some vacant lots. While construction is not as high as pre-pandemic, construction deliveries in 2024 were higher than in 2022—partially attributed to the explosive housing market developing in Houston’s outer belts.
In a December 2024 study, the Greater Houston Partnership found that the number of single-family homes sold topped December 2023’s number by 16.3 percent, and the number of single-family homes on the market in December 2024 was 25.9 percent higher than in December 2023. High housing expansion suggests that commercial and retail growth should soon follow.
One of Houston’s strengths is its acres of empty land around the city. Chris Ziegelmeyer, our Senior Development Project Manager, has worked extensively in Houston and can attest to its constant growth.
“Every time I talk to one of my engineers, they mention master developments in Houston’s suburbs,” he says. “There’s so much land out there, and it’s not real expensive, so these developers can put thousands of homes on thousands of acres and then reserve 10 to 12 acres for commercial needs. That’s where our clients want to be.”
Our clients are bullish on Houston, and their success in the market shows why. Two of our clients are in the suburbs, operating 13 locations each across the city. For one client, STNL Development has built eight locations in and around the city; this work displayed our expertise in Houston, as the second client gave us the reins to develop four new locations.
Interested in developing in Houston? Our deep area knowledge can help you find the right place for your retail business. Contact us at team@stnldevelopment.com for more information.
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