Parking Lot Demand Flat Lines

Jonathan Genton

Demand for parking lots is falling. While this may not be earth-shattering news—we have heard for years now that the potential for driverless cars and public transit will make parking lots obsolete in the future—what is surprising is the cause. Ride-sharing services like Uber are already decreasing demand for parking lots, today. As a result, parking lots have started to fall off investment radar, which is an asset class that has been a popular niche in a car market like Los Angeles.

“We are starting to see demand for parking lots start to fall away. We can only attribute a lot of that to Uber and other ride sharing services,” Jonathan Genton, founding partner and CEO of Genton Property Group, tells GlobeSt.com. “Those services make customers approach that product type differently.” As a result, it has become less advantageous for investors to own parking lots, generally, because the demand is falling.”