Retail Outlook Stays Strong Despite Quarterly Reports

Jeff Rinkov is the CEO of Lee & Associates.

LOS ANGELES—The retail sector lagged in the first quarter of the year, paralleling the slow economic growth and consumer spending, according to the 1Q16 retail report from Lee & Associates, which GlobeSt.com has obtained exclusively. It wasn’t necessarily bad news—the sector positive net absorption and an unchanged vacancy rate at 5.6%—but does tell a different story than the substantial amount a retail investment we have seen from investors at the beginning of the year, like InvenTrust, which has been aggressively acquiring retail properties in key markets across the country. Despite the apathetic growth, the outlook for the market remains strong.

“I am still a big believer that malls drive foot traffic and that they drive the family experience, and they are still centers and destination places, even if it is now based around movie theaters and restaurants,” Jeff Rinkov, CEO of Lee & Associates, tells GlobeSt.com. “I still think malls are going to continue to be places where families and people congregate.”