PHOENIX—More than 200 attended the RealShare PhoenixMetro conference last week at the Phoenician inScottsdale. Jim Mahoney, senior managing director,Trammell Crow Company, moderated the panel,Development: East Valley, West Valley, and Beyond. Panelistsincluded Mark Singerman, vice president andregional director for Arizona, Rockefeller GroupDevelopment Corporation; Molly Carson,vice president of development, RYAN Companies;Fred Stiles, regional director, EJMDevelopment; and Orion Alcalay, executivevice president of due diligence services, AEIConsultants.

Stiles said he had seen more industrial activity in the last fewmonths than in the past six years. “Activity is good. We'veincreased asking rents once if not twice. We're not approaching therents we had in 2007, but we'll get there.”

“We haven't oversupplied the market,” Singerman said of theoffice sector. “Phoenix is a boom or bust market. The fact that therecovery is muted is healthy. The majority of vacancy isnoncontiguous. The number of large projects in the pipeline isrelatively small. I'm hoping that in 2015, small to medium sizedbusinesses will get off the fence and take some of thosenoncontiguous spaces. There has been a sense of uncertainty aboutCongress that has held back those small to medium sized businesses.We hit tons of singles and doubles in this market. Occasionally wehit a home run; but you win the ball game on singles anddoubles.”