The testing covered several areas on the shale, which lies beneath Dallas and Fort Worth and about 20 counties and has been the site of a drilling boom that …

SolarWinds acquires Dallas company

Tek-Tools, which is privately held, has 60 employees in Dallas and Chennai, India. Most are expected to join SolarWinds, officials said. …

Report: Post-bankruptcy issues cost Dallas $757M

In 2009, alerts were filed on 4764 Dallas properties, up 21 percent from the previous year. This means about $757.9 million of real estate was impacted by …

TI Boosts Spending on Assembly and RFAB

With all of its major markets now in recovery mode, Texas Instruments (TI, Dallas) is expanding its assembly and test capacity and has a pilot line up and …

White Rock Coffee to open second branch at Mockingbird & Abrams in Dallas

White Rock Coffee, the mom-and-pop independent coffeehouse in Lake Highlands, is opening a second branch in Hillside Village at …

After three months of shrinking obligations, the stimulus pipeline is beginning to fill up again. The latest numbers from Recovery.gov show that stimulus money “in process”—funds committed to specific projects, but not yet spent—has started to tick upward again. ProPublica reported two weeks ago that the amount of money in process had peaked at $172 billion in October, only to fall consistently through the rest of the year.

But that trend has now reversed, at least for the moment. After dipping below $150 billion in last week’s numbers, the amount of stimulus money in process has now risen to $157 billion. That seems to be the result of federal agencies’ obligating more of their stimulus appropriations to specific projects: in the latest numbers, the amount of stimulus money that agencies have yet to obligate has fallen to $251 billion, from $267 billion last week

Source: Propublica.org

Interactive Chart: How Fast We’re Spending the Stimulus Package

The Dallas-based chip maker’s results were helped by a 27% jump in sales of analog chips, used in everything from cellphones and manufacturing equipment. …

Dallas Fed: Texas manufacturing activity expands again

Texas factory improved in January, according to business executives responding to the Dallas Fed’s Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey, providing another …

AT&T Wi-Fi Handles More Than 85 Million Total Connections in 2009, More Than …

AT&T’s mobile broadband customers are increasingly using the company’s Wi-Fi network – the nation’s largest – to …

The remaining terms, F-Z, will be posted to this site in February.  If you are in need of construction terms, costs, Greater Houston contractors, architects or need an evaluation of your current space for renewal, subleasing, or relocation, please call:

‎Energy was a good place to be for Dallas-Fort Worth companies seeking venture capital last year, making it the star …

Southwest Airlines comes out ahead for ’09

Southwest Airlines Co. said Thursday it earned $116 million last quarter and $99 million for the year, …

Pickens’ natural-gas plan may prove boon to truck builders

T. Boone Pickens, founder and chairman of Dallas-based BP Capital LLC, said converting the US trucking industry to natural gas will benefit manufacturers …

Businesses vacating Four Corners area, for other cities

‎Carrollton, Dallas and Addison are all a short shopping jaunt away. But Farmers Branch officials want to change driving patterns. Get folks to shop locally. .

The companies in order of ranking:

2nd Edward Jones – 37,079 employees

10th Camden Property Trust – 1,743 employees

17th Methodist Hospital System – 11,145 employees

18th Whole Foods Market – 47,478 employees

33rd Shared Technologies – 1,243 employees

36th Container Store – 3,233 employees

39th TDIndustries – 1,588 employees

44th Ernst & Young – 24,815 employees

45th USAA – 21,999 employees

67th EOG Resources – 1,725 employees

76th Balfour Beatty Construction – 1,514 employees

87th National Instruments – 2,568 employees

91st FedEx – 218,770 employees

To note: Of this grouping, the highest salaries were found at EOG Resources, Ernst & Young, Shared Technologies, Methodist, and USAA.

Blockbuster Inc. said Thursday that weaker-than-expected holiday rentals and sales will result in …

Dallas-area cancer researchers to get $17.4 million in state grants

Texas has awarded its first $61 million in cancer research grants, with Dallas-area scientists …

Dallas-Fort Worth new car sales fell 29.9% in 2009

‎The recession cut deeply into local new car and truck sales last year, which fell a dramatic 29.9 percent – one of …

Top execs at Parkland hospital rake in nearly $2 million in incentive pay

Top executives at Parkland Memorial Hospital collected about $1.7 million in bonuses at the end of last year, …

Dallas commercial real estate landlords will see the largest amount of vacancy losses in 2010 than ever in the city’s history.

The reasons for another dramatic decline in leasing activity are as such:

Small business leasing activity, which was tepid in the final months of 2009, remained active up to the summer of last year.   But, in the very late stages of 2009 to the present, small business leasing activity has become virtually non-existent.  Because local and national gains in employment have primarily come from the service sectors, it is understandable that when money’s movement slows, there is a trickle-down type of effect, that affects businesses that rely on “activity” to survive.  So, small businesses that are responsible for over 65% of employ in the city, of which is over 80% service-oriented, are feeling the pressure.  Some think that a slowing in the market is a good thing for leasing activity, as companies will downsize and adjust their expenses to a more moderate level.  This could not be farther from the truth, as most business owners and brokers will attest that a move carries a heavy burden on a company’s time and expenses, advertising, marketing, operations, and community relations – in a healthy business environment.

Most Dallas “bigs” are choosing stay put or shed space themselves via subleasing – space leased directly by the tenant, rather than the landlord.   As recent reseach via REIS indicates, subleasing of space is around 6.5 million square feet and, we feel, is spiking in the Dallas/FW area.  The main reason subleasing is of such great quantity now, stems from the tremendous run of business to upgrade their professional appearance and space requirements in the years of 2005-2008, to which rental rates increased dramatically.  Additional space, necessary or unnecessary during this period of time, was kept for future growth.   So, with the added office space in many of our overpriced pockets of Dallas, it will likely be 2011, possibly 2012, before it will be absorbed or given back all together.  Keep in mind, 2012/13 will also see the greatest amount of lease expirations, ever.

Another reason for the slowing of leasing activity will be the difficulty in obtaining financing – across the board.  More specifically and importantly, while city is in a merger/acquisition and business selling boom, for deals to occur financing is the key.  Because the banks are taking a step back to evaluate not only their operations, but other businesses operations, it is slow, painstaking process.  And, with so many parties and so many rule changes involved for deals to occur, most will disintegrate or be pushed out to a later date.  So, ultimately this affects the company’s decisions for employee retention and soon thereafter, space requirements.  We don’t expect that to occur until 2011, so leasing activity is and will diminish throughout the year.

The final reason that I touched on earlier, is inability to find a middle ground between the business community and the commercial real estate community.  Most likely you have heard of  banks/lenders not realizing their losses, thus not putting up commercial property for sale -ultimately reducing rental rates.  While this was a 2009 phenomenon, the downward pressure that has been applied is breaking support.  In our recent evaluations of advertised sale information and space for lease on Loopnet.com and Costar.com, as of the last 3 to 6 months, sale prices and rents are being reduced.  But, as most commercial real estate brokers can tell you, when it comes to leasing, landlords are finding ways to make up rent decreases (less tenant improvements, etc), so the net effective rents are not necessarily declining.  So, lease expenses are not declining at the rapid rate of business.  Until they catch up, and businesses and financing stabilize to move forwared, which will “hopefully” occur in the next few years, our clients are advising us to search for space at the “all-in” price that accounts for the business community’s pain.

Now, the positive – for Dallas.  While 2010 will post major square feet losses, we feel a bounce will occur from the lows.  As other states budgets and unfunded pension liabilities have gotten so completely out of control, businesses and residents will seek more stable ground.  Dallas will become the beneficiary.