🔒From the Editor: Developments ‘pushing the envelope’ and some boundaries

As the recent MEREDA outlook conference showed us, going into 2022 real estate is very much part of the storyline for Maine’s overall economic health.

Home buyers are still eagerly snapping up every available house, not to mention multifamily properties. After two years of closures and curbside shopping, retailers are again leasing storefronts. The cannabis trade has snapped up much of the light industrial and warehouse space. Changes in regulations in Portland are propelling investors into other cities and towns.

There’s full coverage of the MEREDA conference in “Real estate’s bull market,” on Page 28.

On a related note, on the retail side, retail and restaurant franchises are again snapping up existing property as well as “pad” locations. As Renee Cordes reports, chains like Planet Fitness, Great Clips and Aroma Joe’s are scouting out new locations and investing in Maine. See “Feeding frenzy,” which starts on Page 22.

And yet as real estate deals and new developments continue to surge in Maine, there’s been a lot of talk about waterfront real estate and how it should be used. The Island Institute estimated that, of Maine’s more than 5,000 miles of coastline, just over 20 miles remain as working waterfront, for use by commercial fishermen, boat builders and marine operations. As Jessica Hall reports, two major parcels in Portland have recently changed hands, with pledges to maintain the existing working waterfront. All eyes have turned to Rockland, where a major section of waterfront is up for sale, and there’s no clear agreement on what it should become. See “The ‘last 20 miles’” on Page 18.

The Pepperell Mill deal tops our list of notable commercial property sales in Maine, on Page 38.