Data Center Deals Are Up 2,000%. Here's What It Means for CRE | QCI Show, Ep 39

The best month for commercial real estate transactions since 2005 just happened. Almost half of it wasn't really real estate. It was data centers.   MSCI's July capital trends report puts total CRE transaction volume at $75 billion, up 78% year over year. Great headline. Strip out the $34 billion that came from data centers, though, and the rest of the market (apartments, retail, office) is basically flat. Data center volume alone is up almost 2,000%. This is the K-curve, live, and it's not slowing down.   That's the real story this week.   We get into where Chase is putting capital over the next 18 months (multifamily's a hard pass, for the record), why Google is paying north of $50 million a year for a building in Austin that's sat empty for six years, and why "leased," "occupied," and "utilized" need to stop being treated like the same word.   We also cover Jensen showing up again with a $96.2 billion quarter, up 106% year over year (yes, that's roughly two Coca-Colas' worth of annual revenue in three months); our own very real, very generous new deal with Anthropic; Big Tech's trillion-dollar CapEx bill turning Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta into the world's biggest landlords; the AvalonBay/Equity Residential merger catching a monopoly side-eye over 0.4% of the national apartment stock; 50% tariffs on Canadian cement and plywood (RIP my kids' hockey sticks); and yes, I got hammered on Instagram again for my take on San Francisco.   In this episode: Why MSCI's "best month since 2005" for commercial real estate is really a data center headline in disguise The $34 billion in data center deals driving a nearly 2,000% surge, while apartments and retail slide Where Chase is deploying capital over the next 18 months, and why multifamily didn't make the list Google's $50 million-a-year building in Austin that's been empty for six years, and the "leased vs. occupied vs. utilized" problem it exposes Nvidia's $96.2 billion quarter, up 106% year over year, measured against a full year of U.S. commercial real estate volume Our own eyebrow-raising deal with Anthropic, and two theories on why the token credits suddenly got 10x more generous Big Tech's trillion-dollar 2026 CapEx bill, and why Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta are becoming the world's biggest landlords The AvalonBay/Equity Residential merger, and the Massachusetts AG's monopoly case over 0.4% of the national apartment stock 50% tariffs on Canadian cement and plywood, and what it means for construction costs (and hockey sticks) A robot that broke Usain Bolt's 100-meter record, then ran itself straight into a wall   Timestamps:  00:00 Show Intro 00:49 San Francisco Real Estate Debate 05:22 Commercial Real Estate Volume Surge 08:51 Where To Deploy Capital 13:01 Data Centers In Office Buildings 15:58 Google's Empty Austin Tower 19:50 Nvidia Earnings Explode 24:20 OpenAI Vs Anthropic Pressure 26:19 Anthropic Enterprise Deal 27:03 Anthropic Token Credits 27:42 Why Anthropic Offered This 29:42 AI Subsidies And Moats 32:30 Big Tech CapEx Boom 34:29 Apartment Merger Antitrust 38:35 Tariffs Hit Construction 41:44 World Cup Economic Win 45:12 Robot Beats Usain Bolt 48:19 Show Wrap Up   Hosts:   Greg Gomer: Co-founder & Chief Customer Officer, HqO Chase Garbarino: Co-founder & CEO, HqO   More from the Quantum City Initiative   The future of cities begins now → https://www.hqo.com/the-future-of-cities-begins-now/  Listen to every episode → https://thequantumcityinitiativeshow.podbean.com/    Hosted by Greg Gomer and Chase Garbarino, co-founders of HqO. The Quantum City Show is presented by HqO.   Join the Quantum City Initiative: qci.hqo.com  Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-quantum-city-show/id1830288682   Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6KBhGHqQUblkyOcTAJlJdF?si=b961bd6046704fe7  YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@HqOinc    Produced in partnership with OBEY Creative, building podcast-driven content engines for B2B founders. Learn more at https://obeycreative.com/    Let's Go!