Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
Subscribe to Brandon Donnelly
>4.2K subscribers
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When I was in grad school they used to always tell us that architects are a leading indicator for the development business. Because if architects are getting fewer jobs/billings, it means that at some point in the future there will be fewer construction starts and then fewer completions. And not surprisingly, that is what we are seeing happening right now. Below is the latest data from the AIA/Deltek Architecture Billings Index (via Bloomberg).
Billings, inquiries (an even earlier leading indicator for billings), and design contracts are down:
And it seems to be most pronounced in the West and the Northeast:
This is always something to watch if you want to try and forecast where hard costs might be going and what completions might look like in the next few years.
When I was in grad school they used to always tell us that architects are a leading indicator for the development business. Because if architects are getting fewer jobs/billings, it means that at some point in the future there will be fewer construction starts and then fewer completions. And not surprisingly, that is what we are seeing happening right now. Below is the latest data from the AIA/Deltek Architecture Billings Index (via Bloomberg).
Billings, inquiries (an even earlier leading indicator for billings), and design contracts are down:
And it seems to be most pronounced in the West and the Northeast:
This is always something to watch if you want to try and forecast where hard costs might be going and what completions might look like in the next few years.
3 comments
Architecture billings are down across the US https://brandondonnelly.com/architecture-billings-are-down-across-the-us
fascinating, seems like the post covid slowdown in new development has really settled in
Yup. Around the world.