👋👋 Good morning real estate watchers! Today, we are going to talk about...

1. Starbucks just opened a 3D-printed store in Texas—because nothing says ‘handcrafted artisanal experience’ like having your frappuccino made in a building that looks like it was squeezed out of a giant robot’s toothpaste tube.

2. How the housing market cling to “stability” the way a Fed economist clings to the idea that gas prices, college tuition, and rent going up simultaneously is totally normal.

3. 20% of real estate agents doing 65% of the work—while the rest apparently treat real estate like a seasonal side hustle sandwiched between yoga teacher training and selling essential oils on Instagram.

Let’s go!

TOP STORY

LATTES & LAYERS

Starbucks has opened its newest store on a dusty plot in southern Texas. It serves the usual—venti macchiatos, cake pops, and corporate consistency. But what makes this café different isn’t what’s in the cup. It’s what’s in the concrete.

Welcome to America’s first 3D-printed Starbucks.

The 1,400-square-foot drive-thru, built in partnership with Germany’s PERI 3D Construction, isn’t just a quirky PR stunt.

It’s a test case for a rapidly emerging shift in construction—a technology that could reshape how homes, neighborhoods, and even cities are built. And it comes not a moment too soon, as the U.S. housing market grapples with soaring costs, labor shortages, and the mounting pressure to deliver affordable housing fast.

Concrete from Nozzles, Not Nail Guns

The store’s shell was printed, layer by layer, using a concrete extrusion process that essentially turns architecture into icing on a cake. But this is more than novelty. It’s economics.

According to KRG Hospitality, the new Starbucks' price tag was $1.2 million, higher than the average quick-service build, about $749,000 for a 1,400-square-foot store. But experts argue that that misses the point. As with most new tech, costs fall over time.

And they’re already falling fast.

Take Lennar, one of America’s largest homebuilders. The company recently built a 100-home community in Georgetown, Texas, using 3D printing. Stuart Miller, Lennar’s co-CEO, told CNBC that the firm was already seeing its costs and construction timelines drop by half. “This is significant improvement,” he said, adding the method makes housing more “affordable and attainable.”

Why Now? The Housing Crisis Demands It.

The U.S. is short at least 3.2 million housing units, according to Freddie Mac. Add to that a post-pandemic labor shortage in the trades and a 19% jump in material costs since 2020, and you’ve got a blueprint for disruption.

The World Economic Forum estimates 3D printing can reduce construction costs by up to 70% in some cases, though the average is closer to 30%. Combine that with faster build times (a printed home can rise in as little as 48 hours) and the appeal is obvious.

This isn’t just about coffee shops. It’s about workforce housing, disaster recovery, military barracks, and affordable rentals in markets priced out of conventional development. Several municipalities—from California to Ontario—are actively exploring the use of 3D-printed homes to house the homeless, recent immigrants, and seniors.

A Robot Walks Onto a Construction Site…

Beyond cost, there’s a deeper irony: in an industry plagued by slow innovation adoption, 3D printing offers a leapfrog opportunity. Builders no longer need armies of framers, drywallers, and painters—just one truck, a robotic arm, and a few engineers with laptops.

PERI 3D has completed more than 15 projects in Europe and the U.S., ranging from residential housing to commercial buildings. Japan recently unveiled a 3D-printed train station. And in a global economy facing protectionism and tariffs on everything from steel to Canadian lumber, 3D printing offers a more local, material-efficient solution.

“We’re not trying to reinvent architecture,” a PERI spokesperson said during a media briefing. “We’re trying to reinvent how we build it.”

What’s Next: From Novelty to Necessity

Skeptics remain. Permitting and building codes are notoriously slow to evolve, especially in North America. Many municipalities still require manual inspections and hand-signed blueprints. And then there’s the public perception hurdle, convincing buyers to live in a house printed by what looks like a cement-spewing Roomba.

But momentum is growing.

From Texas to Tokyo, from Starbucks to single-family homes, 3D printing in real estate is no longer science fiction. It’s just science. And if builders can tame the tech, costs, and regulations, it might just become the latte-fueled solution to one of real estate’s most pressing problems: how to build more, faster, for less.

As one local joked outside the new Starbucks: “It’s the only house going up in Texas right now that inflation didn’t touch.”

SNIPPETS

1️⃣ Senior Tax Breaks: Several states are implementing strategic property tax relief programs for seniors and low-income homeowners. Key highlights include South Dakota's tax refund program for residents 50 and older, and Denver's more targeted initiative for those 65+ or disabled, which caps eligibility at 60% of the area median income. These programs acknowledge the financial strain of rising property taxes on fixed-income households, with Denver potentially supporting up to 3,000 residents annually. While not a complete tax waiver, these initiatives offer meaningful financial relief, allowing older homeowners to manage increasing property costs more effectively. (HW)

2️⃣ Inflation Nation: Consumers are projecting a 3.3% rise in home prices over the next year, slightly down from 3% in March, which suggests a relatively stable housing market. Inflation expectations are mixed, with year-ahead inflation steady at 3.6% and three-year projections reaching 3.2% (the highest since July 2022). Fed survey respondents anticipate price increases in key areas like rent, gasoline, and college costs. While the overall economic sentiment has soured, with expectations of slower income gains and potential job market challenges, the Fed views the economy as fundamentally solid. (Reuters)

3️⃣ Permit Pandemonium: The Sun Belt continues to dominate single-family permitting, with Houston, Dallas, Austin, and Phoenix leading the charge, accompanied by Southeast markets like Atlanta and Charlotte. While multifamily permitting shows a more geographically diverse landscape with New York at the helm, there are notable trends: only New York and Columbus saw increases in both multifamily and single-family permits year-over-year, and three markets (New York, Miami, and Columbus) permitted more multifamily than single-family units. The market appears to be stabilizing, with only four of the top 10 multifamily markets showing fewer permits month-over-month, and total permitted units slightly increasing. (RealPage)

4️⃣ Crushing It: In 2024, the top 20% of real estate agents handled 65% of all transactions, not the often-quoted 80%, according to CoreLogic data covering 85% of the U.S. market. This reveals a highly skewed distribution: top performers average 26 deals a year, while the remaining 80% average just 3.5. Notably, the top 1% alone accounted for 18% of transactions. Despite a cooling market, the number of low-producing agents continues to rise, highlighting the persistence of part-time agents in the industry. (MDP)

5️⃣ Colling Demand: Vacation home demand in the U.S. has dropped to its lowest level since at least 2018, with just 86,604 second-home mortgages issued in 2024—a 5% decline from 2023 and down two-thirds from the pandemic-era boom. High mortgage rates, soaring home prices, a return to office work, and rising insurance costs have made owning a second home far less attractive, especially in Florida, where year-over-year demand plummeted by over 30% in some metros. Second homes now account for just 2.6% of all mortgages, down from a peak of 5% in 2020, as the era of Airbnb-fueled, low-rate vacation buying fades into memory. (Redfin)