NOTE TO READERS: This is the second in an occasional look at the factors driving volatility in the market this year. For the first installment, click here. Americans are an optimistic lot. Climate change? Hey, maybe it’s not real and if it is, we won’t be hurt! A completely destabilized Middle East? Hey, my gasoline…

A new report from Marcus & Millichap, the commercial real-estate brokerage firm, indicates strong demand for industrial properties in the Puget Sound region, punctuated by an 800,000-square-foot building leased to Amazon.com at Stryker Business Center in Kent and the 540,000-square foot Des Moines Creek Business Park. Projects are being planned and coming online at record levels….

Once again, Seattle ranks among the top 10 markets in the influential Emerging Trends in Real Estate by the Urban Land Institute and the consultancy PwC.  For 2015, it ranks No. 8 overall based on the tech industry, highly skilled workforce and attractiveness to millennials. “Seattle is one of the top capital destinations outside the…

After the Seattle Arts & Lectures event with former Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Friday night, people talking to me at the edge of the stage were less interested in Too Big To Fail banks and the too-cozy Washington-Wall Street connection than the potential for a real estate bubble and crash in Seattle. There’s no question…