“We can go all the way to Oklahoma, up through Pilot Point, Melissa and Salina,” Wiley tells GlobeSt.com. “For now, retail is most active in Plano, McKinney, Frisco and Allen.”

One example is Custer and 121, at Highway 121 and Custer Road in Allen, TX, being developed by RPS Development Company of Texas. The 45-acre power center will include a large format grocery store, restaurants, soft goods and service users. RPS will be partnering with a national multifamily group for the residential portion, some 15 acres of apartments that are currently leasing. It has a projected completion of 2018.

North Texas is not the only area with explosive retail activity. Lake Highlands, Uptown and Downtown development goes hand in hand, says Wiley. In terms of the Lake Highlands area, redevelopment of existing residential is proving beneficial for the late 20s to early 40s buyers who may have been priced out of other areas. Uptown and Downtown have unique residents as well.

“There are residents coming from Chicago and California who've never had yards and are used to living in apartments,” Wiley tells GlobeSt.com. “Those Uptown and Downtown projects are scratching that itch. And, the Tom Thumb near the Perot Center is a game changer in terms of amenities catching up to those housing projects.”

DALLAS—With RECON set to take place next week in Las Vegas, retail is a fitting focus, especially when Dallas­Fort Worth has had more than its share of growth during the past several years. In fact, the population has increased by nearly 700,000 since 2010 and is projected to increase by another 2 million from 2016 to 2030, according to JLL research. And, 119,000 jobs were added in DFW in 2016 alone.

The job additions and low cost of living have given way to a population with a greater amount of disposable income. As these new jobs and people continue to move to DFW, retail is expected to follow rooftops, so goes the familiar adage.

Dallas, along with New York, leads the markets in construction activity, particularly in freestanding/general retail. While the majority of retail space being built largely consists of freestanding retail (55%), much of which will take the form of urban or high-end mixed use centers, the greatest increase in construction has taken place among power centers, which had 4.8 million square feet under construction at the end of 2016–a 31.3% increase from end-of-2015 activity, according to JLL research.

As Andrew Wiley, vice president of JLL points out in this exclusive, there are even developments beginning in extreme North Texas as these one-stoplight towns build grocery stores and other retail centers.

“We can go all the way to Oklahoma, up through Pilot Point, Melissa and Salina,” Wiley tells GlobeSt.com. “For now, retail is most active in Plano, McKinney, Frisco and Allen.”

One example is Custer and 121, at Highway 121 and Custer Road in Allen, TX, being developed by RPS Development Company of Texas. The 45-acre power center will include a large format grocery store, restaurants, soft goods and service users. RPS will be partnering with a national multifamily group for the residential portion, some 15 acres of apartments that are currently leasing. It has a projected completion of 2018.

North Texas is not the only area with explosive retail activity. Lake Highlands, Uptown and Downtown development goes hand in hand, says Wiley. In terms of the Lake Highlands area, redevelopment of existing residential is proving beneficial for the late 20s to early 40s buyers who may have been priced out of other areas. Uptown and Downtown have unique residents as well.

“There are residents coming from Chicago and California who've never had yards and are used to living in apartments,” Wiley tells GlobeSt.com. “Those Uptown and Downtown projects are scratching that itch. And, the Tom Thumb near the Perot Center is a game changer in terms of amenities catching up to those housing projects.”