A new real estate development company is making big moves in California – and what sets it apart from other real estate development firms is the state’s hottest commodity: cannabis.
Canna-Hub, a California-based real estate development and property management Company for the cannabis industry, announced Tuesday its innovative cannabis real estate development business model to help current and prospective cannabis licensees secure properly zoned property for their cannabis businesses in California. The overall California cannabis market is expected to reach $6.5 billion by 2020, according to ArcView Market Research.
Additionally unique to the Canna-Hub real estate business model is the way it promotes synergies between cannabis business licensees. According to the Company’s release, Canna-Hub has already identified several sites in strategically located cities that can accommodate hundreds of cannabis licensees in an organized manner through the development of Canna-Hub Business Communities, or “cannabis hubs.” The real estate developments will have availability for cultivation, manufacturing, distribution, transport, service or supply vendors, and testing labs.
Helmed by Canna-Hub founder and CEO Tim McGraw, an experienced commercial real estate developer who has also designed or built cannabis specific facilities in several states and abroad, the cannabis hubs will boast about 12 state license types per site.
“Real estate is one of the greatest challenges and biggest opportunities for cannabis licensees and investors ready to participate in California’s exciting Green Rush,” McGraw said in the release. Canna-Hub has identified or secured real estate and zoning approvals in several strategic regions; among the first developments in its portfolio are in California’s Colusa and Fresno counties.
Beginning on January 1, 2018, businesses will be allowed to produce and sell recreational cannabis in addition to medical cannabis which has been permitted for more than 20 years. With a focus on speed to market, Canna-Hub seeks to help cannabis business owners planning to operate under the new regulatory environment starting in 2018 by eliminating the painstaking process of identifying suitable property with the necessary infrastructure and zoning for their operations.
At city council meetings throughout the state, McGraw says Canna-Hub developments provide economic and job creation opportunities for their home communities.
At a Williams City Council meeting in April, McGraw said licensing fees at full build-out could amount to “well in excess of $1 million per year, probably closer to exceeding $2 million per year, which goes into the city’s coffers.”
And at a recent Mendota City Council meeting, he said, “The amount of economic impact and the amount of jobs that it creates is so beneficial to this town that anybody pushing against it would just be pushing against progress.”
The most challenging aspect for any cannabis business can be meeting local zoning laws and requirements, but Canna-Hub offers those businesses space that is already pre-approved with the lowest local permitting fees in the state, the Company said.
“A lot of cannabis companies find a location, and then try to convince, so to speak, the community to accept them and get the support. We did the opposite: We worked backwards into the location, by finding communities that wanted us,” McGraw said to Cannabis Business Times in December about his approach to building relationships between cannabis businesses and communities.
“From an investor perspective, Canna-Hub offers the stability and security that any other commercial real estate venture can provide,” said Canna-Hub founder and chief financial officer Jonathan Charak in the Company’s release. “We also appreciate the fact that our investment risk will be essentially spread across numerous licensees of different types rather than relying upon any single grower or manufacturer for our success. California has the perfect mix of strong market conditions and a regulatory environment that will allow our business model to be successful.”
