Southwest Michigan’s dominant health care organization is also a major force in real estate development in the region’s largest city, Grand Rapids. Corewell Health has invested $57.3 million dollars in buying up 14 parcels—land and buildings—in Grand Rapids’ Monroe North neighborhood over the past four years, as part of its Corewell Health Place project.
That’s according to an in-depth analysis published by Crain’s Grand Rapids Business. (Access the complete article here.)
The Crain’s story details how Corewell’s commitment to its Master Plan for Corewell Health Place has led it to sometimes pay higher-than-market prices for land, buildings, and existing businesses in the path of the project. An example cited is a recent $1.6 million dollar purchase of a small bar and grill, Rocky’s,
Corewell will establish its West Michigan headquarters in an eight-story office tower, now under construction, plus a large, renovated building formerly known as the Brass Works Building. Two new Corewell parking deck structures will accompany the office space, expected to house 1,200 administrative employees currently housed in 26 different leased spaces, according to Crain’s.
The future vision of the Corewell Health Place master plan calls for residential space for medical residents and graduate students as well as market-rate housing attractive to employees and others, close to their work.
Crain’s reports that there’s a ‘good news, bad news’ discussion going on in Grand Rapids: While people are pleased about the Corewell campus expansion, some small businesses in the Monroe North area are fearful of being ‘priced out’ of the neighborhood, perhaps even being forced to leave existing locations due to higher rent driven by the new development nearby. It should be noted that there are no examples of this happening—only suggestions that it might happen. And, the Crain’s story points out that a couple of businesses that exited the neighborhood have built new, larger facilities in suburban areas with the proceeds from their sale to Corewell.
Corewell Health was created by the 2022 combination of Spectrum Health in West Michigan and Beaumont Health in the Detroit area. It is Michigan’s largest health care provider. Corewell Health South is the former Spectrum Health Lakeland, which operates the hospitals in St. Joseph, Niles and Watervliet and many related health care facilities. It is the largest employer in Berrien County.
Access the complete Crain’s Grand Rapids Business report here.
