Mike Jager now sets his alarm at 3:30 a.m., two hours earlier than when Montreal’s industrial real estate market was in top form about three years ago.
Demand roared during the boom years when the market's industrial vacancy rate dropped to 2.26% in the second quarter of 2023, according to CoStar data. Projects raced ahead on confidence alone.
But that pace broke, and the market changed. Montreal's industry vacancy rate now stands at 6.9% after a 12-month period with negative absorption of 3.7 million square feet, meaning tenants moved out of that much more space than they moved into, CoStar data shows.
Undaunted, Jager, co-CEO of Montreal‑based industrial developer Rosefellow, answered the moment by upping his development activity and leaning into the market.
Jager now starts his day earlier as he manages a series of projects underway and lined up across greater Montreal, many of them built on a speculative basis. His company has about 300,000 square feet under development without tenant commitments, and its additional pipeline contains roughly 500,000 square feet planned across two industrial buildings in Laval, additional projects in Saint‑Laurent and a 200,000‑square‑foot industrial building lined up in Candiac.
The company is sticking to its strategy of building on speculation, despite higher industrial vacancy rates. “We’re seeing decisions take longer,” Jager said in an interview with CoStar News. “But once clients move, they don’t have time to wait.”
Tenants, he said, now spend more time securing internal approvals for leases than they did a few years ago. Once those approvals come through, they expect space quickly and operate on compressed timelines. In that environment, waiting to build until everything is signed can mean missing the opportunity altogether. “We don’t need 100 tenants,” Jager said. “We need one.”
A bifurcated market
Jager also sees nuance in the measuring of industrial vacancy. All-encompassing statistics, he said, blur the distinction between modern logistics facilities and older, functionally obsolete buildings. When availability is narrowed to newer Class A buildings in strong locations, he said, supply remains tight. That reality continues to support building ahead of demand even as leasing slows.
Jager and his co‑founder and co‑CEO Sam Tsoumas have extended the same discipline to how they communicate, with frequent unscripted podcast appearances, interviews and industry conversations. Both have remained highly accessible as the market cooled, regularly explaining how they read the cycle and how Rosefellow is responding on the ground in a sector where many owners prefer to stay silent.
That public presence runs alongside a tightly controlled personal routine. Jager starts his morning with a cold plunge around 4 a.m. and heads to the gym shortly after. He trains again later in the day, then ends the evening with a sauna and another cold plunge before bed. The schedule rarely changes.
“I’m extremely disciplined,” he said. “That discipline carries into how I work.”
Jager said he enjoys being in the office and frequently works weekends, not out of obligation but because he wants to. He encourages his team to take the same approach, urging them to treat every project as if it were their own and to take pride in what they deliver. “I want people to look at industrial differently,” he said.
His outlook extends beyond execution into design. Jager has steered Rosefellow toward industrial buildings that move past the anonymous non-descript she, incorporating elements such as wood structures, solar panels and other sustainability features. He sees industrial real estate as long‑term infrastructure that deserves care and intention.
“Why does industrial always have to be a warehouse box?” he asked.
Jager addressed the pressure of building on spec directly during remarks at the Montreal Real Estate Forum. “We occasionally don’t sleep until leases are done,” he said on stage. “But once they are, we sleep very, very well.”
As the industrial market recalibrates, Jager said preparation matters more than prediction. Tenants may hesitate longer than they once did, but when they move, they expect immediate solutions.
Rosefellow’s response, he said, has been to stay ready, with sites lined up, designs in place and shovels close to the ground.
At 3:30 a.m., his routine starts again.