APEX 2026 IGNITES CHICAGO: AMERICA'S PROPERTY EXHIBITION OPENS ITS MOST AMBITIOUS EDITION YET

The Third Edition of APEX Launches at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Centre, Uniting Real Estate, Smart Homes, and Infrastructure Under One Stage Running Through May 9, 2026

CHICAGO  Yesterday, May 7, 2026, the doors opened on one of the most consequential gatherings in American real estate this year. Investors, developers, architects, diplomats, and global industry leaders converged on the Donald E. Stephens Convention Centre in Chicago for the launch of APEX 2026  America's Property Exhibition, the third edition of the platform that is rewriting what a property summit can be.

With two days still to run through Friday, May 9 , the energy of Day One left little doubt: this is not a conference. This is a movement.

FROM DUBAI TO CHICAGO: ONE MAN'S UNSTOPPABLE DRIVE TO BUILD BRIDGES

The moment that defined Day One did not come from a polished script. It came from the man who built this platform from the ground up.

David Wang took the stage during the opening ceremony as the audience listened attentively. Despite travel disruptions and delays affecting regional flights, he completed a journey of more than 16 hours from Dubai to attend the event. Some exhibitors and delegates from the Middle East were unable to travel and are expected to reconvene at the Las Vegas Edition in September.

"I came from the conflict area, but we're still hungry, eager, looking for business globally. We expecting all of the country can share hand, join hand, make business, make peaceful world."

Wang also shared the personal story behind Chicago's place on this year's circuit. He founded his US company in this city in 2021, having first visited the United States in 2011 and carrying the memory of Chicago with him ever since. APEX was originally scheduled exclusively for Las Vegas this September  and that edition remains firmly on the calendar  but Chicago was added as a tribute to the city where it all began. He told the audience that he also started the platform in New York, then Miami, before bringing the exhibition to Chicago. Next year, he expects to return with a significantly larger global delegation.

Wang also announced that APEX has expanded to three co-located events launching from Chicago: APEX itself, a newly launched Smart Home event, and a newly launched Smart Infrastructure summit  all three of which will continue their journey to Las Vegas in September.

Jed Wilcox, Country Director of MIE Group USA, opened proceedings by framing the historic scope of the occasion. For 25 years, MIE Group has operated across industries, trade shows, business consulting, investment platforms, and tourism  connecting markets and people around the world. In the United States, that work has focused on real estate. APEX 2026 marks its fullest expression yet: three verticals, one platform, one conversation about where the built environment is going.

The summit was hosted throughout the day by Joe Nicastro, Partner at Partner, Vesta Preferred Realty, the number one independent brokerage in Illinois and the firm that represents the most buyers in the city of Chicago.

DISTINGUISHED VOICES FROM GOVERNMENT, DIPLOMACY, AND CIVIC LEADERSHIP

The opening ceremony drew a remarkable assembly of VIP speakers whose remarks underscored the international reach and civic significance of the platform.

Wang Lixin, Commercial Counselor at the Consulate General of the People's Republic of China in Chicago, extended warm congratulations and reflected on Chicago  the birthplace of the skyscraper and a treasure trove of architectural art  as the ideal city in which to hold a conversation that is not merely about buildings, but about defining the future of housing. 

Mike Puccinelli, representing Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas, who has served as Cook County Treasurer since 1998 but was unable to attend due to last-minute obligations, addressed the room on the critical role of property taxes in funding the villages, towns, and cities of greater Chicago. Puccinelli highlighted that Treasurer Pappas's office handles over $19 billion worth of property taxes every year, and noted that the most recent Pappas Study found property taxes in Cook County rose 182% between 1995 and 2024.

Zhengdong Huang, President of the Chinese American Association of Greater Chicago  , an umbrella organisation representing 153 associations, clubs, and professional groups across the greater Chicago area, praised APEX for bringing together leaders across real estate, architecture, construction, investment, design, and technology, and expressed pride in a platform that strengthens dialogue and collaboration among business leaders from different backgrounds and industries.

Jan Zheng, Chief Operating Officer of the Windfall Group, spoke with conviction about the future of multicultural commercial development in America. Windfall specialises in Asian town development and multicultural commercial development across the United States, with a mission to create vibrant, economically sustainable destinations serving the rapidly growing Asian American population and increasingly, the broader general public. "The future of real estate is no longer about building isolated properties," Zhen told the audience. "The future is about creating ecosystems."

Dr. Fei Chu, President of the Board of Directors of the Association of Chinese American Scientists and Engineers (ACSE)  , one of the largest professional organisations of Chinese Americans in the United States  extended congratulations and championed the cross-disciplinary collaboration that events like APEX make possible.

Lisa An Wong Co-Chair & Vice President and General Manager, Win Shing Investment LLC & Chicago AI Counsel at AI 2030, closed the opening ceremony's VIP remarks with a forward-looking address on the convergence of capital, infrastructure, and artificial intelligence. Drawing on over two decades at the intersection of risk strategy and financial institutions, including BMO Wealth Management, UBS, and Bank of New York, Wang argued that the smartest investors always follow infrastructure first and that the next frontier of infrastructure is not just steel and concrete, but data, AI, and resilient systems. "Vision without execution," she told the room, "is a blueprint collecting dust."

KEYNOTE: WHERE ARCHITECTURE MEETS THE HUMAN SOUL

With the opening formalities complete, APEX delivered its first major session, and it set a high standard for the day.

Stephen Yas, AIA RIBA, NCARB APEX America’s Property Exhibition Managing Director - USA / Global Design Leader at NOVO Architects LLC took the stage for a keynote spanning 50 years of international practice. His presentation, Design Process and Methodology Based Upon Cultural and Human Values, ranged from Oxford lecture halls to Bedouin deserts, from the offices of Mies van der Rohe to competition-winning towers in Shenzhen, and from urban design master plans across China to projects across NOVO's five offices in Shanghai, Hong Kong, London, Los Angeles, and Chicago.

His argument was as simple as it was powerful: great architecture is not about aesthetics or money alone. It is about architectural psychology  people's emotional response to physical space. "Before there was a concept, there was a spirit," Yas told the audience. "And we need to find that spirit in every project."

He shared how immersing himself in a client's cultural context rather than imposing his own  consistently delivers both superior human experience and superior return on investment, illustrating this through projects where cultural understanding transformed a stalled design into a competition winner, and where creative structural problem-solving cut four to five months from a construction schedule and saved 30% on structural costs.

Yas also announced the inaugural Yas Global Architecture Award for Women Architects, a cause he is developing in partnership with MIE's Division of Culture and Arts. Focused initially on the Middle East and China for its first year, the award has two categories: licensed women architects who are citizens of or working in each region, and emerging young architects and students in the first three years of their careers. The inaugural awards ceremony is planned for the Las Vegas edition of APEX in September 2026.

THE GREAT HOUSING RESET OF 2026: NAVIGATING A BALANCED CHICAGO MARKET

The morning closed with the day's most sharply focused panel  a rigorous examination of the national housing affordability crisis through the lens of Chicago's specific opportunity.

Moderated by Sean O'Gorman, Global Residential Practice Area Leader at Gensler, the session brought together four formidable voices: 

• Javier Santana, Managing Broker, The Sunland Group 

• Jennifer Schultz America’s Property Exhibition Partner / Leader, National Real Estate Development & Land Use Practice, Nixon Peabody

• Mitch Green Senior VP- Tishman Construction Company 

• Mike Consol Editor - Real Assets Adviser, Institutional Real Estate Inc  

The conversation was honest, sharp, and at times deliberately provocative. Panellists traced the structural forces behind America's housing shortage to two generational shutdowns in construction output following the Global Financial Crisis and COVID, compounded by restrictive zoning, costly compliance requirements, and deep-seated NIMBYism. Mike Console put the Chicago paradox into stark relief: the city peaked at a population of 3.6 million in 1950 and stood at 2.7 million as of 2025. A million people left, and yet the city still cannot build enough housing. That paradox, the panel agreed, is the opportunity hiding in plain sight.

Jennifer Schulz argued that Chicago may be the best office-to-residential conversion market in the country by a significant multiple. Dozens of office buildings in the last two years alone have traded at discounts of up to 75% from their pre-COVID values. The basis reset has happened. Mitch Green brought the builder's precision to the discussion, examining what it actually takes to convert a historic commercial structure into livable space. Javier Santana made the ground-level case for Chicago's walkability, neighbourhood identity, and deeply underappreciated value proposition relative to coastal markets.

The session closed with a clear challenge to the room: Chicago's corporate leaders, developers, and City Hall need to get in a room together. The blueprint exists. The moment is now.

AFTERNOON: FROM THE WALDORF ASTORIA TO PANAMA TO THE PERMIAN BASIN

The afternoon programme extended Day One's ambition from Chicago to the world, delivering three sessions that gave attendees entirely new frameworks for thinking about wealth, legacy, and opportunity.

The Waldorf Astoria New York: A $2 Billion Masterclass in Adaptive Reuse

The afternoon's centrepiece was a rare inside account of the most complex adaptive reuse project of the modern era: the conversion of the Waldorf Astoria New York , 1.6 million square feet spanning an entire Midtown city block between Park and Lexington Avenues and 49th and 50th Street, built over active rail yards with effectively no basement, and constructed in the teeth of the Great Depression  into a mixed-use luxury hotel and condominium development representing over $2 billion in investment across eight years of construction.

The panel, featuring Mitch Green of Tishman Construction, walked attendees through the full arc of the project. Hilton, which had owned the property since Conrad Hilton purchased it in 1949, eventually recognised that operating 1,400 hotel keys at a five-star luxury standard was no longer viable. Test demolitions conducted before the hotel closed revealed plumbing so deteriorated that any in-place renovation would have immediately failed. The hotel closed on March 1, 2017, and demolition began in the fall of 2017.

Among the session's most striking revelations: the project ultimately produced nearly 200 unique residential floor plans, a direct consequence of a column grid inconsistent wing to wing, bay to bay, and in some places floor to floor. The Grand Ballroom had to be physically isolated as a box within a box; every connecting steel beam and concrete slab was cut, beams mounted on rubber shoes, and gaskets installed to prevent noise transmission to condominium buyers at $3,000 to $4,000 per square foot. And the craftsmanship required to restore historic interiors, largely extinct in the US, has been recovered through 3D scanning technology and fabrication expertise, particularly from mainland China.

The result, unveiled from beneath the restored Park Avenue canopy: a fully preserved Park Avenue lobby mosaic, Cole Porter's original piano returned to the Clock Lobby, heritage spaces restored to their 1931 colour palette, and a landmark that sets the standard for adaptive reuse at the highest level of ambition.

From Chicago to the World: Why US Investors Are Looking Overseas

Kathleen Peddicord, Founder and President of Live and Invest Overseas, and Lief Simon, Lead Investment Advisor, Analyst, and Editor at Live and Invest Overseas  who met on a real estate tour of Ireland nearly 30 years ago and have been investing internationally and building their publishing business together ever since made a compelling and timely case for diversifying beyond US shores.

In a world of mounting political uncertainty, the pair argued that going global is no longer optional for the serious investor. They walked the room through the realities of international real estate transfer taxes ranging from 1% to 10% around the world, limited financing options for non-resident buyers, the critical importance of understanding your renter pool before committing capital, and the lifestyle dividend that overseas property delivers that is too often underestimated.

Their standout market recommendation: Panama, a fully dollarised economy running inflation of under 1%, a regional hub through which approximately 40% of US shipping passes via the Panama Canal, the number one overseas retirement destination for Americans, and a market offering genuine cash flow yields alongside long-term capital appreciation potential. They also highlighted Northern Cyprus as an emerging market of interest for investors prepared to look beyond more familiar destinations.

Doors to Wells: Scaling Wealth with US Oil and Gas Mineral Rights

Closing out Day One was Michael Bacani, Senior Wealth Manager at Eckard Enterprises  a privately owned, family-operated oil and gas company with assets in Oklahoma's Anadarko Basin and Texas' Permian Basin. In a session crafted specifically for real estate investors, Bacani opened a door that most in the room had never considered: US mineral rights, available only in the United States as the sole country in the world that severs subsurface rights from surface ownership.

Eckard's fully integrated model spans Eckard Energy, which drills wells directly with a full-time contracted rig; Eckard Land and Acquisition, which acquires the real estate underground; and Eckard Midstream, a pipeline infrastructure operation that charges a tariff on every molecule of oil and gas that passes through meaning investors participate from ground to end user. With US daily consumption running north of 20 million barrels against domestic production of approximately 13 million on its best days, the structural supply deficit is not cyclical. It is permanent. Bacani also walked attendees through the tax advantages specific to this asset class, including Roth conversions where investors are seeing 60% to 80% discounts on conversion due to the declining asset nature of mineral rights, and 1031 exchange opportunities through portfolios ranging from $10 million to $100 million in tranches.

TWO DAYS REMAIN. THE CONVERSATION IS JUST BEGINNING.

Day One of APEX 2026 delivered a full day of ideas, connections, and frameworks that will echo well beyond the walls of the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center. From a founder who flew through a war zone to open his summit, to architects who design from the soul of a culture, to developers sharing the inside story of the greatest hotel conversion in New York history, to investors being invited to look at Panama, Northern Cyprus, Oklahoma, and Texas with fresh eyes this was Day One.

APEX 2026 continues today, May 8, and concludes tomorrow, May 9, 2026, at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center, Chicago. Exhibition floors remain open, networking continues in full force, and the programme ahead promises to build powerfully on the remarkable foundation Day One has laid.

The platform continues to Las Vegas in September 2026, where the full international delegation including many who could not travel during the recent regional conflict  will reunite for what David Wang has already promised will be an even larger edition of the summit that is redefining what it means to build, invest, and connect.

For media accreditation, speaker and exhibition enquiries, and attendee registration for the remaining days of APEX Chicago 2026 or the Las Vegas September edition, please contact the MIE Group team 1-773-8971967 or contact us through https://www.uspropertyexpo.com/get-in-touch 

APEX  America's Property Exhibition is produced by MIE Group, a 25-year global platform connecting markets, industries, and people across trade shows, investment platforms, business consulting, and tourism. MIE Group USA is based in Chicago, Illinois.