From the northeast side of One Arlington, a 13-story hotel-turned-apartment complex in the Chicago suburb of Arlington Heights, tenants have an unobstructed view of one of the most controversial pieces of land in the state, if not the entire Midwest.
There are no focal points or landmarks to signify its importance. Instead, it’s the emptiness of the flat, 300-acre property that stands out in the otherwise developed suburb.
Owners of the Chicago Bears NFL franchise bought the former horse-racing track and its surrounding parking lots known collectively as Arlington International Racecourse for $200 million in 2023 with plans to build out a $2 billion stadium and accompanying $3 billion mixed-use “stadium village.” The proposal requires $855 million in public infrastructure funding.
If completed as planned, the owners of One Arlington and other surrounding properties would go from owning a slice of sleepy suburbia to hitting the real estate jackpot.
But all has not gone as according to plan.
After years of tax-incentive negotiations with local and state leaders and threats from the team to abandon Arlington Heights in favor of staying in their current stadium at Soldier Field inside city limits and vice versa, the board of the Bears organization announced in June that they had given up on Illinois altogether and were planning a move just across the state line to Indiana.
“As someone who has lived in the northwest suburbs for 30 years, [going to Arlington Heights] is way better than going to Soldier Field and I certainly would never go to Indiana to watch them. I hope that someday everyone comes to their senses,” said Rick Cavenaugh, whose development firm Stoneleigh Companies redeveloped and operates One Arlington.
The decision sent shockwaves through local and sports media, leaving the 100-year-old team’s fanbase reeling. And a quieter sense of disappointment descended over the neighbors of the Arlington race course.
“It ended up becoming a bit of a toxic stew. Everybody’s out to grab their own little piece, instead of thinking about the betterment of the whole,” Cavenaugh said.
“It ended up becoming a bit of a toxic stew. Everybody’s out to grab their own little piece, instead of thinking about the betterment of the whole.”
Whether the door is truly closed on Illinois — or on the Arlington Heights stadium specifically — is unclear, but the dramatic saga has shed light on the risks of a relatively new sector of speculative real estate plays that depend on stadium developments.
As taxpayer funding for such projects has fallen out of favor with voters, franchise owners have been increasingly relying on revenue from real estate development that includes mixed-use districts around stadiums to boost their bottom lines. And those projects can be a boon for nearby businesses and result in big paydays for neighboring landowners.
On Chicago’s West Side, longtime land owners cashed in, selling upwards of $100 million worth of land to the developers of a new $9 billion mixed-use district anchored by a redeveloped United Center that will be used by the Chicago Bulls and the Chicago Blackhawks.
As of 2024, there were 43 “sports venue-anchored” mixed-use developments in the U.S. and Canada. That number is expected to nearly double in the coming years with 41 more under construction or planned, according to research from real estate consulting firm Robert Charles Lesser & Co.
All of those projects have the potential to mint new real estate powerhouses or leave nearby property owners holding the bag when things go wrong.
Boulevard of broken dreams
For one developer, the chance to ride the momentum of the Bears’ potential move to Arlington Heights came too early.
After failing to find construction financing, Chicago-based CA Ventures and its investors walked away from an Arlington Heights development site near the Chicago Bears’ potential stadium site in May 2025.
First Bank Chicago seized approximately 3.5 acres of vacant land from an affiliate of CA Ventures through a deed in lieu of foreclosure before any work on the property could begin.
It was the third property the company fumbled next to the stadium site.
CA built a 263-unit apartment complex called Payton Place but later defaulted on an $80 million loan tied to the property that came due in 2023. Lender TPG Real Estate seized the property in 2024.
Adjacent to Payton Place, CA was hit with a separate foreclosure complaint for over 2 acres of vacant land last year after allegedly defaulting on a nearly $4 million loan from Chicago-based Signature Bank; a judicial sale was conducted late last month.
It could be a while before new plans take shape for the massive former racecourse property and help prop up the surrounding real estate.
“I don’t think there are a whole lot of buyers out there that would pick up such a gigantic chunk,” said Brian Carley, a senior executive at Chicago-based developer Bradford Allen, which is building an 18-acre mixed-use district known as Arlington Gateway in the northwest suburb. “It would have to be a well-capitalized national developer that could take that on and they were motivated to act quickly. But I would imagine [the Bears] might subdivide it and try to find individual development groups.”
Still, growing demand for single family, multifamily and senior housing in the northwest suburbs all point to opportunities for the right buyer, according to multifamily broker with Interra Realty, Paul Waterloo.
“Right now there’s a definite shortage of housing here, so I imagine that would be very desirable for a homebuilder,” he said.
Right place, right time
In Hammond, Indiana, the supposed new home to the Chicago Bears, property owners surrounding a potential stadium site could be heading toward an unexpected payday.
The organization has not purchased a property yet but is rumored to be looking near Wolf Lake, about 20 miles southeast of downtown Chicago.
In the largely industrial area, nearby landowners like British Petroleum are likely uninterested in capitalizing on the stadium deal.
But others could be accidental winners. A small Catholic college and a port-a-potty company both own large tracts of land in the general area.
At least ten homes in the surrounding area have hit the market in recent months, with many listings highlighting the Bears’ potential moves, public listing data shows.
“I don’t think there are a whole lot of buyers out there that would pick up such a gigantic chunk.”
Indiana state legislators lobbied aggressively for the Bears to come to their state, by offering to build the stadium with $1 billion contributed by the state and $2 billion contributed by The Bears. To fund its contribution, Indiana would issue bonds backed by Hammond’s admissions tax and a professional sports development area tax district.
The effort drew a contrast to the approach of Illinois lawmakers. A similar bill to solidify the Bears’ presence in Illinois did not get enough votes to pass in the state legislature before it adjourned this spring but Governor J.B. Pritzker has said he is open to convening a special session to address the issue.
In Illinois, state leaders grew frustrated with the Bears’ efforts to gin up extra tax incentives by what appeared to be an effort to pit the City of Chicago against the Village of Arlington Heights.
“We’re not going to raise taxes, sales taxes, tolls on people to build a stadium for a billionaire-owned team,” Governor Pritzker said in a press huddle in June.
The new rise of stadium village developments across the U.S. points to a growing impression that tax payers should receive amenities and tax revenue in return, rather than forgo revenue for public services to help developers front the costs of building a new facility.
“There’s going to be an openness to coming and developing it, but it’s going to be a very focused vision and what’s best for our community and what makes sense over the next, you know, 50 or 90 years,” said Jon Ridler, executive director of the Arlington Heights Chamber of Commerce.
A 2017 poll of over 40 economists conducted by The University of Chicago Booth School of Business found that 83 percent of the respondents agreed or strongly agreed that tax subsidies provided to build professional sports stadiums “cost the relevant taxpayers more than any local economic benefits that are generated.”
Still, other stadium projects are forging ahead with a mix of public and private financing.
For the $7 billion United Center redevelopment, Chicago City Council has approved $55 million in tax breaks so far.
Mayor Brandon Johnson has also floated $425 million in infrastructure-focused tax breaks for a $750 million privately funded Major League Soccer Stadium that will serve the Chicago Fire, led by Morningstar founder Joe Mansueto.
Both projects broke ground this year while the Bears’ proposal remains stuck on the sidelines.
“Everyone should be engaged in trying to move this thing forward,” Cavenaugh said. “Everyone’s sticking in their corners and putting up their defense.”