Global real estate is under the spotlight.
Investors, rating agencies, analysts and media are watching carefully to see how companies are dealing with interest rate changes, maintaining access to capital, and positioning themselves through the real estate cycle. Four years after Covid, the world remains focused on the changing trends around commercial real estate, and the evolving mix of demand from office and hybrid working, multi-family, retail and industrials. This has implications for long-term growth in rents and pricing power, and for opportunities in single-family rentals, build-to-rent, senior care and life sciences.
Companies increasingly need to think about differentiation, and how to leverage their scale and long-term partnerships – a task that requires more than well-positioned buildings. It is one that includes mixed-use environment, design, digitized systems and strengthening communities. Companies must also meet the challenges of green modernization, ESG requirements, and the divergence between prime and secondary assets. The occupiers of tomorrow will be in greener buildings, no question. The leaders of tomorrow, meanwhile, will be the developers who demonstrate they can deploy their capex to meet future demand and grow as they balance a range of issues – around location, product and the role of trader developers building brand to sell, versus holding assets for letting.