13-page summary of U.S. commercial real estate markets
For anyone who is interested, here is a summary of quarterly commercial real estate conditions that my group assembles: [link](http://www.aegonrealty.com/Images/Commercial%20Real%20Estate%20Overview%20February%202015_tcm42-16353.pdf)

The report contains charts we believe to be important to CRE. None of them contain forecasts, just a summary of some of the macro level factors that we believe are relevant to investors. Page one has a summary of U.S. CRE acquisitions by investor type during 2014. Globe Street and Real Estate Alert have both published articles with quotes implying that foreign investors have been driving up apartment demand. The analysis on page one was started because I wanted to understand and quantify those comments, but to my surprise that narrative appears to be false (at least based on this data, which is mostly from RCA).
[{"id": "cosj35j", "text": "This is a nice report, do you publish reports on specific markets too?", "replies": [{"id": "coso38z", "text": "Thanks - market specific analysis and reports are unfortunately only available to clients/investors. \n\nedit - maybe they will be in the future. [This 1-page CRE report](http://www.aegonrealty.com/Images/Investment%20Outlook%20for%20Commercial%20Real%20Estate%20February%202015_tcm42-16382.pdf) was also published this week.", "replies": [{"id": "cp5p8kn", "text": "Both of these are very interesting.  I will definitely be going forward armed with some of this information.  Thank you kindly!\n\nEdit* spelling", "replies": [], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "cotg9qy", "text": "I have a question...\n\nIn your report how do you qualify a private investor? If I bought a 50MM property where I put in 5MM and a fund put in 15MM are you able to properly credit both sides? Is there a risk that you're overstating how much investment is from \"Private investors\" and understating funds investments? ", "replies": [{"id": "cotqc5d", "text": "Yes, that is a good point and something I've though about as well. There are only a few firms who are trying to do this investor-type break down on every public transaction that takes place, and the source in this report is [Real Capital Analytics](https://www.rcanalytics.com/), who is the best at this in my opinion.\n\nIn addition to the deficiency you address, I believe private investors  apply higher average leverage than, say, REITs do. Because of this, private investors will have a higher reported acquisition amount, even though they may be spending less cash-out-of-pocket.\n\nAlthough these deficiency exists, I think the typical usage for this type of analysis is meaningful. The relative level of acquisitions, as reported via a consistent methodology over the past 10 years, is useful for finding warning signs in specific markets. The national allocation, which is what the page-one chart is depicting, is probably not as valuable as market-level analysis, which is why I put mostly market level conclusions in the comments. The analysis also goes deeper, with the property by property list that makes up the data in every market, but there wasn't really room to get to that level in a national summary report.", "replies": [{"id": "cotqgqr", "text": "I have no doubt that the analysis is useful - I was just trying to determine the methodology. \n\nMaybe a bit of a trap but REITs and private investors are bidding on the same assets. Its true that many REITs will not apply above 50% LTV some are all cash. However you have a lot of private investors who are all cash or minimal debt and those who put in 5% and are loaded with senior, mezz &amp; pref. However, I don't think that will necessarily result in private investors paying more for the same assets as REITs. It's very case dependent. ", "replies": [{"id": "cotqr78", "text": "Agreed - If the all-cash private investor universe is bigger than my anecdotal observations indicate, then it's possible they average lower leverage. The REIT regulatory LTV limit, in addition to all the A/B debt that many private investors use is all I'm basing my guess on.", "replies": [{"id": "cotrk24", "text": "I think private investors use more leverage - but it doesn't necessarily result in outbidding REITs on the same opportunities. ", "replies": [], "depth": 5}], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}]