Everyone I talk to says the key to real estate market recovery is resuscitating the CMBS markets. There´s plenty of equity "on the sidelines," but without credit and refinancing sources, the capital markets will stay frozen. Ironically, the CMBS concept helped jump start market recovery 15 years...

"Change is good." That's what the head of an acquiring company once told me and other employees of a business he was taking over. For all the spin about mergers and acquisitions being good for companies--the majority do not pan out except for the bankers who engineer the deals and then later...

A raft of recent statistical indicators show the recession has ended--housing prices increase in many regions, job losses decline month by month, and today the government announced a shallower contraction in GDP during the second quarter. It's odds on that third quarter GDP numbers will be in the...

Many investment managers and wannabe investment advisors now put together funds to take advantage of the market distress. There's plenty of talk of mountains of equity capital on the sidelines ready to pounce on deals once there are deals to pounce on. We've heard this talk for several years now...

Public pension funds have been big investors in real estate over the past 25 years, but what´s the future for these pools of capital? Corporate pension plans are steadily getting replaced by 401K alternatives which reduce company expenses and put investment decision making into the hands of employees....

Mortgage REITs have been getting plenty of attention lately. Their proponents--the sponsors and Wall Street bankers--tout them as a solution for providing the real estate debt markets with desperately needed liquidity. And yes, they may provide some funding to refinance borrowers with few other available...

The healthcare debate points to a growing schism in the U.S. between older people and younger Americans. The economics of Social Security and Medicare (both socialist programs by the way that few if any Americans want to give up) depend on younger working people supporting older retired seniors. The numbers...

The inevitable tidal wave of commercial loan busts begins to form--over the next six months more borrower reserves run out and owners come to terms with the harsh reality of rising vacancies and lowering rents. Why should they put good money after bad trying to keep up with debt service when the property...

It´s a year since the Lehman Brothers collapse and we read in the New York Times over the weekend about investment banks securitizing bonds backing the proceeds from life insurance policies bought from elderly people looking to cash in benefits before they die. Since the CMBS and RMBS markets are dead,...

I had meeting last week with the head of real estate for a household-name institutional investor which is a big player in the international markets. He likes Brazil. Another executive who works under his umbrella favors India. U.S. real estate will be an opportunity play eventually, they say, but its...