JLL: Investors Looking to Break Into Canada

CHICAGO—For years, owners in the world’s top markets have become accustomed to Canadian investors beating a path to their door whenever their buildings go on sale. But at the spring meeting of the Urban Land Institute in Vancouver, which began yesterday, officials from Chicago-based JLL will release their latest research report, titled “The Canadian Quartet—Playing on the World Stage,” which shows how the flow of Canadian money largely goes only one-way, out of Canada and into shopping centers in Germany, industrial warehouses in Mexico and multifamily properties in the US.

Canadian offshore investment accounted for a one-fifth of all global cross-border investment activity in 2013, totaling nearly $10 billion, JLL found. But so far, foreigners have had few opportunities to make big investments in Canada, including the top four cities of Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal and Calgary. In 2012, for example, just 1% of transactions in Canada involved foreign groups. This number did jump to 9% in 2013, but inbound investment in Australia, a similar country in many respects, regularly exceeds 30%.