Wall Street’s presence in the housing market expanded after the subprime mortgage crisis exploded in 2007. But institutional investors have never owned more than a small slice of the overall housing market: around 2% to 3%.

The rate of multifamily rent growth was flat in 2025 compared to the year before. Though rent growth strengthened in the first part of the year, those gains were erased by weaker performance at the end of the year.

53% of U.S. homes have lost value in the last year, the most since 2012. Southern and Western cities saw steepest declines; Northeast remained stable. Even so, home prices are projected to rise 4% in 2026 despite increased inventory.

The FTSE Nareit All Equity REIT Index chalked up a total return of about 2.3% for 2025, well below the 17.9% of the S&P 500.

Mortgage rates drop to lowest level in nearly 3 years as Trump orders buying of $200 billion in mortgage bonds.

Home prices are up more than 50% nationally since 2019, and the median existing-home price in November rose to $409,200. Home buying overall has dwindled over the past three years due to high home prices and the surge in mortgage rates.

U.S. condominium prices experienced their largest annual decline since 2012, falling 1.9% from a year ago. Over 10% of condos had a lower estimated value in November than their last sale price, with some metro areas seeing over 25%. Rising homeowner-association fees, higher insurance premiums, and maintenance costs are making condominium purchases less affordable.

Downtown Dallas recorded a 27.2% office vacancy rate, the second highest of any downtown nationally, with many companies moving to newer suburban campuses. Real-estate investors purchased $51.7 million in downtown Dallas office property in the first three quarters of this year, versus $1.8 billion in Dallas’s suburban markets.

Los Angeles will implement new rent-control limits in February, capping annual increases at 1% to 4% for most multifamily apartments. The new policy affects approximately 651,000 apartments, or three-fourths of L.A.’s multifamily housing stock. The average rent for a rent-controlled unit in Los Angeles is about $1,800, compared with $2,700 for market-rate units.

Spending on data-center construction looks poised to surpass office-building construction as soon as next year. Data centers yielded an 11.2% return last year. That was higher than every other sector, other than manufactured housing.