John Haskell, founder and chief investment officer at Atla Capital Management LLC, was a guest on the latest episode of the Nareit REIT Report.
During the interview, Haskell talked about the opportunities from investing in global emerging market listed real estate, the scope of the market, the key theme of urbanization, challenges posed by the lack of reporting standardization, the potential shelter that emerging markets offer relative to other markets, and more.
Haskell manages the Atla Global Urbanization Listed Fund. A key theme for the fund is urbanization, and the opportunities presented by the rapid rise of emerging market cities.
“The greatest social and economic transformations in the world today are in developing countries and it all comes down, in my opinion, to urbanization. While developed cities have mostly plateaued in population growth, emerging market cities are inflecting in population and in wealth,” Haskell said.
Since inception two-and-a-half years ago, the fund has produced an accumulative net return of 33%, Haskell said. The fund has significantly invested in Mexico, where valuations today are slightly less compelling than in the past, according to Haskell. “We’re finding more opportunities in Brazil and Chile today, and in Southeast Asia as well,” he said.
When investing for the long term in global emerging real estate markets, “it pays…to select the best governed and the most strongly capitalized real estate companies on these exchanges,” Haskell stressed.