Nicole Funari

REITs are making great strides in ESG by working to enhance ESG data and disclosure.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released the June 2022 Consumer Price Index (CPI) data showing continued high inflation at 9.1% annually.

According to data from Google on all workers and Kastle on office workers, workers in gateway cities are more likely to work from home.

Evidence is emerging that hybrid or remote work is becoming a permanent feature for many office workers.

Charting the change in REIT earnings, represented as funds from operations over the course of the pandemic.

REIT earnings, as measured by funds from operations, increased 30.9% from the previous year to a record high of over $18 billion in the first quarter of 2022, according to the Nareit T-Tracker®.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics released the April 2022 Consumer Price Index data showing a much smaller monthly increase in prices in April than in March.

March marked 23 straight months with hires greater than separations and the March JOLTs report showed private job openings are in excess of 10.5 million, the highest level ever recorded.

Despite continuing high inflation, REIT returns continue to outpace returns for the S&P 500 on an annualized basis and REIT operating performance growth has exceeded price growth in 2021.

REITs average higher returns over multi-year time horizons compared to private real estate with a broader allocation across innovative property sectors, according to Nareit analysis of past performance.

Historically, REITs have performed well during periods of rising long-term interest rates with average four-quarter return in periods with rising rates of 16.55% compared to 10.68% in non-rising rate periods from the first quarter of 1992 to the fourth quarter of 2021.

REITs have outperformed private real estate property and fund indexes through the fourth quarter of 2021 and have an annual increase of 41.3% in 2021 compared to 22.2% for private real estate.