Is the Investment Sales Market in a Mini-Bubble?

The investment sales market has been steadily improving over the last few quarters, as fundamentals begin to improve and economic recovery, while sluggish, is upon us. With regard to fundamentals, we have seen rent concessions evaporating and occupancy rates improving. The economy is moving in a generally positive direction but is having difficulty finding momentum as employment growth is well below expectation and last week it was reported that consumer spending experienced a decline of 1.2% in May, the first drop since September of 2009. While the investment sales sector appears healthy, the future of the market, however, is uncertain as market indicators are presently difficult to interpret. These conditions beg the question: Are we in another bubble at the bottom of a cycle?

Today, nothing is impacting the investment sales market more than the supply / demand relationship. Real estate markets are always dependant upon the supply  / demand dynamic, however; it appears to be impacting the market more acutely now than we have seen in the past. Presently, there is excessive demand met by a relatively weak supply of available properties for sale.