Porter also pointed out that a hot spot here is Playa Del Rey.

For Scott Farb, partner of CohnReznick at RealShare Los Angeles, who will moderate the morning's opening Economics panel, the news is on the residential front. He tells GlobeSt.com that in Southern California, the median price for a home increased over 22% since last February, but that doesn't tell the whole story, he says. “For homes selling in the $300,000-$800,000, prices jumped over 33% and the volume of homes that sold for more than $800,000 rose over 60% year over year.”

Nationally, Farb says, “permits and starts of all housing types are at monthly levels not seen in more than four years and the inventory of existing single family homes fell to a 12-year low. Lastly, new foreclosures are down to a six-year low.”

He also explains that “given the record low interest rate environment we're in, it appears that real estate and the stock market are the best investment alternatives these days.”

And according to Chris Cooper, principal and managing director of Avison Young, mixed-use is where the news is at in the region.

But Bill Hughes of Marcus & Millichap's capital markets division sees opportunity in Orange County multifamily product, Playa Del Rey, coastal markets, shadow Inland Empire product, and explains that he is bullish on retail and infill product where the value can't be duplicated. In addition, he says, CBD office product has some opportunity as well.

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In a preview story leading up to the event, panelist Emile Haddad, president and CEO of FivePoint Communities, who will be speaking on the Industry Leaders panel today at RealShare L.A., said that some trends he is seeing emerge in master-planned community develops are to really look at who the home buyer is going to be for the coming decade. “We think that buyer is going to be from Generation Y, theaging Baby-Boomers as well as immigrants,” he said. “All three are looking for mixed-use environments—they want to be able to walk to a café or restaurant and connect with others—so we're going to see more of the mixing of use rather than the segregating of use.”

Haddad also pointed out that “wellness is very important, and people are much more into hiking, walking, biking and really going out and enjoying the outdoors than those who bought homes in the previous generation of master-planned communities. The old ones—designed 30 years ago—were for a different buyer, the Baby-Boomers who were moving up and creating families. They had different priorities then.”

And since the commercial real estate world tends to focus on the office sector, market drivers are often gauged by jobs and absorption in office high-rises, particularly in Los Angeles, Avison Young's Cooper, said recently in a preview story.

“This is important, but I think that the two big drivers in L.A. are going to be 1. Continued demand for creative space—mostly seen on the West side and the whole Silicon Beach region—and 2. Increased demand for hospitality, especially in the Downtown area. Those are the drivers and the headlines.”

Cooper will be elaborating on these trends when he speaks today on the panel “Brokerage Leadership Insights” during RealShare Los Angeles. The RealShare conference series is produced by ALM's Real Estate Media Group, which also publishes GlobeSt.com and Real Estate Forum.