NEW YORK CITY-Though they cut across a wide swath of the REIT industry, the speakers at the NYU Schack Institute of Real Estate conference, held on Thursday, sounded some common themes throughout the event. The final session of the conference though—a conversation with Sam Zell, chairman of Equity Group Investments who's been unofficially called the grandfather of the REIT industry—trumped all of the presenters, ending the conference on a high note.
Zell, in his characteristic frank-speaking manner, had a less-than-upbeat take on the industry's future, at least in the short-term. “I am much less of a bull than everyone else seems to be. Unemployment is 'down to 7%' but it's really 16%, so I find it difficult to see any great horizon until we get this fixed.”
Throughout the day, speakers touched on a perceived lack of activity in the market, the state of capital markets, coastal versus other markets in the U.S., the pros and cons of globalization and some other possible obstacles ahead.
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Rayna Katz
Rayna Katz is a seasoned business journalist whose extensive experience includes coverage of the lodging sector, travel and the culinary space. She was most recently content director for a business-to-business publisher, overseeing four publications. While at Meeting News, a travel trade publication, she received a Best Reporting award for a story on meeting cancellations in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina.
