But bottom line, really office tenants—creative or not– are seeking to cut space per capita costs. Beyond the packaging, fewer cubes and even fewer offices, less privacy, lots of work benches and plug in stations help squeeze more workers into less space.

And investors should really give pause to the growing work-from-home trend which is and will continue to hamper growth in demand for all office space, and especially among creative office users, who are particularly committed to remote work solutions in an increasingly virtual world. New IPO darling Snap Chat even boasts that it doesn't really have a headquarters. At relatively old school Yahoo, flailing CEO Marissa Mayer had tried to end the work-from-home culture, but alas Marissa is close to the end of her time there, and so too the diminished brand maybe at the end of its line. These companies are all in fluid states which do not easily compartmentalize into long-term tenancies or traditional growth tracks.

Above all, work from home will be as corrosive to office as e-commerce has been to bricks and mortar retail. In real estate, I think now that's what is meant by creative as in creative destruction.

And that translates into more volatile office returns.

NEW YORK CITY—Despite the happy talk around deregulation and tax cuts boosting the stock market, real estate investors have been growing nervous about recent double-digit annualized returns falling into single digits, receding offshore capital, and the end to cap rate compression with interest rates headed higher.

On the ground evidence is a bit disconcerting. First there is the softness in the overbuilt luxury apartment sector with more projects still under construction—rents already go sideways in the prime 24-hour markets and luxury condos have become a much harder sell. High street retail vacancies signal tenants are no longer willing to pay up for loss-leader branding billboards as e-commerce makes further inroads even on upscale goods. Mall owners grapple with the on-going decline of department stores—they try to fill empty anchors with food concepts in direct competition with strip retail anchored by supermarkets, which leads to the obvious conclusion that there is just too much retail space in the face of sinking growth in demand.

The next sector to suffer some decline will be office and in particular the investment gambit breezily-labeled as “creative office” which begins to show signs of inevitable overhype. Developers have been racing to remodel old warehouse buildings with large floor plates and high ceilings into incubators for app makers, code writers, and digital marketers. New office projects in hip, up-and-coming districts all target the unicorn set of tenants who may have new age promise, but, oh well, maybe not the greatest credit. And let's not forget, high-tech dominated office markets historically have been among the most volatile—suffering their last major bust in 2000 and a minor one in 2009, usually the result of shakeouts among companies with big ideas that don't prove out , bleeding away their venture capital.

Developers tout the layout advantages for attracting millennial brainpower with lots of natural light, community work areas, open kitchens and game rooms. Somehow brick walls and exposed duct work can stimulate productivity along with the environmental benefits of waterless urinals and bike racks. So voila brokers package all of this into “creative office” and investment managers buy up these buildings for their institutional clients, at the same time ballyhooing their cutting edge, forward thinking portfolio acumen.

But bottom line, really office tenants—creative or not– are seeking to cut space per capita costs. Beyond the packaging, fewer cubes and even fewer offices, less privacy, lots of work benches and plug in stations help squeeze more workers into less space.

And investors should really give pause to the growing work-from-home trend which is and will continue to hamper growth in demand for all office space, and especially among creative office users, who are particularly committed to remote work solutions in an increasingly virtual world. New IPO darling Snap Chat even boasts that it doesn't really have a headquarters. At relatively old school Yahoo, flailing CEO Marissa Mayer had tried to end the work-from-home culture, but alas Marissa is close to the end of her time there, and so too the diminished brand maybe at the end of its line. These companies are all in fluid states which do not easily compartmentalize into long-term tenancies or traditional growth tracks.

Above all, work from home will be as corrosive to office as e-commerce has been to bricks and mortar retail. In real estate, I think now that's what is meant by creative as in creative destruction.

And that translates into more volatile office returns.