"Once-in-a-generation" is the way some big CRE fund managers have described current investment opportunities — even in office, which as a class has offered questions and doubt. Some of the funds have brought in billions for debt investment.

However, when it comes to owning property, many global investors are pulling back and showing their inner bear. Starwood Real Estate Investment Trust, which started seeing a big wave of redemption requests in late 2022, has drawn more than $1.3 billion of its $1.55 billion unsecured credit facility since the beginning of 2023 following heavy redemption requests, the Financial Times reported. Before 2023, the REIT hadn't tapped its credit line. At the current rate, it will run out of credit and cash in the second half of this year unless it borrows more or sells more property assets, the FT says.  In 2023, investors withdrew $2.6 billion from Starwood and $12.4 billion from Blackstone's BREIT.

Part of the issue is liquidity, a point Starwood CEO Barry Sternlicht made 18 months ago during its initial big redemption crisis. "We're not a hedge fund," he said when speaking with Newmark president Jimmy Kuhn at a New York University Schack Institute's capital markets conference. "We can't liquidate our properties overnight at attractive prices. We have to manage liquidity."