The inconvenient truth

The Association of German Pfandbrief Banks (Verband deutscher Pfandbriefbanken, or vdp) have started a new (welcomed) initiative publishing a German office building rent index. The first result of this index are available on the vdp website (you will find the press release http://aox.ag/mfaQxW , and the index itself http://aox.ag/kkFoxR - theses links are for the English version but the same documents are available on vdp site in German as well).

Nash Equilibrium

A number of open ended funds are offering their unit holders a very nice opportunity to make good usage of game theory and figure out what to do next.

Some funds (see related article in the Immobilien Zeitung -in German- http://aox.ag/lvAZK1 ), are asking their current unit holders, what would be their behavior if the funds were to reopen for redemption. The underlying idea, is that the more unit holders opt for redemption, the more likely is the fund to liquidate.

Control Freaks

Social media is clearly not yet an accepted way of communicating in a publicaly listed environment. alstria’s short experience in the matter, is that very little (real estate ?) stakeholders actually look at twitter, blogs, LinkedIn and other social media. Still you never know how thinks might develop in the future. So we might want to keep the social media experiment up for a while.

Real Life

Some pictures of the Mundsburg Construction site.

The good, the bad and the ugly

In a recent paper, signed by Joseph Harvey, President and CIO of Cohen and Steers (disclaimer, Cohen and Steers is as far as I know one of our shareholder), the investment manager argues about the merits of allowing European REIT to execute capital increase excluding subscription rights. (The document can be read at the following address http://bit.ly/flBlrP)

Having executed a recent capital increase for alstria with the exclusion of subscription rights, I wanted to share my thought on the matter, and explain how we have looked at the issue from a company perspective.

Japanese’s whispers

I have put on a paper some thoughts while I was in roadshow in Asia, following meeting with investors and investment analysts. As a disclaimer, I am writing this in the middle of a jetlagged night, and I clearly do not pretend to know what I am talking about here.

1- In China, it seems that it is more reasonable to invest into less known secondary cities, than in the majors. Rational being that a lot of speculation is driven by some cities names, not by economics. Ring a bell in Germany as well. Except that Frankfurt is by no way a major city by Chinese standards

Same Player Shoot Again.

A recent article in PropertyEU (http://bit.ly/dXPKja) and other real estate newsletters report on the last IPD/IPF conference where a number of commentator have indicated that the solvency II directive will increase insurance companies willingness to lend to real estate. This might as well be true, but between you and me Solvency II will have potentially more far reaching implication for the real estate market as a whole than just additional lending. 


More interestingly, one of the main commentator is reported to have said: "I expect CMBS to return 'in some form or shape ... because without access to the capital markets we don't stand a chance".

Real Life

Picture from the construction site of the New Ohnsorg Theater.