Press Release
February 4, 2010

Attendees at Real Estate Conference see Real Estate Infrastructure Top Growth Opportunity in 2010

NEW YORK, February 4, 2010 – An interactive survey conducted live at the 2010 International Real Estate Capital Markets Conference revealed that the overwhelming majority of attendees see recovery of real estate capital markets to be three or more years away.  But when asked to identify top real estate market growth opportunities in 2010, 39 percent of attendees surveyed said infrastructure had the greatest potential, followed by residential (18 percent), hotels (16 percent), industrial (11 percent), retail (9 percent) and commercial/office (7 percent).

Asked when they expect the combination of equity and debt capital will be sufficient to recapitalize and stabilize real estate assets, 50 percent of conference attendees surveyed said within three years. Another 24 percent said it would occur within four years, while 23 percent surveyed said within two years. Only three percent of attendees surveyed said equity and debt capital market recovery would happen within one year.

The International Real Estate Capital Markets Conference was organized by Columbia Business School and Goodwin Procter LLP and took place in New York City. It attracted nearly 500 real estate industry attendees, including executives representing real estate investment managers and operators, REITs, investment banking firms and placement agents and institutional real estate investors.

“At this time last year, there was virtually no equity or debt capital available to fund, recapitalize or de-lever real estate investments,” said Gil Menna, a partner at Goodwin Procter and co-chair of its Real Estate, REITs & Real Estate Capital Markets Group. “At that time, no one would have expected that the REIT industry would be able to see itself through the ‘near depression’ and financial crisis relatively quickly and raise the amount of equity capital it has, or that there would have been several single-borrower securitization transactions completed by the end of 2009.”

In another survey question, 66 percent of attendees said the near collapse of Wall Street and financial markets was the cause of the current recession while only 34 percent called Wall Street and financial markets a casualty of the recession.

About Goodwin Procter
Goodwin Procter LLP is one of the nation’s leading law firms with offices in Boston, Hong Kong, London, Los Angeles, New York, San Diego, San Francisco, Silicon Valley, and Washington, D.C. The firm’s core areas of practice are corporate, litigation and real estate, with specialized areas of focus that include financial services, private equity, technology, REITs and real estate capital markets, intellectual property, tax and products liability. Information may be found at www.goodwinprocter.com.