The PERE Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

A number of new or emerging managers are attempting to grab market share as the next private real estate capital market cycle takes form.

In this episode, PERE editor Evelyn Lee and Jonathan Brasse, editor-in-chief of the real estate for PEI Group, discuss firms on the fast track to industry prominence, and what their challenges tell us about the sorts of organizations jostling for position in the years ahead.

The discussion is a meditation on PERE’s latest cover story, titled Next Contenders 2025: Asset managers ramping up in real estate.

The episode also includes Lee’s interview with Phill Solomond, head of real estate at Stonepeak, one of the six firms featured in the cover story. The wide-ranging conversation covers everything from how Stonepeak's real estate and infrastructure teams work together on deals, the firm’s key achievements to date as a first-time real estate manager, and the investment opportunities Solomond is seeing in the new market cycle.

New York-based private equity giant KKR has reorganized its real estate and infrastructure businesses under a unified real assets platform with a combined $137 billion of assets under management.

In this inaugural episode of The PERE Podcast, editor-in-chief of real estate for PEI Group Jonathan Brasse, PERE editor Evelyn Lee and PEI Group’s infrastructure editor-in-chief Bruno Alves dig into the details of the new business and reflect on the context of the DeepSeek AI revelations and their impacts on digital real assets.

To subscribe to the podcast, search for The PERE Podcast on your podcast platform of choice, or click here. To learn more about the KKR merger, read our piece KKR makes real estate, infrastructure leadership changes.

The PERE podcast is a weekly discussion between members of our senior editorial team providing you with analysis-led commentary about the biggest events in private real estate capital markets around the world. Our discussion spans formation, strategy and deployment and draws from the ongoing coverage of PERE, PERE Credit and PERE Deals.

Listen at www.perenews.com/podcast or subscribe wherever you like to listen.

New York offices are having a moment. As the ink dries on a pair of billion-dollar refinancing deals at 3 Bryant Park and the MetLife Building, the city's office sector may soon receive its most momentous vote of confidence yet, with bellwether investor Blackstone reportedly in talks to acquire a major stake in the 50-story tower at 1345 Sixth Avenue.

All of this leads to a central question: Is this once-eulogized market finally getting its groove back? Listen in as PEI Group real estate editor-in-chief Jonathan Brasse chats with PERE Credit editor Samantha Rowan and PERE Deals editor Guelda Voien about a pivotal moment for the market and what it means for institutional investment in the sector going forward.

To subscribe to the podcast, search for The PERE Podcast on your podcast platform of choice, or click here.

Investment manager Barings’ agreement to acquire value-add specialist Artemis Real Estate Partners creates a combined $60 billion real estate behemoth that is well-suited to reap the benefits of a US market recovery. It also represents a major endorsement of Artemis, one of the sector’s largest women-founded firms, led by industry trailblazer and co-CEO Deborah Harmon.

On this episode, PEI Group real estate editor-in-chief Jonathan Brasse and PERE EMEA editor Charlotte D’Souza break down the deal, how Barings and Artemis fit together and what it all means for private real estate’s road ahead.

Apollo Global Management’s agreement to acquire Utah-based Bridge Investment Group, announced earlier this week, is set to create a $110 billion combined real estate platform, growing Apollo’s AUM in the sector by 40 percent. This is a step change for the manager, helping it to scale its equity business – which focusses on residential and logistics – to its existing and sizeable credit business. The firm now has a suite of real estate capital solutions – but in today’s real estate equity and credit markets, why is this important?

In this episode, Greg Dool, PERE’s America’s editor; Sam Rowan, editor of PERE Credit; and Dan Cunningham, editor of Real Estate Capital Europe, take a look at the deal and explore why managers are seeking not just scale, but breadth of offering.

On the heels of Real Estate Capital’s deep-dive analysis of the emergence of back leverage in European property markets, a new episode of The PERE Podcast looks at how this form of finance will reshape the way real estate debt funds provide loans on the continent.

A common feature of the US market for some years, the increasing use of back leverage by banks and alternative lenders in Europe is not merely a trend, “but a structural shift in how commercial real estate debt is conceived and executed,” according Jessica Qureshi, an associate at Knight Frank Capital Advisory and author of a February research report on the topic.

How, exactly, does back leverage work, and what does its increased adoption mean for global real estate debt markets? Listen in as Real Estate Capital editor Dan Cunningham, PERE Credit editor Samantha Rowan and PERE Credit deputy editor Randy Plavajka break it all down.

American private equity has been storming into the UK-listed property sector this month with a series of takeover bids.

On Monday, KKR and New York-based Stonepeak intensified their pursuit of London-listed healthcare real estate investment trust Assura, with the two managers advancing a £1.6 billion ($2.1 billion; €1.9 billion) cash offer.

Meanwhile, Blackstone and Sixth Street sweetened their offer for London-based Warehouse REIT with a £470 million bid that was again rebuffed by the industrial investor. And on Tuesday, US-listed nursing home investor CareTrust REIT struck an $817 million agreement to acquire UK-listed Care REIT.

What do these three developments, each of which involve US investors hunting publicly traded UK sector specialists, say about the state of the global real estate investment market? Listen as Jonathan Brasse, Evelyn Lee and Randy Plavajka break it all down on the latest episode of The PERE Podcast.

Property investors gained some relief on Wednesday when US president Donald Trump announced a 90-day pause on his administration’s sweeping “Liberation Day” tariff hikes, but the outlook for global real estate markets remains anything but certain.

As the prospect of a US-China trade war looms, private real estate managers and investors have been forced to reassess short-term business while adapting their longer-term strategies to a changing risk environment. But in times of volatility, there are also opportunities.

On this episode, Greg Dool sits down with Jonathan Brasse, Evelyn Lee and Samantha Rowan to break down how market participants have responded to an unpredictable few weeks and what it all means for investment in the property sector moving forward.

Retail’s real estate resurgence is in the spotlight again as a pair of massive private-equity-backed deals target neighborhood shopping centers across the US. On the heels of Blackstone’s $4 billion take-private deal involving 93 grocery-anchored strip malls, fellow investment giants Goldman Sachs Asset Management and Ares Management are getting in on the action as well.

As PERE reported last week, Goldman and Ares provided equity backing for Atlanta-based RCG Ventures’ $1.8 billion acquisition of a 100-asset shopping center portfolio from listed real estate investment trust Global Net Lease.

Taken together, the two deals represent the transfer of nearly $6 billion-worth of US retail properties from publicly traded REITs to private investment vehicles, and they signify a major comeback for a property sector that had been largely exiled from institutional portfolios.

On this episode, PERE Americas editor Greg Dool is joined by PERE Credit editor Samantha Rowan and PERE Deals editor Guelda Voien to explore the numerous layers to the RCG, Ares and Goldman deal and shine a light on retail’s renaissance more broadly.