NUS Real Estate Breakfast Roundtable Discussion

"Why Are US REITs Going Abroad?"

24^th May 2018
Marina One East Tower
Singapore

NUS Real Estate organized a Breakfast Roundtable discussion that engaged members of the REIT community in an exchange of views on the topic "Why Are US REITs Going Abroad?". This Breakfast Roundtable is the first in an annual series of  Roundtable discussions that seek to provide a unique platform for leaders of the industry and the academia to come together and enable the sharing of insights that would strengthen our understanding on emerging and pertinent issues in real estate finance.

By bringing leading practitioners and academics under one roof and by leveraging on the diversity of perspectives and insights, this platform also serves to facilitate the germination of innovative concepts and encourage the cross-fertilization of ideas.

Chairman of the NUS Institute of Real Estate and Urban Studies (IREUS), Dr. Seek Ngee Huat, opened the session by welcoming all attendees which included industry leaders from organizations such as GIC, Blackstone, CapitaLand, ARA and City Developments Ltd. Prof. David Ling, McGurn Professor of Real Estate from the University of Florida, 'fire-started' the discussions by reframing the question and deliberated on issues related to improved visibility, diversification, home-biasedness and transaction costs, amongst others. A lively debate ensued across the table and saw an interesting spectrum of issues and considerations being raised, some of which related to tax efficiency, investor education, regulations, introduction of new asset classes, trend of capital flows and the phenomenon of high net-worth individuals.

A/P Sing Tien Foo, Director of IREUS, moderated the discussions.