Richard Barkham, chief economist at CBRE, was a guest on the latest episode of Nareit’s REIT Report podcast.

CBRE is forecasting GDP growth of about 2.3% this year. With the economic momentum of 2024 continuing into 2025, “I think we're seeing the slow start to a new real estate cycle,” as vacancy begins to trend lower and rental growth generally firms and starts to head higher, Barkham said.

Barkham described investor sentiment as “very positive” given the GDP forecast and the outlook for the year, “and based on the fact that people haven't been active for two or three years, or not very active….people are anxious to get moving and adjust their portfolios and deploy capital.”