If it looks like core and acts like core, then it must be core. Right? The spring conference season has mercifully come to an end, and it is time to look back at the main themes and see if we can find any hint of what managers and investors might do in the second half of 2013.

Saying that we are looking back on the main themes isn’t totally accurate. There was only one main theme — investors are still fixated on safety, and that translates to a laser focus on core assets. Survey after survey — whether done by INREV, Ernst & Young, PwC, PREA or any other polling organisation — came to the same conclusion: we want more core.

A few surveys see a minor uptick in the desire for value-added investments