We are halfway through 2015 and investors are beginning to take stock of how their investments are doing. For nearly all real asset categories, the first half of the year has been pretty stable, maybe even boring. In general, it has been a slower, less extreme version of the last six months of 2014. If the sector was doing well in 2014, it is still doing well, but not quite as well. If returns were falling in 2014, they are still falling, just not as fast.
REAL ESTATE
Real estate has continued to prove an attractive investment. As everyone knows, 2014 was an outstanding year. The FTSE NAREIT All Equity REIT index found equity REITs returning 28.03 percent. Unleveraged private real estate did not quite reach those heights, but the 11.82 percent NCREIF NPI 2014 annual return (up from 10.98 percent in 2013) is quite good for core assets. Much of this return was from appreciation, with 5.36 percent coming from income and 6.21 percent from appreciation. Lev