Residential is now the second most popular global real estate asset class, behind offices, following a 56 percent increase in investment into the sector over the past five years.

Institutional investment into global residential markets reached $110 billion (€100 billion) in first half 2019, according to Savills’ Global Living report. This represents a year-on-year increase of 9 percent, at a time when investment into all other major asset classes saw a decline.

In the report Savills states that investors are shifting their focus towards operational residential assets in the search for income, with the student, senior and multifamily housing sectors being key beneficiaries. Multifamily housing is by far the largest of the three sub-asset classes: despite global headwinds, investment into multifamily has grown, with $97 billion (€88 billion) invested in the first half of 2019, a 13 percent increase compared to the first half of 2018.