After more than two years of sustained rental declines across Asia Pacific, 2025 marked a turning point. Prime office rents stabilised, vacancies tightened, and for the first time in several years, fundamentals are firming, if not yet dramatically, then at least clearly.

The real estate industry has a data problem — and almost no one wants to talk about it. Behind the scenes, everyone knows the truth: Most real estate performance numbers are not comparable. Not even close. The problem isn’t the maths. It’s the lack of standards.

This past year delivered new shocks to global supply chains, but logistics occupiers adapted by focusing on long-term supply-chain needs, escalating demand through 2025, according to the Prologis Logistics Rent Index.

Nuveen has agreed to acquire Schroders in a board-recommended cash transaction valued at approximately £9.9 billion (US$13.5 billion).

Closed-end real estate fundraising activity had its best year since 2021, with 119 funds raising US$151.5 billion in 2025, according to data collected by Institutional Real Estate, Inc’s IRE.IQ database, marking a 66 percent increase on 2024’s US$91.4 billion raised by 79 closed-end real estate funds.

Seoul Square, a trophy office tower in Seoul’s central business district, has been sold by Singapore’s Aravest and South Korea’s NH Investment & Securities for KRW 1.28 trillion (US$870 million), according to Mingtiandi.

Asia Pacific real estate is showing signs of a cyclical shift, with stabilising cap rates now supported by growing investor confidence and early transactional momentum, according to Colliers’ Asia Pacific Cap Rate report for the fourth quarter of 2025.

In a sponsored interview published in the April issue of Institutional Real Estate Asia Pacific, Kevin Yam managing director, portfolio management, and Jim Halliwell, head of housing and alternatives at Principal Real Estate, discussed today's complex and dynamic housing market, and how Principal uses a sophisticated perspective and precise analytical methods to identify opportunities quickly and move decisively as the market shifts.