China has endured the pandemic the longest, and experienced an early economic rebound as a result of its containment efforts, all while other world economies continue to struggle under the weight of new cases and slow vaccine roll-outs. A year on, what can investors learn from China’s economy and real estate markets as they continue to recover?

Looking at China’s residential markets through the lens of a multiplayer game among the central government, local governments, developers, lenders and homebuyers can yield a better perspective than any market demand/supply models.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the institutional real estate community has taken steps to adapt, which can be seen in the responses to our annual investor survey. They revealed an impact on real estate investment activity in 2020, though lesser than occurred during the global financial crisis, according to 2021 Institutional Investors Real Estate Trends, the 25th annual investor survey jointly conducted by Institutional Real Estate, Inc and Kingsley, a Grace Hill Co.