We're pleased to share the second paper in the One Real Estate Universe series from INREV and EPRA: ‘Measurement, Performance and Portfolio Construction.’
Building on the foundations of the first report, this edition examines how listed and non-listed real estate can be assessed on a common basis, compares their performance and risk characteristics across major and alternative asset classes, and explores their role within multi-asset portfolios.
Its central finding is that listed and non-listed real estate are complementary instruments tuned to the same market. Across optimisation methods, the data support a material allocation to real estate held through both routes.
Key highlights:
- The two routes move through the same property cycle, with listed prices leading non-listed valuations by about two quarters. The volatility gap between the two routes narrows to around 1.8 once the non-listed series are desmoothed.
- A risk-based portfolio construction supports a total real estate allocation of 19.5%, well above the average current institutional target of 12.5% reported in the ANREV/INREV/PREA Investment Intentions Survey.
- Non-listed real estate’s distinctive contribution is a low, stable correlation with other asset classes that lowers the total risk of a multi-asset portfolio. In fact, it has the lowest average cross-asset correlation of any asset class over the recent decade.
- Listed real estate is a liquid, tactical instrument, a strategic long-horizon holding and a source of diversification within the real estate allocation.
INREV would like to thank Dr Alexandra Krystalogianni for her work in producing this paper.
Download the full paper below.
One Real Estate Universe
Published on 02 Sep 2026