JLL's 2025 Insights: Trends shaping Multi-Housing, Industrial, Retail

JLL’s 2025 Market Insights webinar on May 8 gave private investors an inside look at emerging opportunities amid the more fluid economic backdrop. Five of our capital markets experts shared exclusive insights and data on the latest trends shaping the multi-housing, industrial, and retail sectors.

David Gaines, managing director and private capital group leader for JLL Capital Markets, hosted a lively panel discussion with JLL’s Erik Hanson, John Indelli, Brian Smuckler, and Lauro Ferroni.

The team homed in on the leading economic and market factors underpinning these growth sectors and the upsides for U.S. private investors post-April. The country’s commercial real estate performance fundamentals remain stable—even amid elevated market volatility—and capital markets are liquid with bid counts and loan application volumes on the rise. Private capital investors accounted for 66% of winning bids across JLL transactions in Q1 2025.

“We are taking a deep dive into the economic forces driving change across the CRE landscape in 2025,” said David Gaines in Chicago. “This includes the impacts of tariffs, the strength of the debt markets, supply and demand dynamics, and emerging opportunities for private investors.” Also, the number of lenders quoting transactions in all core sectors, including office, increased in Q1 with retail seeing the biggest gain from late 2023’s trough at 61%.

“We’re seeing deepening bidder pools across transactions and more institutional investors coming back,” said Lauro Ferroni, JLL’s head of Capital Markets Research for the Americas. “With the repricing of asset values since the Fed started raising interest rates—that has essentially de-risked our asset class.”

These are some of the highlights for private investors in the multi-housing, industrial, and retail sectors.

The U.S. multi-housing sector is seeing significant gains, most notably in the Midwest, where renter demand and rent growth fundamentals are strong. Landlords are benefitting from the lack of supply in recent years.

“Absorption demand is at levels we haven’t seen since the early 2000s,” said Brian Smuckler, senior managing director with JLL Capital Markets in Phoenix. “Markets that weren’t heavily developed and don’t have high supply deliveries are shining with continued rent growth right now.”

Inventory, meanwhile, has picked up in Sunbelt markets such as Austin, Phoenix, and Nashville, which have been heavily supplied and have peak delivery schedules.

Investors are seeing an ongoing shift from a homebuyer’s market to a renter’s market due to elevated interest rates and rising home prices nationally. As the cost of home ownership remains prohibitive, the number of long-term renters is projected to further increase. The difference between the monthly single-family cost to own and the monthly multi-housing cost to rent stood at 65% in Q1 2025. “Every 1% dip in home ownership translates to more than 1 million households shifting from owners to renters,” said Brian Smuckler.

There is ample liquidity in the U.S. multi-housing markets. With the agencies needing to allocate a certain amount of capital, more than 75% of multi-housing transactions are financed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. This has helped soften the impact of higher interest rates. At the same time, investors are factoring potential slower-growth scenarios and other critical considerations into their underwriting to reduce future risks.

“Across the country, renter demand is really strong,” said Brian Smuckler. “Private investors have the ability to put together a business plan over a two- to three-year period to take advantage of rent growth.”

The U.S. industrial sector is bolstered by strong occupancy levels with user-end diversity fueling new property innovations. While tariff and supply chain disruption impacts remain a concern, investors are seeing upward growth trends with industrial assets anchored by cold storage, last-mile groceries, industrial outdoor storage (IOS), and various hybrid uses.

“Long-term fundamentals continue to be healthy in industrial,” said Erik Hanson, senior director with JLL Capital Markets in San Francisco. “The advanced manufacturing world is really taking off. You are going to see a lot of reinvention of spaces with owners and tenants utilizing properties in new ways, which is exciting to track.”

The industrial sector saw significant development activity nationwide following the pandemic. New construction starts have slowed precipitously in correlation with recent economic shifts and land-use restrictions in certain markets, helping keep supply in check.

“The market was priced to perfection a few years ago and has been sorting through that,” said Erik Hanson. “We recently met with a large institutional investor who had 17 out of 20 disposition deals move forward in the past few weeks without any price reduction or buyer drop. Given how uncertain the past few weeks have been that’s a pretty good indication.”

The U.S. retail sector remains resilient in the face of recent volatility.

Economic uncertainty around tariffs has impacted a number of retailers. But landlords are seeing some favorable upsides as the latest few bankruptcies lead to higher credit tenants, new retailers that drive additional foot traffic, and higher rents. Owners are seeing 20% to 40% higher rents in many cases. Some landlords have noted that retailers are staying nimble and looking to get ahead of the next bankruptcy to secure prime space.

“We’re hearing from retail owners that Q1 2025 was one of the strongest Q1s in terms of leasing velocity and market rent growth they’ve seen in at least the last decade,” said John Indelli, senior director with JLL Capital Markets in Houston. “Lack of new supply over the last decade coupled with continued strong demand for retail space is driving great fundamentals.”

Retail landlords and tenants have learned strategic lessons from the Covid era, including how to navigate market volatility during expansion periods. Across the board—from fitness concepts to quick-service restaurants and grocers—retailers are growing their footprints. Expansion minded retailers learned from the GFC and COVID era that if they shut down growth plans it can be very challenging to pick back up. “There are a number of retailers today that are planning for the next decade, not just the next quarter,” John Indelli emphasized.

As retail construction starts have been muted for the past 10 years-plus, the retail sector now has a landlord favorable supply and demand imbalance. Brick-and-mortar retail continues to thrive with a few large-scale owners pointing out that foot traffic was up 6-7% in April year over year.

“We’re looking closely at retailer behavior and how it impacts owners,” said John Indelli. “With some uncertainty there is opportunity. If you’re willing to swim across the current, and do your homework, you might just come out on top.”

To view the full discussion, watch here