Construction Maison

If you’re a regular reader of DCK Investor Edge , you know that investors who own data center REIT shares have seen better rewards year-to-date compared to more traditional commercial real estate asset classes like office, retail, apartments, net-lease, and healthcare. Data centers sit squarely at the intersection of real estate and technology, providing space, power, and access to networks and cloud service providers that attract coveted enterprise customers . When it comes to the various REIT sub-sectors, data centers sit squarely at the top, while the broader real estate sector is treading water, down 0.6 percent. Data centers as a sub-sector are chalking up another year of outperformance, following similar gains in 2016. Source: Seeking Alpha – Hoya Capital Real Estate Aug. 18, 2017 Many investors rely on mutual funds and ETFs which own a broad basket of all the REITs. However, this can lead to being overweight on large- cap mall REITs , sho...

Capitalism is “a process of creative destruction” according to Austro- American economist Joseph Schumpeter . That is working out right now as new communications technologies are revolutionizing sectors like short-term housing and short- distance human transportation . I use these wordings rather than “hotel” and “taxi” because companies like Airbnb and Uber are changing the very meaning of these historic terms. Much of this is to the good, enabling society to get more satisfaction of human needs and wants from a given set of resources. But Schumpeter’s insight that economic creation inevitably is linked with destruction still applies. Innovations also destroy outdated businesses and products.  Airbnb is the one in the news right now as the St. Paul City Council considers new rules to limit the fraction of rental housing units that can be converted to short- term Airbnb units . That is an issue in many other cities. Airbnb and its small competitors also raise the same issue as Uber...