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The Real Estate Market Watch - current events through a real estate lens.

The Real Estate Market Watch - current events through a real estate lens.

Written by: Dr. Adam Gower
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 A shifting economic order. Rising geopolitical risk. Capital on edge. In The Real Estate Market Watch, Dr. Adam Gower, author, academic, and commercial real estate veteran with over 40 years of experience, examines the macroeconomic signals reshaping the real estate investment landscape. This isn't a show about deal hype or trend-chasing. It's about what happens when confidence meets correction - and how investors and sponsors can respond with clarity, discipline, and a focus on downside protection. Each episode features candid conversations with economists, multi-cycle real estate professionals, and respected market thinkers. The aim: to make sense of fast-moving events without partisan noise or clickbait headlines - only the real implications for real estate. There's no fixed release schedule. Episodes are published in response to market conditions, not calendars. If you're trying to navigate uncertainty with a clear-eyed, capital-first approach, this podcast is for you. Newsletter: GowerCrowd.com/subscribe Email: adam@gowercrowd.com Call: 213-761-1000Unless otherwise indicated, all images, content, designs, and recordings © 2025 GowerCrowd. All rights reserved. Economics Personal Finance
Episodes
  • Feasibility Studies in Minutes with AI

    Feasibility Studies in Minutes with AI
    Jan 26 2026
    Introducing the Demo Day YouTube/Podcast Demo Day is a new series focused on one simple idea: showing, not telling, where AI is actually revolutionizing commercial real estate. No theory. No slide decks. Not a clever ChatGPT prompt. Just live, on-screen demonstrations of AI tools you can use today to get a significant edge against your competitors. If you think ChatGPT is all AI has to offer, this episode will reset your mental model fast. In this Demo Day, I reveal the extraordinary AI platform, TestFit, a platform that applies AI directly to land underwriting and early development decisions by building super-detailed feasibility studies for you in minutes. Best seen on YouTube, watch this episode to see how AI does what traditionally took weeks, consultants, and real pursuit capital: Instantly show what can be built on a site Kill weak deals early and surface better ones faster Update layouts and early-stage economics live on screen Run thousands of zoning and density scenarios in real time This is the real deal. Beneath all the hype about AI, and the usual 'here's (yet) another great prompt' incremental benefits, there truly are companies revolutionizing the industry. Testfit is one of them. If you want to get REAL benefit from AI and give your company a real, immediately tangible competitive advantage in the new AI era – start here. *** At GowerCrowd, we are aggressively researching AI tools you can actually use and that bring real, immediate value to your business. Subscribe to my newsletter and get access to this transformational intel before anyone else: https://gowercrowd.com/subscribe Email: adam@gowercrowd.com Call: 213-761-1000
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    52 mins
  • When IRRs Lie and Cycles Matter

    When IRRs Lie and Cycles Matter
    Jan 21 2026
    My guest this week, Jeremy Roll, is a full-time professional passive investor with more than two decades of experience allocating capital across multiple real estate cycles. He is relentlessly data-driven, deeply immersed in macro and capital markets, and unapologetically conservative in how he thinks about risk. That combination matters right now. Jeremy is not trying to predict the next rate cut or headline shift. He is focused on something far more useful: where we actually are in the cycle, which assumptions quietly failed in 2025, and why capital remains sidelined despite constant talk of opportunity. His view of the market heading into 2026 is sober, unsentimental, and grounded in how cycles really work. The overarching thesis of our conversation is simple but uncomfortable: predictability broke, patience was rewarded, and many investors learned the wrong lesson. We discuss questions that serious investors and sponsors should be asking themselves now, including: Why did "survive till 25" fail so completely? Why have interest rates stayed higher than most expected? If there is so much capital on the sidelines, why isn't it moving? Why hasn't price discovery fully happened yet? Where does real opportunity actually come from in a slow-moving reset? What was the real mistake behind floating-rate, value-add deals? How should investors evaluate sponsors after the last three years? Jeremy also draws a sharp distinction between heavy value-add investors, who are already active, and value-oriented investors, who face the very real risk of being too early. He frames today as closer to late 2009 or 2010 than 2011: the light is visible, but the reset is not complete. This is not a conversation about hype, shortcuts, or timing the exact bottom. It is about discipline, incentives, and understanding why doing nothing for long stretches is sometimes the most rational strategy. If you invest in commercial real estate or allocate capital to those who do, this episode will help you think more clearly about what actually matters heading into 2026. *** In this series, I cut through the noise to examine how shifting macroeconomic forces and rising geopolitical risk are reshaping real estate investing. With insights from economists, academics, and seasoned professionals, this show helps investors respond to market uncertainty with clarity, discipline, and a focus on downside protection. Subscribe to my free newsletter for timely updates, insights, and tools to help you navigate today's volatile real estate landscape. You'll get: Straight talk on what happens when confidence meets correction - no hype, no spin, no fluff.Real implications of macro trends for investors and sponsors with actionable guidance.Insights from real estate professionals who've been through it all before. Visit GowerCrowd.com/subscribe Email: adam@gowercrowd.com Call: 213-761-1000
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    43 mins
  • Affordability Is Now Structural, Not Cyclical

    Affordability Is Now Structural, Not Cyclical
    Dec 18 2025
    Mark Zandi is one of the few economists who can do two things at once: explain what is happening in the data, and explain why households experience it so differently. He is the chief economist at Moody's Analytics, and in our conversation, the last of my podcast series this year and the second of two Holiday Specials, he connected inflation, affordability, market structure, and geopolitics in a way CRE professionals will recognize immediately. The theme was simple, but not comforting: affordability is no longer a "cycle" story - it is becoming structural. And the US economy is increasingly dependent on a relatively narrow slice of consumers continuing to spend. Zandi's framing matters for sponsors and investors because it changes what "risk" looks like. If the top of the income distribution is carrying demand while the middle and bottom are constrained, the economy can keep moving - but it can also become unusually fragile if equity markets stumble or confidence shifts. He also made a point many people avoid saying plainly: even if AI is transformative, markets may be pricing in an adoption curve that is too fast. That is how you get corrections - not because the technology is useless, but because expectations got ahead of diffusion. Five questions we get into: Why has affordability re-emerged so forcefully in 2025 - and why does it feel like it is not going away? What does a "K-shaped economy" mean in practical terms for spending, jobs, and social stability? If the top 10% accounts for nearly half of spending, what breaks the expansion? Is today's AI boom more like 1997 or 2000 - and what would cause a valuation reset? Why does deglobalization threaten America's "exorbitant privilege," and what does that mean for markets? If you are underwriting 2026 with a clean, mean-reversion narrative, you will want to hear this conversation. *** In this series, I cut through the noise to examine how shifting macroeconomic forces and rising geopolitical risk are reshaping real estate investing. With insights from economists, academics, and seasoned professionals, this show helps investors respond to market uncertainty with clarity, discipline, and a focus on downside protection. Subscribe to my free newsletter for timely updates, insights, and tools to help you navigate today's volatile real estate landscape. You'll get: Straight talk on what happens when confidence meets correction - no hype, no spin, no fluff.Real implications of macro trends for investors and sponsors with actionable guidance.Insights from real estate professionals who've been through it all before. Visit GowerCrowd.com/subscribe Email: adam@gowercrowd.com Call: 213-761-1000
    Show More Show Less
    47 mins
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