U.S. Outflows Exceed Inbound Capital for First Time Since 2014

Inbound capital to the U.S. dropped 54% in 2019, largely due to a sharp decrease in entity-level sales that tend to be highly volatile from year to year. In 2018, rising U.S. interest rates and discounted REIT share prices contributed to entity-level sales’ unprecedented 51% share of total inbound volume. But as these trends reversed in 2019, this share dropped to just 6%. Excluding entity-level transactions, 2019 inbound investment decreased by a more moderate 12.1%.

With U.S. capital outflows down by just 1% from 2018, the amount of capital that U.S. investors deployed in foreign real estate markets exceeded inbound capital by nearly $18 billion in 2019.