Canadian commercial real estate continues to outperform

TORONTO, Feb. 11, 2014 /CNW/ - The REALpac/IPD Canada Quarterly Property Index, released today, showed that Canadian commercial real estate continued to deliver double-digit performance for the year ending December 31, 2013 with a total return of 10.7%.

Importantly, over the last 12 months, real estate underperformed public equities at 13.6% (MSCI Canada Index); but outperformed bonds at -3.6% (J.P. Morgan Government Bond Index 7-10 years) and inflation at 1.2% (Statistics Canada).

Simon Fairchild, IPD Executive Director & Head of North America, said, "Looking at the 14-year history of the index, the year ending December 31, 2013 was the ninth highest annual total return. Returns on direct real estate in western Canada remained robust, mainly due to above average income and capital returns."

Of the six largest markets, Calgary and Edmonton continued to outperform the market overall while returns in Toronto and Montreal were slightly below the market average. Ottawa's sub-par performance was attributable to below market income and capital returns.

The REALpac / IPD Canada Annual Property Index measures 2,138 institutional grade properties across Canada valued at $117.6 billion CAD, as of December 31, 2013.

About IPD

IPD provides real estate benchmarking and portfolio analysis services to clients in over 30 countries around the world. These services incorporate more than 1,500 funds containing nearly 77,000 assets, with a total capital value of over U.S. $1.9 trillion. Each year, IPD produces more than 120 indices helping real estate market transparency and performance comparisons, as well as nearly 600 benchmarks for client portfolios. IPD is a subsidiary of MSCI Inc., a leading provider of investment decision support tools to investors globally, and clients include real estate investors, managers, consultants, lenders and occupiers. For further information on IPD, please visit www.ipd.com.

About REALpac

REALpac is Canada's senior national industry association for owners and managers of investment real estate. Its members include publicly traded real estate companies, real estate investment trusts (REITs), private companies, pension funds, banks and life insurance companies with investment real estate assets each in excess of $100 million. For further information on REALpac, please visit www.realpac.ca.

SOURCE: Real Property Association of Canada

For further information:

Media Enquiries

Hank Hakewill, IPD, Chicago, [e-mail] + 1.312.461.4377

Simon Fairchild, IPD, Chicago, [e-mail] + 1.312.461.4369

Carolyn Lane, REALpac, Toronto, [e-mail] + 1.416.642.2700 (ext. 223)