Survey: RE Investors' Hopes 'Soaring'

Real estate investors' hopes are "still soaring" as a result of declining vacancy rates and a "deluge" of capital into real estate, according to a quarterly investor survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers.Another finding of the PricewaterhouseCoopers Korpacz Real Estate Investor Survey is that high home prices, surging construction costs, and rising mortgage rates have spurred increasing demand for apartments in recent months. "Last year, 75% of central business district markets posted year-over-year declines in overall vacancy, compared to only 25% recording such declines between 2002 and 2003," said Peter Korpacz, director of the PricewaterhouseCoopers Global Strategic Real Estate Research Practice. "At the same time, in suburban office markets, 80% of CBD markets saw year-over-year declines last year, as compared with only 29% between 2002 and 2003." More information on the survey can be found on the Web at http://www.pwcreval.com.