2026 Macro Outlook Recap & Reaction: Rates, Growth, and Real Estate

The narrative that you see all over the news channels is, you know, investors took all the homes. BlackRock bought all the homes, and it's just wrong.

The GDP growth has been very, very strong and is forecasting 3.9% growth, which is way above consensus.

The biggest near-term risk is sentiment, not fundamentals. When I hear that, I hear opportunity, opportunity, opportunity, right?

Hey, future billionaires. We recently hosted our 2026 Macro Economic Outlook with leading economists like Belinda Roman, John Chang, Jay Parsons. These are experts that major institutions and large capital allocators rely on for data analysis. But more importantly, there was incredible insight shared for individual investors to help you make more informed decisions or better informed decisions in 2026 as you look to allocate capital. And so you can find these entire presentations on our YouTube channel at Invest Like a Billionaire. But today I sit down with Ben Fraser and Bob Fraser to really summarize this event and get their key takeaways. And the insights that are shaping our firm, Aspen Funds, and how we're allocating capital in 2026. Enjoy. All right, guys. So let's recap these presentations. But I want to start with Belinda Rahman. If for those who maybe didn't show, didn't show or don't know who we're talking about, she's a lead economist for Rahman Economics. She was actually voted the most accurate economist by the Wall Street Journal in 2023. And I thought she did an incredible job at the beginning of our outlook of kind of a broad forecast of the economy. And so, Bob, why don't you summarize for us just a few of the points she spoke on and then we can react to those?

Yeah, I loved her input because she's really a general economist and a true generalist. And so, so I love her. I love her big picture. She said the U.S. economy is stabilizing and performing better than it feels. She mentioned a disconnect, which a couple of the people mentioned as well, between the data the sentiment. So people feel grumpy, they don't feel like things are going good. But the reality is they're spending and they're making more money than they ever have. So there's this gap between the data and the emotions. And it matters because, because people who are, who are grumpy or less confident don't, don't rent houses, they don't buy houses, they don't move, they don't spend, they don't invest, they don't behave, you know, you know, like, like things are going well. So, so it slows things down a little bit, although we're not really seeing that in the data. So it's, it's interesting. She mentioned that the GDP growth has been very, very strong and is, and is, is forecasting 3.9%. So growth, which is way above consensus. I mean, you look at that's probably double consensus of traditional economists. So, so pretty, pretty crazy. She said the strength is coming from two main sources, consumer spending, which I also pointed out. Investment because the federal policy is encouraging domestic and foreign investment in projects, especially tied to nearshoring and reshoring. So she's calling out the trends that we've been talking about for years, for years. And so she's basically saying the GDP is solid. She said employment is shrinking, but productivity is rising, which I also pointed out in my presentation. So fewer workers are producing more output earning higher wages. So, so long term, it is a, it is a concern because there is a, there's an insufficient labor supply that GDP may be constrained in the future, GDP growth. But that's really not the case now. And then she said inflation is trending down but likely to remain elevated. And she basically said that, that it made her forecast for inflation between 2.5% and 3%. Which is really where it's at today. And that's, I think, where a lot of economists are falling. So I made some different points there. But so my takeaways were from her were really very strong GDP growth, weak employment growth, and high-ish inflation, higher than people want. So those are my takeaways, which is actually very close to what I was saying, what I'm forecasting. I also believe in the very high GDP growth. I believe in lower, lower inflation. So, I don't know. What are your gentlemen? What are your takeaways?

Yeah, I think I agree with you. I really loved having her set the stage as a first presentation and really bring in these big picture things that are moving the needle in the economy. It's so interesting because to hear her say her expectation of GDP to be close to 4%.

Holy cow.

I mean, that was eye-popping. Like you said, it's probably double consensus. Economists are like everybody else, they like to go with the herd. To be a contrarian takes guts. I think it's partly why she's been accurate in the past, and it's because she's willing to separate signal from noise, which you talked about in your presentation, is how do you parse through all the different indicators and then really look for the things that are meaningful. It's interesting how much we align with her just because of things we're looking at and we're not beholden to some consensus or pressure to be resounding the norm. But I thought that was really interesting and it obviously speaks to a strong economy. GDP growth is one of the biggest indicators of a strong economy and really driven by consumer spending. It's interesting hearing the disconnect between consumer sentiment and their spending. We've talked about this years ago on the podcast. And really, what we've kind of come to believe it's primarily driven by is more a political and social feeling and emotion rather than pure wealth, feeling like things are going well. There's a lot of—

So, the question is, what impact is that really going to have? Um, because the data says, well, it's not affecting people shopping. So, so, but, but I, I can't remember who it was. It was either John Chang or Jay Parsons mentioned that people tend to not move and they, they, they tend to— it slows, uh, you know, people moving up into, you know, renting, I, I believe. And, uh, I don't know if you guys can recall that, but, but I, I also think it's become a less powerful, uh, correlation.

Right. And we— yeah, for sure, charts that we've shown in the past where sentiment used to be the biggest driver of directionality, of—

right, it was a leading indicator. Great.

But it hasn't shown up, and they have— no, the sentiment's been low for a long time, and it's still, you know, a lot of spending's happening.

So, so to clarify, are you guys saying from an investor standpoint, how should investors navigate that? Would you say follow the data more than sentiment? I mean, sentiment does drive, uh, you know, it can drive valuations, especially in the mar— the public markets, for example. So how would you say as a listener, as an investor, you know, they should navigate those two different dynamics?

Yeah, great question. I mean, I think clearly it's, it's not affecting spending. Okay, we can say that for certain because sentiment is low and spending is hitting records and spending is what drives economy. But, but, you know, one of the speakers was saying how it, how it reduces household formation, right? So people that are, you know, living with their parents, young people, are they ready to move out and form a household? That it tends to slow that down. I mean, I would go with them and say that's, that's likely. So we may see, you know, kind of slower household formation, which drives housing demand. So I'll buy that.

One thing that I did find very interesting, she said the jobs report is supposed to come out. We're recording on February 10th. I think it's supposed to come out tomorrow, Wednesday, February 11th. That was one thing she did say could sway some of this. What impact do you think, Bob or Ben, that may have on maybe her predictions or her outlook, if any? And kind of what are you guys predicting for that tomorrow?

Well, I mean, I'm, I'm going to go with my forecast. So I said jobs are going to be weaker than people expect. I think we're going to continue to see jobs being weaker. And, you know, we're seeing a pretty major disconnect from the government BLS data and ADP data and ADP data is much more negative, and it's based on actual payrolls because they're the payroll processing company, not based on economic models, which is what the BLS data is, is doing. So there's a lot of talk that the economic models need to be adjusted. So, you know, I can't say what's going to happen tomorrow. I mean, again, you know, you're asking me what the— what, what, what the next wave is, how high the next wave is going to be. I, I can't tell you that, but I, I do believe we're going to see weaker, weaker, uh, employment numbers coming down the pike, which, which, which, which plays into interest rates. You know, if the employment numbers are weaker, then the Fed is going to be much more comfortable pulling the trigger on lower rates, which is why I'm also forecasting, you know, not 1 to 2 rate cuts but 3 to 4 rate cuts this year.

Yeah, to that point, I think it's interesting, um, the inflation outlook, right? Because inflation, you know, the Fed has 2 mandates, you know, low, low unemployment and inflation target of 2%. And maybe the unemployment numbers soften a little bit and make them more comfortable. But if inflation is sticky in that 2.5% to 3% range, there's probably going to be a lot of division amongst all the Fed chairs of what they do, right? Because it's not obvious and you could potentially create more inflation if you stoke the economy too hot, too quickly. And I know a lot of people are concerned with that, with Trump's putting in a new seemingly dovish Fed chair later this year. So, what are your thoughts on how does the stickiness of inflation impact interest rate policy and as a byproduct, this cycle of more inflation?

Yeah. Well, yeah, again, going back to my take, I thought unemployment was going to be higher than we expected and jobs weaker. I thought inflation was going to be softer than most people expect, and that's primarily because of energy prices and shelter. So wages are going to continue running hot. And, you know, there's 3 big inputs in my— the way I look at inflation, 3 big inputs: wages, energy, and, and, um, um, what was the third? Shelter. And, uh, only one of them is actually a CPI component. Uh, the last— the, the 2, wages and energy, underlie everything. So, so most economists miss that. So energy is super low right now, very— and that just filters through the economy, keeping price pressures low. And then, um, and then yeah, wages are running hot. And then shelter is— we're going to see shelter, the shelter, which is, you know, 30 to 40% of the CPI number, coming in weaker. So I believe we're going to approach the 2%. I think it's— my prediction is, is low, low 2s, uh, percent for inflation. And if we have that, if it's approaching 2 and we have higher higher unemployment and weaker jobs data, you— the Fed's going to be much more comfortable lowering rates. So that's really where I'm coming in with my forecast for the year and high GDP. So it's really everything. It's really Goldilocks, you know, it's kind of like, you know, it's going to— you know, I'm predicting a pretty good year.

Well, let's go to John Chang. So we were— we also had John Chang on, who's a senior vice president and chief intelligence and analytics officer for Marcus Millichap. So this is a guy who really is able to instruct really large organizations all across the country with his, his data and market, market intelligence. And so, Bob, I'll allow you to summarize again what his data really went over. It was kind of a broad approach to all commercial real estate assets, which I thought was really incredible.

Yeah. And he was— he's great because he— so, you know, he's really focusing on real estate. He's with one of the large real estate brokers and just a very, very clear voice. And I love— I love John's— John's presentation is always extremely insightful. So he basically is predicting lower GDP growth, like in the 2% range and supported by consumer spending and investment in AI and data centers, these kind of things. He's all— he also said that there's a, there's a real challenge in, in geopolitical uncertainty, right, with politics, tariffs, immigration, Fed leadership. So a lot of uncertainty, but made the point that it's becoming more the new normal. And I think people are just kind of getting comfortable with that. Makes the point again about job growth slowing sharply, except in healthcare and services, and is expecting employment to remain stable. And he does see that job growth, slower job growth, weighing on housing demand so that we may see, you know, some of the high absorption numbers we've been seeing out of housing, you know, to maybe begin slowing. So consumers, he he, he, he was, uh, you know, obviously seeing the very high consumer spending numbers and, and, but also pushed back that, that it was a deeply K-shaped economy, meaning that, that, uh, that, that, you know, the economy is only good for the top percents, right, and not good for the rest. And pointed out that, yeah, the, the top percentage of, of the, of folks, you know, higher earners, are, are having higher, you know, better economics, but they also are carrying higher debt. So he's, he made that point, which I thought I thought, I thought was great. He's, he's with the consensus on 1 to 3 potential rate cuts. And really the consensus is 1 to 2. So he was maybe going a little bit more, more bullish there and is also saying the 10-year Treasury, which matters because that's kind of the big investment, that, that's the, that's the number of most investments look on, not the Fed numbers, but you know, what affects investment is the Treasury range and said that that's probably going to be pretty stable. So then he really— so that was his view of the general economy. And then he hit, he hit commercial real estate and noted that construction has slowed dramatically across all property types, significantly reducing future supply risk, which as we know has been a very big deal, right? And he said cap rates appear to be stabilizing. Cap rates are the price of real estate, appear to be stabilizing. And, and said, you know, institutional investors are holding record levels of dry powder, signaling increased, increased transaction activity. He made the point about multifamily that its demand has held up much better than expected despite record deliveries, which we've all kind of noted that oversupplied Sunbelt markets like Florida, Texas, Phoenix, Denver face near-term pressure. But affordability constraints and slowed construction support long-term fundamentals. So he's making the point that, hey, these growth markets are growth markets for a reason. And yeah, they're going to be short term, but there's still a lot of pent-up demand that's going to reemerge. So there's a lot of young adults living with parents that are going to, going to start forming households as job growth stabilizes. But again, because he was predicting slower job growth, that, that may be a slower trend emerging. Retail, he mentioned, was structurally very healthy. It's interesting, retail is one of these things we called years ago, right? And, and placed capital there that we've, we, we really nailed that. And, and he says it's going to continue to be a, to be a great market. Office, he hit on, you know, says it's actually going to be a bifurcated market. So older central business district properties are going to continue to be challenged. But, but a lot of the, the markets are going to strengthen as employers are forcing more back-to-work kind of trends. And with labor softening, right, you know, people are not going to push back the same way. So employers are going to demand workers move back into the office. Industrial, he said there's been a lot of new supply, but infill and modern logistics assets remain tight. So there is this bifurcated market in older obsolete buildings underperforming, but newer modern assets are doing super well. So a big picture. So I really loved this. I really love this. He said that 2026 is about selective opportunity, not broad-based risk-on behavior. So it's not time to, you know, empty the piggy bank and buy everything. But it's about selective opportunity, which is kind of what we're seeing, right, Ben? And, and, you know, higher, higher cap rates, slower construction, improving capital inflows and stabilizing fundamentals create great conditions for investors to have— who have a long-term, like a 3 to 5 year horizon. So I thought that was fantastic. Yeah.

To quote John Chang, and when I asked him what's good this year, he said, real estate, baby. So, but I want to ask you this. I mean, I think he brought us back to, as Bob just mentioned there at the end, kind of a longer term horizon, or maybe back to the fundamentals of investing in real estate. Talk about kind of that takeaway and how you viewed, you know, from an investment standpoint, the strategy of buying real estate? Because there was a little bit of hesitation, right? I even used the word fragile at some point. So, how you kind of thought about both of those sentiments?

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I discussed this after all the presentations of how do we translate this into real-world decisions as an investor. And I think one of the things that we've seen across asset classes and investor types is what I would say a return to the fundamentals of real estate investing. Real estate historically is a very, very strong asset class, but you have to have longer-term hold periods and longer-term expectations of when to realize the business plans that you have for each asset. And one of the things that I think happened in the last market cycle with commercial real estate, where it was just easy to print money, you buy something, you throw a couple million bucks at it, and all of a sudden, you sell it for double the price 2 years later. This was something that I think was short-lived, but a lot of people got addicted to this kind of quick, fast returns. And then, the market corrected and all those people that bought in 2021, 2022, are left holding assets at peak prices that have really reset 25%, 30%. And so I love what John's saying here because it's not just back up the truck and buy everything that you can get your hands on right now because there is still a lot of distress in the market. But if you're selective, if you know your market, if you know the kind of long-term fundamentals of supply and demand, and you know the submarkets that you're in and have strong demographic trends, you're going to be a winner in real estate over the next, you know, 3, 5, I'd say 7+ years because of the long-term drivers of real estate appreciation. So to me, it was just confirmation of what we've been seeing, the conversations we've been having internally with other investors of shifting from this kind of short-range investing mindset to a longer-range time horizon.

Yeah, I mean, so, so we've got a little bit of distress left in the market, but we're seeing that distress burning off. Meanwhile, the fundamentals remain intact. So it's really— we have a good year, maybe 2 years where it's going to be a buyer's market, right? We can buy really good assets, right? So, so I think it's— I think it's really time to be, to be doing that, you know. You know, Ben, what's your view of the, of the, you know, multifamily markets and that you're liking or the types of properties that, you know, what's your, what's your selective opportunity buy box looking like?

Maybe we share more of that once we get to Jay because I feel like Jay really honed in on the housing multifamily market and have some specific strategies. But as a whole, I think it's well-located assets is to me the first and foremost decision factor you got to put into those investments. And next, it's just fundamentals of the property performance. Does it have cash flow? Does it have a stable renter base and a renter base that wants to be there and can have some upward mobility. And then safe financing, not getting too aggressive on leverage, and putting together a long-term business plan. So, nothing too fancy. It's kind of the boring vanilla strategy of real estate, but that's how you win over the long haul.

Yeah.

I love his takeaway. He said 2026 may be one of the most attractive entry points in this cycle. Cycle. So I, I love that, you know, you, you don't want it when you're, when you decide to get back in the market, you, you know, uh, I, I think you don't want to be too late, right? You don't want to be too early, you don't want to be too late. But so being what you may be a tiny bit early, but not in all the markets, right? I think just in the Sunbelt markets where there's a lot of distress. But even there, I, I could see, you know, if you can get really good basis, you know, and you maybe have a year, year or two or more of distress, and you can, you can use that to get a great price on assets, you know, maybe it's, maybe it's okay to be, you know, time to be dipping in, in those assets even as well.

Well, Bob, you brought up multifamily. We also had on Jay Parsons. So if you're a multifamily or housing investor, you've probably read or seen some of Jay's stuff. He's a rental housing economist, and we really kind of ended the day diving deep into housing and multifamily. Ben, why don't you let Bob take a break and you summarize, uh, the Jay Parsons talk?

Yeah, well, he said, he said a lot of things that I think, um, fly in the face of a lot of the headline narrative, right?

I love that.

You know, one of the things he said is the narrative that you see all over the news channels is, you know, investors took all the homes, right? BlackRock bought all the homes. And it's just, it's just wrong, right? And contrary to the headlines, um, the U.S. actually lost more than a million single-family rental homes over the past decade, and not, not just to investors. Um, and those individual homebuyers are, you know, outcompeting investors for houses generally, because they're willing to pay a little bit more because they don't necessarily care about the cash flow. They want a place to live in the school district or the neighborhood they want to live in. And so, the reality is really far from what the headlines make it appear. The other thing that he said, which I thought was really interesting, is his take on inflation is actually it's lower than it appears. And because one of the things that you share, Bob, is shelter is one of the core components of the CPI metrics. But if you break down where they're getting that data, it's actually lagging reality. And usually, it's about a 12- to 18-month lag. And so, what's showing up in CPI is actually data from a year to a year and a half ago. And so, he said when you exclude shelter, inflation has actually been hovering near the Fed's 2% target. And so, that comes into play with what you were saying, Bob, on weaker jobs, labor market, and we might see some softening in inflation to get the Fed more comfortable to lower rates this year, maybe more than consensus. Another thing that was really interesting, I think this is a thread that John shared and we've been talking about a lot, but supply of housing and multifamily is, he said, one of the most important variables in looking at where does it go from here. And he had some great charts, rent growth very highly correlates to areas that have new supply.

Wherever you see a lot of new supply, you see low rent growth. I mean, duh.

Right. And it's almost so obvious, it sounds silly to say, but it's so important because we've been in this kind of high supply, low growth market for a few years. And so, it can feel like, "Man, is there ever going to be rent growth again?" especially in the Sunbelt markets. But we've talked about this for a long time, the supply pipeline, it really takes about 2 to 3 years to go through the full cycle of identifying opportunities, getting the permitting, going through construction, and then delivering a new multifamily building to the market. So a lot of the— I mean, 2 or 3 years ago when those starts really started to fall off because of interest rates and construction costs, and this fear of the economy, it's created this huge gap. And so we're starting to see the new supply hitting the market reflect what we saw in the data a couple years ago, where it's much, much lower than we've seen historically. And even in the Sunbelt markets, the future supply is going to be far below the pre-COVID levels. And so we're really seeing a big fall-off in supply, and that's going to be Very important as you look towards rent growth and absorption in the future. The other thing that he said, which I thought was really interesting, and again, one of those kind of like, duh, obvious things, but you don't think about it until you hear someone say it, is we're seeing the absorption of new supply starting to fall. It's been very, very, very strong over the past couple of years, but we're starting to see it fall. And he said, don't let that alarm you, because as there's just less supply to absorb, by default, that number is going to go down because there's just a limited amount to absorb. But as long as supply is falling faster than the absorption or the demand, you're still going to see positive occupancy numbers over time. I think that's what's really important because even John Chang mentioned weakening in demand and more softness in demand, But as long as that is higher or not falling as fast as supply is falling, you're still going to see a net positive increase of occupancy. So I think it's really, really important nuance there where you can't just look at one variable on a headline without comparing it with the other side of it.

He had some other fundamentals that were kind of surprising too. He mentioned, so there's been a lot of talk about the affordability crisis, right? And he said that's actually not what it seems. It's the data says that only the only rent-burdened folks are people earning under $50,000 a year, that the rest we're seeing not— that's really not a problem. So that, that's a pretty major takeaway that says that, that really the bulk of the U.S. population is not rent-burdened, which means there's, there's, there's room for growth. He says that wage growth has outpaced rent growth for the past rent growth for the past 3 years. So, so that's kind of a, huh, okay. So that's pretty major fundamental. Then he, then he said also that demand remains structurally strong. He said the renter population grew by 1 million people last year. Again, that's not a story that you're hearing. So, so Jay Parsons is kind of the rental guru, right? The rental real estate guru. And so he's calling out some pretty major fundamentals there that I think is being missed in the headlines. And again, All of those are really bullish, right? And again, so, you know, the opportunity is, is when the narrative doesn't fit the data, right? And most people are missing, you know, so I think to get this kind of, kind of thing, you know, right matters. And we, we can say, hey, there's an inefficient market right here, an opportunity.

Well, I think it's so such a good point because, you know, the obvious question is, well, if those are If that's true, then why haven't I seen rent growth? But again, you have to go back to supply and what happens in these high supply markets for these new properties to get absorption quickly, they have to discount their rates substantially. But when Class A discounts the leasing rates, that has a trickle-down effect across all other older classes and vintages of real estate. Your Class B have to then cut to compete so that they're not the same price as a Class A. The renter's just going to go and do the Class A only, and then the Class C has to drop their rent.

Cut even more.

Cut even more. And so you've had this low rent growth or negative rent growth in a lot of markets, really because of excess supply, not because of waning demand, but demand has still been there and the wage growth has outpaced rent growth. And so that really creates this margin of potential for our future rent growth, um, as the supply gets worked through again. So again, just you have to go a couple layers deeper, uh, from just looking at the single data points. And I think, like you said, Jay is so good at this, of pulling out the data that really matters.

Yeah, and I think this is a better time to ask you about the multifamily. So can we go back to that question Bob asked, or maybe Bob asked that question again, for us to really understand kind of Aspen strategy? Strategy for multifamily?

Yeah.

Well, we ask them directly, "Hey, where are the opportunities?" Right? So, where do we go buy? And I think one of the challenges is investors that are paying attention are starting to see all the same thing. Right? And so, the question is BlackRock and Bain and all these big institutional investors are raising enormous funds to go and buy real estate. And John Cheng mentioned the amount of dry powder is is at the historic levels. So, the question is, well, how am I going to go compete with these big institutions? But the institutions, they're still very risk-off and they want to go buy the newest, nicest assets in the best primary markets. But there's still a lot of other opportunity for—

And I would say that's not even the best opportunity. Those are going to be low cap rates, low yield, you know, yeah, they're low risk, but they're also gonna be low return.

Totally. And so some specific strategies and things we're looking at, you know, is maybe you want to be in a primary market, but maybe you're in a tier 2 submarket. So it's not, you know, the submarket that all the institutional investors are, you know, investing in, but, you know, a growing emerging submarket that has, you know, strong demographics, you know, strong school district, etc., but that maybe is off the radar Another is you go and invest in newer assets in really good submarkets and secondary markets. So not the big primary markets, tier 1 cities, but ones that are emerging, that are growing, and ride that growth. The other, I think, is smaller properties. One of the big challenges of raising a ton of capital is deployment and deployment efficiency. And by default, they have to go and invest invest in larger properties so they can write a bigger check and get the money spent faster. So, I think under 200 units, there's going to still be a big opportunity there across vintages and asset classes. And then, the other opportunity, which Bob, you mentioned and pushed back on Jay on a few things, are older assets, Class B and Class C assets in good submarkets. And you want to share? Yeah.

Oh, I think people always think the Class C, you get a picture of Class C as this old dilapidated, you know, dated property. But I mean, we've got a 100-year-old property in the Plaza, right? That's, you know, been well maintained. It's huge demand. There's no construction around there. It's extremely kind of a hip spot, right? It's just an older property. And is that really always gonna be this sucky property? Well, no, absolutely not. So I think selective Class Cs, if they're well maintained and, and well located, right? Just, just because, because the ABC designation is primarily an age designation. Right. But, but to me, that age is, age is not right. Hey, we know there's old people that are, you know, that matter, you know, and there's old buildings that matter.

Right.

So, you know, I refuse to be ageist in my, in my real estate selection. I don't know. What are your thoughts about Cs, Ben?

Yeah, well, I think it's going back to Jay— not Jay, John's comment of being selectively opportunistic, because I agree with you. I actually think there's going to be a very big opportunity in older assets because it's, it's completely off the radar of any, you know, big checkwriter. They're saying it has to be 2000s and the prices are insanely low, right?

Yes, because they're out of demand.

But it does matter on the CapEx risk you're taking. You are taking a lot more risk risk of an older asset with the roofs and the plumbing and the HVAC systems. And a lot of times, worse renter basis. So you have to scrutinize the rent rolls. You have to really know your renter base. Are they good tenants? You have to scrutinize the CapEx needs of the property over the whole period. But I actually think because there'll be a lot more opportunities there, you're going to be able to be more selective about what which ones you want to invest in. And we just bought an asset a couple of months ago that had $7 million of CapEx invested by the last seller. And we bought it below their basis 3 years later, and everything's been replaced. Everything's done. It's a '70s vintage, but it looks way newer, very strong renter base, very strong location with a good school district and a great submarket. And it's cash flowing like crazy. Right. And that's something that you haven't seen in multifamily for a long time. So I do think there is going to be opportunities like that where it's just, you know, if you're willing to look a little bit older, you're going to see some real, real diamonds.

Yeah. And the bottom line is basis matters, right? I mean, if we get in, you know, there's no such thing as a bad property, really. It's just a bad price. Right. And so as we see prices getting attractive, There's just a lot of opportunity.

One more thing on that is I also think as the new supply starts to get absorbed and there's less pressure of the A's heavily discounting their rates, that creates this huge margin potential for the B's and C's as the A's stopped discounting.

Stop discounting. Now, the C's and the B's stop having the pressure to compete. Meet with that and can start raising rents again. Exactly. You know, I want to call out too something that you and I have talked about in the past, Ben, was, you know, concern about the, the demographics. And this is a very long topic, but, but we're seeing across the world, right, the youth population is decreasing and, you know, everybody's aging out. And so how does that affect housing? And he actually made the point, uh, which I love, that there's actually a number of of Sunbelt and mountain states that are— that have a strong youth population and strong youth migration. And, uh, so, and it, you know, made the point too— who was the other, uh, the gentleman we had, Spencer Levy, you know, where, where, where he— you know, I said, I brought up this, this thing, this challenge of demographic challenge. He said there's always going to be demand, it's just a matter of where, where do they want to live, right? So I thought I thought that was super good. And I think that should be one of our underwriting metrics as we go out and start shopping.

And I think the last point Jay made, he said the biggest near-term risk is sentiment, not fundamentals. When I hear that, I hear opportunity, opportunity, opportunity. If everyone is too scared to jump back in, but all the data is screaming at you, hey, it's time, um, then this is a window. This is—

we've been proved over and over right by doing that, right? When we see the narrative doesn't match the data, that is when it's time to move. And over and over we've made those calls, and over and over we've been proved right.

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