Slow news cycles often provide the clearest insight. When headlines quiet down, fundamentals and market-level data move to the forefront, making it easier to evaluate longer-term trends without the noise of short-term narratives. For real estate—and hospitality in particular—these periods often reveal more about where momentum is building than weeks dominated by breaking news.
Heading into 2026, pairing broader real estate outlooks with ownership-level market detail helps clarify what’s changing. Capital is reengaging, transaction conditions are gradually improving, and fragmented hotel markets are beginning to surface clearer hotel investment opportunities beneath the surface.
Three Data Points Driving Momentum Into 2026
Listed real estate is positioned differently than private markets
Cohen & Steers, a global investment manager specializing in real assets and listed real estate securities, recently published its 2026 Real Estate Outlook outlining how the next phase of the cycle may take shape. In that outlook, the firm notes that listed real estate has lagged listed equities over the past year, but views 2026 as a potential inflection point on multiple fronts.
Their analysis emphasizes that listed real estate is expected to outperform private real estate, largely because listed vehicles typically have greater exposure to higher-growth property types and benefit from improved liquidity and price transparency. In a more selective capital environment, those attributes can materially influence where capital chooses to reengage.
Delinquencies may rise - but transaction volume can limit broader impact
Cohen & Steers also expects delinquencies to increase as aggressively underwritten deals from the previous cycle mature. However, their key qualifier is just as important: increased real estate transaction volumes should limit a wide impact on the market and overall valuations.
The mechanics behind this are straightforward. When transactions continue to occur—even amid stress—pricing becomes clearer, lenders and buyers can recalibrate expectations, and capital can reallocate rather than remain frozen. Active transaction markets allow assets to reprice incrementally instead of experiencing abrupt valuation resets. In contrast, prolonged inactivity often creates greater uncertainty once deal flow resumes.
For hospitality assets, steady transaction activity helps separate property-specific challenges from broader market risk.
Valuation gaps are creating pressure - and signals
A third theme highlighted by Cohen & Steers is the widening gap between public and private market valuations. Apartments currently show the largest divergence across commercial real estate, which the firm believes may push private-market cap rates higher and values lower.
While this observation is apartment-specific, the broader takeaway applies across real assets. Valuation dispersion forces capital to reassess risk, pricing realism, and relative value—conditions that often accelerate selectivity and reward participants who understand where pricing adjustments are likely to occur.
Capital Is Returning — With a Sharper Lens
A “new equilibrium” is emerging
Colliers, in its recent real estate market outlook commentary, describes the industry as entering a “new equilibrium.” This assessment reflects a broader recalibration across property types, including signs that office demand has bottomed, and that industrial growth is resuming, supported in part by technology and AI-related investment.
Rather than signaling a return to pre-cycle conditions, Colliers’ viewpoints to a market where capital is reengaging under new assumptions—tighter underwriting, clearer return thresholds, and a greater emphasis on asset-level fundamentals.
Selectivity is redefining capital deployment
PwC reinforces this perspective in its latest real estate and capital markets analysis, noting that capital began flowing again in the second half of the year—but selectively. According to PwC, investors are no longer deploying capital broadly across sectors. Instead, they are prioritizing assets and platforms that demonstrate operational durability, liquidity, and a clear path to value creation.
PwC frames the current environment as one where the deal landscape rewards groups that combine data-driven insight with strategic conviction, as liquidity, technology, and consolidation increasingly define competitive advantage in real assets.
Market-Level Intelligence: Tampa and Albuquerque
Ownership data often reveals what top-line metrics cannot: who is positioned to transact and where fragmentation creates opportunity.
Tampa: scale and fragmentation side by side
Tampa includes 883 total hotel properties across construction statuses. By scale, independent hotels account for 511 properties, followed by Upper Midscale (138), Upscale (82), Economy (59), Midscale (44), Upper Upscale (43), and Luxury (6).
Extended stay represents a meaningful component of the market, totaling 223 properties and 17,226 rooms. Ownership remains widely distributed, with the largest owner—Blackstone (Extended Stay America)—controlling 13 properties, while multiple groups cluster in the mid-single digits. DHRUV Management, for example, owns eight properties across upper midscale, economy, and independent segments.
Albuquerque: smaller market, similar ownership dynamics
Albuquerque consists of 255 total hotel properties, led by Independent (95), Economy (48), and Upper Midscale (44) hotels. Extended stay totals 52 properties and 5,511 rooms.
Ownership is similarly fragmented. The largest owner listed controls 15 properties, while the remainder of the market is dispersed among smaller groups—often a setup that precedes consolidation or repositioning activity.
Why this matters for hotel investment opportunities
In both markets, fragmentation—not concentration—is the defining feature. As capital returns selectively, these ownership dynamics often create earlier hotel investment opportunities, particularly for buyers seeking scale and for sellers preparing assets ahead of renewed deal flow.
Interest Rates and the Path to Deal Activity
Hoya Capital data indicates that expectations for two or more rate cuts in 2026 are holding steady at roughly 70%. While timing remains uncertain, consistency in expectations can matter more than precision.
Stable expectations allow buyers and sellers to underwrite transactions with greater confidence. Hoya Capital’s broader market snapshot also shows hotel and lodging real estate posting positive performance alongside a relatively stable Treasury yield environment.
For hospitality assets—especially in upper midscale and independent segments—this combination supports renewed transaction viability as financing conditions become more predictable.
Turning Market Signals Into Strategy
Momentum heading into 2026 is being shaped by a combination of disciplined capital, improving transaction conditions, and clearer pricing signals. Listed real estate positioning, selective capital reentry, and ownership fragmentation in markets like Tampa and Albuquerque are converging to create a more navigable environment for decision-makers.
If you’re evaluating hotel investment opportunities, reassessing hotel valuation, or preparing buying or selling a hotel, now is the time to translate these signals into strategy.
Contact us to discuss how these trends apply to your assets, your markets, and your objectives as the next phase of the hospitality real estate cycle takes shape.