Blackstone Prepares A Record $50 Billion To Snap Up Real Estate During The Coming Crash
The past two months have seen a barrage of negative news coverage focusing on the US housing market…
- Is The Housing Crash Starting?
- Why The Housing Bubble Bust Is Baked-In
- The One Housing Chart That Shows A ‘Buyer’s Market’ Has Returned
- As Mortgage Rates Explode Price Cuts Soar And Buyer Demand Collapses
- Housing Market Peaks: Home Prices Finally Drop From All-Time Highs
… which is predictable: after all, with mortgage rates soaring at the fastest pace on record to decade highs, and sending US housing affordability to the lowest in history…
… only a handful of the “1%” can afford the American Dream.
Alas, it also means that just like in 2007, a housing crash is now just a matter of time.
That much is known. What is also know, is that once housing craters, the largest US residential and commercial landlord – private equity giant Blackstone – is about to get even bigger. That’s when it will deploy some (or all) of the record $50 billion in dry powder it has raised to prepare for just the coming housing crash.
According to the WSJ, Blackstone is the final stages of raising a new real-estate fund that would set a record as the biggest vehicle of its kind, defying market volatility and a crowded landscape for fundraising.
The private-equity giant said in a regulatory filing Wednesday it has closed on commitments totaling $24.1 billion for Blackstone Real Estate Partners X, the latest iteration of its main real-estate fund.
According to the WSJ, Blackstone is committing about $300 million of its own capital and has allocated an additional $5.9 billion to investors, which will bring the fund to $30.3 billion when it is finalized. The firm raised the fund, expected to be the largest traditional private-equity vehicle in history, in just three month. It was also Blackstone that set the prior record, with the $26 billion buyout fund it raised in 2019. The new real-estate fund will be 50% larger than its predecessor, a $20.5 billion pool raised in 2019.
Together with funds dedicated to real estate in Asia and Europe, Blackstone will have a war chest of more than $50 billion to do so-called opportunistic investments, which tend to be higher-risk deals with the potential for higher returns.