Altus: Commercial Real Estate Transaction Activity Increases in Q4

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Altus, Toronto, released its quarterly report on U.S. commercial real estate investment and transactions, finding that through Q4, 46,395 properties transacted. That’s up 3.9% quarter-over-quarter and 2.2% year-over-year.

For full-year 2025, 176,445 properties transacted, up 0.6% from 2024. That’s the first annual increase since 2021.

Some sectors saw notable annual increases in the quarter. Hospitality was up 85.9%, multifamily was up 3.8% and office was up 2.9%. However, industrial was up just 1.4% and retail was basically flat.

Aggregate transaction volume was $179.9 billion, up 20.7% from Q3 and up 20.2% year-over-year. Specifically, industrial jumped by 54.4% year-over-year to $44.9 billion, or about a quarter of total activity.

Other sectors that saw significant year-over-year dollar-volume gains were hospitality (up 72.9%), general commercial (up 51.9%) and multiproperty (up 32.2%).

Total annual transaction volume was $560.2 billion, up 14.4% year-over-year.

Median price per square foot for single-asset transactions was up 2.5% quarter-over-quarter. General commercial was up 4.4%, industrial was up 3.9% and retail was up 2.5%. Hospitality, however, fell by 0.4%.

Year-over-year, median pricing was up 12.1% across all property types, with retail up 13.4% and multifamily up 12.4%. Since Q4 2019, median price per square foot has increased 58.5%. Industrial specifically is up 83.8%, but on the other hand, office is up 38.2%.