Considerations for Sponsors and Investors in Commercial Real Estate: How AI, Operational Expertise, and Creative Structures Are Reshaping the Investment Landscape

Artificial intelligence, operationally intensive asset classes, and evolving capital structures are converging to redefine commercial real estate investing. For much of the last decade, the traditional real estate investment thesis was simple: acquire well-located assets, hold through a period of cap rate compression, and exit at a profit. The operator mattered, but the market mattered more. Today, that model is changing.

At the recent PERE Women in Real Estate Forum for North America, which took place in June 2026 in New York City, a consistent theme emerged: the sources of value in real estate are shifting, so the capital structures, asset strategies, and technological tools that investors deploy must shift with them. Sponsors and investors who recognize these shifts—and move beyond traditional underwriting assumptions—will be better positioned to generate and capture value.

Key Takeaways

Three intertwined developments across the commercial real estate landscape deserve close attention:

• AI is reshaping real estate at every level—from the physical assets that house AI infrastructure, to the operational tools available to asset managers, to fundamental questions about whether companies will need the same real estate footprint as AI transforms the workforce.
• Operationally intensive real estate is the new frontier. Returns now depend not merely on owning the right asset, but on acquiring the expertise to run it.
• Alternative deal structures are unlocking capital. In a fundraising environment that remains constrained, sponsors are turning to joint ventures, co-investments, and other bespoke arrangements to access capital and deliver value.

AI as a Real Estate Variable

Artificial intelligence is the defining variable in real estate today, and its influence is being felt on multiple fronts.

The most visible impact is on the asset side. Data centers have emerged as one of the most sought-after asset classes across the industry, driven by extraordinary and still-growing demand for computing infrastructure to support AI and other digital workloads. The capital requirements are substantial, the power and cooling demands are unprecedented, and development pipelines are constrained by everything from grid capacity to local permitting. The complexity of the underlying infrastructure—energy procurement, interconnection rights, tenant credit structures—is producing novel deal structures and financing challenges.

AI is also transforming how investors and asset managers build, deploy, and refine their strategies across asset types. Conference speakers emphasized that AI tools are becoming essential to competitive real estate asset management—helping investors analyze market data, identify pricing trends, optimize leasing strategies, and inform capital allocation decisions. Asset managers that do not integrate these technologies into their platforms risk falling behind.

Perhaps the most provocative question concerns AI's potential impact on the demand for real estate itself. For example, if AI enables businesses to operate with fewer employees—or with employees performing fundamentally different functions—what will become of the need for office space? Some conference participants reported already seeing shorter office lease terms, as tenants hesitate to commit to five- or ten-year occupancy when their space needs may look very different after several years of AI-driven transformation. Others were bullish that AI will not eliminate the need for people, even though the services those people provide may change. Whether AI ultimately reduces headcount, reallocates it, or simply changes what workers do remains an open question—but it is already influencing leasing behavior, and sponsors should be thoughtful about how their underwriting accounts for it.

The Rise of Operational Real Estate

If AI is reshaping the demand side of real estate, the supply side is undergoing its own structural shift: the rise of operationally intensive assets, where performance depends not just on what you own but on how you run it.

Conference panelists emphasized that investors can no longer rely solely on cap rate compression or broader market forces to generate returns. Marking a meaningful departure from traditional models that focused primarily on land value and rental income, investors are turning to the income component of real estate operations—the value to be generated by the unique ability to operate more specialized assets. This requires an experienced, savvy operator with proprietary skills and expertise to manage the business of the particular asset in question.

The asset classes attracting the most attention reflect this shift: data centers, senior housing, student housing, cold storage, self-storage, and healthcare-adjacent facilities like memory care and skilled nursing. These all share a common characteristic—they require a high degree of operational expertise and specialized knowledge to generate competitive returns. These are not assets where value is created simply by signing a long-term net lease with a creditworthy tenant. They are assets where the quality of operations—staffing, technology systems, regulatory compliance, resident experience—is a primary driver of financial performance.

This dynamic is coinciding with (or, perhaps, producing) a notable trend: investors are increasingly putting capital directly into a given operator’s platform rather than merely acquiring ownership stakes in the underlying real estate alongside that operator. By investing in the operator, investors gain access to a scalable business with institutional infrastructure, specialized knowledge, and management depth—plus participation in operational upside. The philosophy is "buy it, don't build it.” Approaching operationally intensive real estate asset-by-asset, without the resources and expertise to add value, is simply too difficult. Investing in the platform also gives investors more control and additional levers for value creation through active asset management.

Senior housing illustrates this with particular clarity. The demographic tailwinds are powerful—the "Silver Tsunami" of an aging population is well documented—and the supply of purpose-built senior housing remains inadequate to meet projected demand. But investing successfully requires far more than acquiring real estate. It demands operational expertise in nursing, healthcare system navigation, regulatory compliance, and resident services. The investors succeeding in this space are those who have partnered with—or invested directly in—operators that bring this specialized capability.

Accessing Capital Through Structure and Strategy

These asset-level shifts are occurring against a challenging fundraising backdrop. Many limited partners have not yet received distributions from prior fund commitments and have outstanding capital calls that have not been deployed. Traditional blind-pool fundraising remains difficult.

In response, conference participants noted that the market is turning to alternative structures. Joint ventures, co-investments, continuation vehicles, and other bespoke arrangements are proving effective alternatives to conventional fund structures. These vehicles tend to be more relationship-driven, nimble, more open to creative solutions, and better able to align the interests of sponsors, operators, and capital partners around specific opportunities.

The broadening of real estate into new and more specialized asset classes is itself creating structural demand for joint ventures and partnerships. As investors move into some of the more “niche” asset classes discussed above (e.g., data centers, senior housing, cold storage, and other operationally complex sectors), the need for joint ventures with operators who have deep expertise is growing. The capital partner brings financial resources and institutional infrastructure; the operating partner brings the platform, talent, and specialized knowledge. This convergence of capital and operations is becoming the organizing principle for a significant share of new investment activity.

What This Means for Sponsors and Investors

The themes emerging from these conversations point in a consistent direction: the real estate market is evolving in ways that reward operational capability, technological adoption, and structural creativity.

For sponsors evaluating their strategies, the implications are practical. First, AI fluency is no longer optional. Whether the focus is on investing in AI-adjacent infrastructure, deploying AI tools across asset management platforms, or underwriting AI’s impact on tenant demand, sponsors need a clear view on how artificial intelligence fits into their investment thesis. Second, the shift toward operationally intensive assets is fundamental to succeeding in sectors like senior housing, data centers, and specialty storage. Third, capital formation is increasingly a function of deal structure and partner selection—the ability to design joint ventures, co-investments, and bespoke vehicles that align operator and capital provider interests is becoming as important as the ability to identify attractive assets.

The sponsors and investors best positioned in this environment will be those who can integrate all three capabilities. The real estate market has always rewarded those who could see around corners. What has changed is what lies around the corner—and the tools, partnerships, and structures required to get there.

Please reach out to Sally Davis or [email protected] if you would like to discuss any of the topics outlined above.