In the real estate market, having a multi-billion dollar real estate portfolio in most cases is not enough to earn you an invitation the big boys’ club; you also need top notch high tier real estate properties to earn you that “street credibility” in this cut throat business.
According to Forbes Global 2000 list, there are numerous multinational companies that can lay claim to the real estate investment throne and today we shall be counting down ten such companies who are some of the biggest players in this neck of the woods.
BrookField Asset Management
Boasting assets worth $196 Billion with annual revenues totaling more than $47 billion, Brookfield is one of the biggest real estate companies in the world with the company discreetly owning most of the city skylines in areas like Toronto, Sydney, London and Los Angeles. Additionally, Brookfield also owns hotels and shopping malls in cities across Europe, Brazil and the Bahamas.
American Tower Corporation
Based in the United States, this cellphone tower company owns assets greater than $34 billion which include roughly 144,000 tower sites that are either directly owned, managed or leased.
The company makes a large portion of its profits from real estate holdings which primarily include cell tower properties which are then used by Telecommunications giants like AT&T and Verizon. The company recently bought a controlling stake of 51% in Viom Networks, an Indian cell towers company which has added almost 42,000 more cell towers to the company’s assets.
Simon Property Group
Also headquartered in the US, Simon Property Group is considered to be the biggest commercial real estate developer in the world and primarily operates in shopping mall chains.
Based in Indianapolis, the company is valued at more than $65 billion with assets totaling more than $31 billion and annual revenues of $5.5 billion. Simon has drastically increased its annual revenue yyear on year by developing and leasing new shopping malls whilst also reducing competition by acquiring their rival malls. The company currently operates roughly 330 retail stores with a total workforce of 5,500 employees.
Annaly Capital Management
Annaly is widely considered to be the king of MREIT, a company that invests in residential mortgages, mortgage insurance and securities.
Annaly’s business model primarily involves investments in residential mortgage backed securities however, the company has recently diversified its business portfolio by steadily investing in commercial properties and commercial MBS debt which is a type of mortgage backed security. The company currently boasts assets worth over $100 billion with annual revenue of $2.66 billion.
Prologis
Based in the US, Prologis is one of the biggest commercial real estate owners on the world, owning close to 600 million square feet of commercial properties around the world in 2015.
The company owns, invests and manages industrial real estate with a focus on providing distribution facilities like airports, sea ports, transportation centers and warehouses. The company currently owns commercial assets in excess of $29 billion with annual revenue of $2.68 billion.
Link REIT
Located in Hong Kong, Link Real Estate Investment Trust is the biggest REIT in Asia and one of the world biggest retail REITs in the world with their business footprint spanning across Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing.
Link’s business model relies heavily on their retail properties with a focus on sub-urban retail shopping centers and markets whilst the company in recent times, has also diversified its portfolio by investing in office buildings along with expansion in other cities. The company owns and manages retail assets worth over $24.5 billion with annual revenue greater than $3 billion.
Weyerhaeuser
During the 19th century, most of the property in the United States was either sold or granted to soldiers, governments and companies and Weyerhaeuser turned out to be one of the biggest benefactors, owning key properties in areas of dense forests with an abundance of timber.
Today Weyerhaeuser is the owner of millions of acres of timberland in areas like Wisconsin, Minnesota, Washington and Oregon with the company recently buying more land in the southern parts of the United States along with other countries including Australia, New Zealand, Philippines and Indonesia.
The company has recently diversified its business operations in other areas including commercial properties, industrial real estate, business centers and golf courses. The company boasts assets totaling $24.14 billion with annual revenue close to $1 billion.
