FIRST DRAFT LIVE: Controlled Turbulence Or Chaos? CBRE's Spencer Levy Checks In On 2026

Earlier this month, Bisnow published its annual halftime report, surveying commercial real estate leaders on the state of the industry at the end of the second quarter. Sixty-two CRE leaders from more than 30 markets answered one question: Are you moving or waiting? 

The answers ranged from “we’re sitting on the sidelines” to an emphatic “we’re moving,” showing that the industry remains divided between cautiously optimistic and just cautious — but most agreed this year isn’t really going to plan. 

But CBRE Global Client Strategist and Senior Economic Advisor Spencer Levy doesn’t think the real estate industry is far off the path he foresaw.

Levy was the final First Draft Live guest of 2025, describing the year as “controlled turbulence.” Now that we’ve reached the halfway point of 2026, Levy sat down with Bisnow Editor-in-Chief Mark F. Bonner once again to talk about where he thinks things stand. 

Levy said there is always macro noise in the industry, especially since the pandemic. But he believes real estate has been able to adjust accordingly, especially when it comes to interest rates. 

That has come with strategic shifts, however. Levy said the investors he speaks to — typically the biggest, best-funded names — are changing their asset type and city allocations. Many are having to shift down from core to core-plus or value-add because raising money is difficult at the top end of the market when returns are the same as bonds but with more risk.

As for that wall of maturities that keeps getting fretted over? 

“There's no reckoning coming,” Levy said.

View the full conversation below: