A picture speaks a thousand words, and sometimes a chart can say a lot more about the state of a market than any amount of verbiage.

So Tristan Capital head of research and strategy Simon Martin distilled his Risk of Reality data blog for Bisnow and picked out five charts that sum up where European real estate is and answer whether Europe is the tortoise or the hare.

Investment volumes on the slide

"Real Capital Analytics's recent data clearly shows that the institutions that drive the investment market have taken a pause for breath since mid-2015, despite the rapid improvement in the European economic data."

Politics is giving people a reason not to invest

"Some will say that this is simply a function of high real estate prices. Personally I don’t buy that — not in a world with negative nominal bond yields. There are plenty of other macro reasons for them to have held back. The excellent BAML global fund manager survey clearly shows that political risk has been right at the forefront of global investors’ minds. No one has been immune."

The Eurozone is getting more and more attractive

"The fog of global geopolitical risk may still be there, but in Europe the immediate risk of populist insurgency now seems to be lifting. The markets are refocussing on the economics and on the need for yield. The renewed focus on the fundamentals is visible in the words of our central bankers and in the performance of the Euro. This could tempt investors to increase their allocations to Europe."

The U.S., Asia or Europe?

"This residential data from Topdown Charts suggests that it may come down to a cyclical call. Timing is everything. Investors will have to choose from the menus of a cyclically advanced U.S. market, a highly volatile Asian market or plain old boring Europe."

German employment growth makes its real estate a good bet

"I’d humbly suggest that as the cycle ages gracefully … boring might be better … particularly when you can invest in long term assets that pay big leveraged yields in cities growing as above.

But then again, I was always rooting for the tortoise over the hare …"