Good morning,

Firstly, from our family, we hope that you, your families and teams are all well.

Who could have foreseen what has taken place around the world over the past 2 months. We take enormous heart in the stories of people and businesses coming together to ensure that we all emerge stronger on the other side.

We are pleased to announce that over the past month we have completed over $140,000,000 in settlements across a CBD shopping centre, neighbourhood shopping centre and a family resort hotel to 3 different Buyer categories, (Hong Kong Investor, Australian Institution and Australian Private Investor). Information on these deals are at the bottom of this email or can be viewed HERE. Please get in touch to receive the respective sales analysis.

We have an additional $880m of properties in exclusive due diligence across three Australian States and New Zealand. This ensures that we have a real time understanding of current market movements and considerations.

The MRE team are all actively working remotely and in the past 2 weeks have spoken with over 200 key decision makers that will shape the course of our industry over the coming months – it has been fascinating to observe the various approaches being adopted.

The key themes we are seeing include:

•   Quality assets will always have a market.

•   There has been an immediate increase in enquiry from offshore investors keen to take advantage of the low Australian Dollar. In the short term this may be offset by the recent changes to FIRB, mostly related to timing of approval, however we see the majority of deals, outside of the expected M&A activity, occurring to offshore Buyers who have historically not been able to compete because they require more time than local groups.

•   Many tenants are being opportunistic, however proactive Landlord’s are strengthening relationships during this period.

•   Banks will need to take a rational and longer term view in relation to Interest Coverage Ratio Covenants.

•   Unlike 2008/2009 there remains liquidity in the debt markets, the cost of which is at record lows.

•   Government Stimulus has been well placed and well received. There will be more to come.

•   The cost of this stimulus, although cheap given current bond rates, will push inflation higher. Real Estate is a terrific hedge against inflation.

•   There will be a significant, short term spike in unemployment, however, looking at post SAR’s data in 2003 and recent numbers from retailers in China, the pent up demand will create a surge in spending.

As always, we are available at any time to discuss any aspect of the market and happy to catch up over a virtual coffee (or wine!).

Stay healthy.

Sam and Dan