It Was a Hot Real Estate Trade. Now Investors Are Worried.

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Given the opportunity to park money with the world’s largest private equity firms, ordinary investors rushed in. Getting out might not be so easy. The private equity firms began to seek out smaller investors almost a decade ago. It was a major shift for firms like Blackstone, Starwood Capital Group and KKR that had previously been funded by enormous pensions, endowments and sovereign wealth funds. But it was also a way for the big fund managers to grow their assets and rake in ever larger fees. For the individual investors, who were directed to the new private funds by their wealth managers, the chance to invest with Wall Street’s elite was too good to pass up — even if it came with rules, like limits on withdrawals that would mean that getting money back in tough times might be a challenge. The private equity firms had an allure, created by stellar track records, including during the 2008 financial crisis, and the fact that they had been off limits to ordinary (although wealthy) investors. One offering in particular captured peoples’ attention: private real-estate investment trusts, known as REITs, which own commercial or industrial properties and pay big dividends off the rental income they generate.