This year's commercial real estate investment market is expected to reach a point where technology shifts centered on artificial intelligence (AI) begin in earnest to reshape asset values. As the boundary between real estate and infrastructure breaks down and the "cross-asset (Cross-Asset)" era opens, new concept-building and investment approaches will be the key factors for gaining a first-mover advantage, the analysis said.
IGIS Asset Management's Strategy Research Office said on the 8th it published a report titled "Commercial real estate market outlook for the first half of 2026," built around these points.
The report presented "Hybrid Capital & Asset" as this year's core investment strategy. In an environment where convergence across sectors is accelerating, it is a strategy that seeks both profitability and risk management through flexible capital structures and investments linked across diverse asset classes.
The data center market was cited as the sector most clearly illustrating this asset value reshuffle. As AI workloads increase, facilities are evolving from traditional server lease–centric sites into "hyperscale AI factories," and now, securing power and permits has become the key competitive edge over urban accessibility. Accordingly, the supply axis is dispersing to the outskirts of the Seoul metropolitan area and to non-capital regions.
In the office market, a traditional asset class, strength continues centered on prime assets in Seoul. As of the end of the third quarter last year, office transaction volume was 16.4 trillion won, surging 90% from a year earlier, and rents are continuing to rise amid a low vacancy rate below 5%. The logistics market, too, is shaking off concerns about oversupply, and investor sentiment is recovering around high-quality assets with high power capacity and high clear heights that are well suited for automation equipment.
In financial markets, the rise of the private debt market following real estate project financing restructuring is drawing attention. As banks raise lending thresholds, private debt is filling the resulting funding gap, acting as a "relief pitcher." The hotel market is also seeing intensified acquisition competition among large conglomerates and financial affiliates, buoyed by a surge in inbound demand and higher average daily rates.
Choi Jar-yeong, head of the Strategy Research Office at IGIS Asset Management, said, "This year marks the point at which asset values begin in earnest to change due to technological shifts," adding, "Beyond existing investment approaches and revenue concepts, the establishment of concepts and investment approaches for cross-asset that fuses AI with infrastructure will be the key to gaining a first-mover advantage in the market."