REIT Industry Sustainability Report 2024
Since 1960, REITs have been owning, developing, and improving properties to enable people to conduct business and live their lives, all while creating value for investors. Those properties, which include residences, working spaces, shopping destinations, entertainment venues, goods distribution, data transmission and storage, and much more, must be prepared to meet the current—and future—needs of people and businesses in our rapidly evolving society.
REITs have long understood this, and Nareit’s sixth annual REIT Industry Sustainability Report shows how REITs are taking strides to make progress in improving the resiliency of their buildings, managing resources, mitigating financial risks, prioritizing people, and honing their business strategies to deliver sustainable results to realize benefits for their customers, communities, and other stakeholders.
Click through the tabs to review highlights from this year’s report or complete the form at the bottom of any of these report pages to receive through email the full report (PDF) along with the report data in Excel.
The report includes findings relevant to three overarching themes.
REITs are stewards of long-term investments in real assets and have a long history of owning and developing sustainable, resilient, and efficient real estate.
The buildings where we live, work, and socialize must be sustainable over time —an implicit mandate that takes on even more importance in the face of current challenges such as climate risk. That’s why REITs are leading the way in developing decarbonization pathways while focusing on adaptation. The report documents this work, and shows the progress REITs are making in reporting their sustainability initiatives and aligning that reporting with global standards.
REITs are prioritizing people and meeting the evolving needs of their employees, tenants, and the communities in which they operate.
Fostering diversity, inclusivity, and wellbeing is critical to driving innovation, creativity, and productivity in REIT workforces, buildings, and communities across the nation. This report details how REITs are implementing programs that address the needs of a diverse workforce and are refining practices to attract and retain top talent. The report also shows how REITs are giving back to the communities in which they operate through capital improvements to public spaces and corporate giving programs that target areas where REITs can positively impact their local communities.
The REIT model continues to provide inherent governance benefits, including the alignment of management and shareholder financial incentives, and formal oversight of sustainability and social objectives.
REIT shareholders value the transparency of the REIT model. Transparency provides REIT stakeholders an understanding how their real estate portfolios and operations will contribute to and be affected by external factors such as decarbonization, demographic shifts, and technological advances. The report illustrates how REIT governance is enhanced by the evolving composition of REIT boards, which include independent and diverse members, and the increased oversight of environmental and social matters.
Our physical world, society, and the rules and regulations that govern them will inevitably continue to evolve. As an industry, we’ll continue to learn and adjust as needed to continue to be responsible stewards of capital, employ innovative approaches to property ownership, deliver value to our tenants, and make positive contributions to the communities where we invest and operate.
I hope you enjoy reading Nareit’s REIT Industry Sustainability Report 2024, which is organized into five areas: transparency and reporting, leadership and governance, resources and resilience, workforce and culture, and community and business connections.
I encourage you to join Nareit in continuing the conversation. We look forward to seeing how the landscape evolves and will continue to support the REIT industry for the benefit of our members’ shareholders, employees, tenants, communities, and society.
About This Report
Nareit collects information publicly reported by REITs and based on participation in global voluntary sustainability assessments. Data is compiled and reported at the industry-level as a percentage of market cap. Information on data sources and methodology for the information reported here can be found in the REIT Sustainability Data Methodology Statement (PDF).
All data cited, unless otherwise noted, is based on public reporting of the top 100 public equity REITs by market cap as of Dec. 31, 2023.
Nareit's Mission and Support for Sustainability
Nareit’s mission is to actively advocate for REIT-based real estate investment with policymakers and the global investment community, which includes supporting the real estate community in the assessment, management, and disclosure of sustainability-related risks and opportunities.
Nareit has had a long history of supporting sustainability programs on behalf of the REIT and publicly traded real estate industry. Several milestones include:
- Developed Leader in the Light Awards (2005) to recognize and support members demonstrating leadership in sustainability and expanded awards to include Diversity Impact Awards (2018) and Sustainability Impact Awards (2024).
- Began hosting the Leader in the Light Forum (2005) to gather members to exchange ideas on emerging real estate industry trends and continue to bring together industry leaders at the annual REITworks conference (2022-present), which includes discussion and expert speakers on a variety of key areas of environmental stewardship and social responsibility.
- Formed member leadership councils to bring together REIT sustainability leaders to address various complex issues facing REIT management teams: Real Estate Sustainability Council (2016), Social Responsibility Council (2020), Corporate Governance Council (2020), and Dividends Through Diversity CEO Council (2020).
- Launched the Dividends Through Diversity Initiative (2017) to take actionable and sustainable measures in support of the recruitment, inclusion, development, and advancement of diverse talent in the REIT industry. The initiative expanded its philanthropic efforts and raised $2.8 million through its Giving Campaign (2022) and awarded nine grants to nonprofit organizations (2023) that are working towards advancing diversity in the real estate industry.
- Issued first annual REIT industry sustainability report (2018), and the report continues to provide insights on the adoption and reporting of sustainability practices across the REIT industry. The sixth annual report (2024) includes a growing library of Nareit sponsored third-party research that is used to promote REIT-based investing around the world.
Additional Resources
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