The monumental problems for commercial real estate continue, with stories about office vacancies piling up in the news. There’s a reason I’ve been talking about it for over a week now – when the bill comes due for all the companies attached to this hard-hit sector, the fall is going to be fast. There’s a saying, in fact: “Stocks take the stairs up, and the elevator down.”

In one of the starkest examples of the ongoing disaster in commercial real estate, the famous office building at 555 California Street in San Francisco is in trouble. Its owners, Vornado Realty Trust and the Trump Organization, have now asked lenders for more time to pay back the $1.3 billion loan they have on the property.

While it boasts a 93% occupancy rate now, many of California Street’s leases are about to come up for renewal, and it looks like there might be an exodus on the way. Vacancy rates across the country are averaging around 50%, so they’re looking at a huge loss of potential income.

We know the culprit here, of course: remote work. While it was a necessity during the pandemic, it’s just continued to pick up steam, especially as technology makes remote collaboration easier. With AI now on the rise, this is one of the hottest sectors for investors to be in right now.

For my money, if you’re going to try and capitalize on this trend, the trick is to get exposure to companies that have multiple business segments related to work-from-home or tech that makes remote work easier. My favorite has its fingers in all the proverbial pies: computer hardware, productivity software, cloud computing, you name it.

But the icing on the cake is that they’re integrating OpenAI’s tech with their services in a way that will leave competitors racing to catch up.

For the ticker and my recommendation, check out this video – I recorded it yesterday, but due to technical difficulties, my team wasn’t able to get it uploaded until today. Here it is:

Now, if you were listening, I mentioned that there’s a link below you need to click on to get my full briefing on the CRE downfall. Here’s why: while people have made fortunes on real estate when it’s doing well, the real money gets made when it falls. Investors in the past have made millions, even billions on betting against the real estate market during pivotal moments, making huge fortunes almost overnight.

With CRE in the hot seat, we’ve got a chance to join them.

— Shah Gilani

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Source: Total Wealth