🏠 House strips BTR forced-sale ban from housing bill
📉 Apartment construction starts hit 15-year low
🕊️ Iran ceasefire sends oil plunging — but for how long?
🔧 Upcoming Workshops:  Building & Funding Student Housing

Data Viz of the Week: Credit Card Delinquencies Climb

Unemployment is low and mortgage delinquencies are tame, but credit card balances 90+ days overdue have hit GFC levels.

Household debt overall has held steady. The pressure is concentrated in unsecured credit: higher rates, the return of student loan interest payments, and looser post-pandemic underwriting have made carrying a balance materially more expensive. Expect the squeeze on consumer spending to show up in real estate fundamentals — softer retail, weaker rent growth at the lower end, and tighter household formation — over the next several quarters.

Upcoming Thesis Driven Workshops

• 📣 Last Call - May 18: C-PACE: Redefining Commercial Real Estate Capital Stacks (💻 Online): ​​​An interactive workshop for developers, lenders, investors, and advisors seeking a clear, working understanding of C-PACE and its role in today’s financing environment. - $299

• May 20: AI in Underwriting (💻 Online): ​​​An interactive workshop for owners, operators, developers, acquisitions teams, and asset managers exploring how AI is reshaping underwriting—from deal screening to investment committee. - $299

• May 21: Structuring an OpCo/PropCo Business (💻 Online): ​​​​A one-day interactive workshop designed for real estate operators, entrepreneurs, and investors looking to structure or invest in OpCo/PropCo platforms. - $299

• May 27: AI in Capital Raising (💻 Online): ​​​​​A one-day interactive workshop designed for sponsors, bankers, capital advisors, and investor relations professionals who want to understand how artificial intelligence is reshaping the mechanics of capital raising - $299

• May 28: AI in Real Estate (💻 Online): ​​​​​A three-hour interactive workshop for owners, operators, and developers exploring how to use AI in the real estate sector. - $499

Three Articles We Loved from Last Week

It’s not easy keeping up with everything. Here are three articles we loved from the past week that you may have missed:

1. (Bisnow) House Cuts Build-to-Rent Ban From Latest Bill, Targets Vote Next Week After weeks of industry lobbying and legislative deadlock, senior House lawmakers released an amended version of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act that strips the forced-sale provision that had frozen the BTR market since March. The updated bill explicitly states that nothing in the section requires institutional owners to divest single-family homes — a full reversal from the Senate version that would have compelled sales after seven years for anyone holding 350+ BTR properties. House leadership is pushing for a vote under suspension of rules as early as next week. The move came despite President Trump publicly calling for a ban on Wall Street firms buying single-family homes — a sign that pragmatism won out over populist messaging, at least for now.

2. (Commercial Observer) U.S. Multifamily Construction Starts Drop to Lowest Level Since 2011 Apartment construction starts fell to roughly 55,000 units in Q1 2026 — a 73% decline from the early-2022 peak and the lowest quarterly figure in 15 years, according to CoStar and Apartments.com. The total pipeline has shrunk to approximately 579,000 units nationwide, in line with mid-2010 levels and down 50% from the 1M+ units under construction in early 2023. Slower rent growth, elevated financing costs, and high development expenses are making new projects pencil-impossible in most markets. The supply-side implications are significant: with deliveries set to plummet over the next 18-24 months, the stage is being set for a meaningful rent recovery — particularly in Sun Belt markets that overbuilt during the boom.

3. (CNBC) Oil Plunges on Iran Ceasefire News, Setting Stage for Some Relief on Gas Prices Brent crude plunged 13% to $94.80/barrel and WTI dropped more than 15% to $95.75 after the U.S. and Iran announced a temporary two-week ceasefire, conditional on the immediate reopening of the Strait of Hormuz (which handles ~20% of global oil supply). But the relief may be short-lived: as of mid-May, Trump called the ceasefire "on life support" after rejecting Iran's latest proposal. For real estate, the reprieve — however fragile — matters: oil above $100 had been driving up diesel, construction materials, and utility costs across the industry. Mortgage rates remain above 6.4%, but any sustained easing in energy prices would take pressure off both construction budgets and consumer spending power.

Developer of the Week: Core Spaces

Core Spaces closed a $1.64 billion student housing fund, signaling massive institutional appetite for purpose-built student housing as a maturing asset class. The fund's scale—one of the largest dedicated student housing vehicles ever raised—reflects both strong occupancy fundamentals and a broader trend of institutional capital consolidating around specialist operators.

Core's simultaneous launch of a Global Wealth Management platform to democratize access further signals how student housing is evolving from niche to mainstream institutional real estate.

You can read more about Core Spaces on the Thesis Driven GP database here.

Investor of the Week: Sundial

Sundial is an invite-only multi-family office built for founders and entrepreneurial families, with a lean team operating across four arms: Sundial Real Estate Partners (direct CRE), Sundial Holdings (PE/buyout), Sundial Wealth (RIA), and Sundial Advisory (tax/accounting). Capital comes from member families — not institutional LPs — and the founders co-invest alongside members in every deal, targeting a 20%+ IRR across strategies. The firm is capacity-constrained by design, positioning itself in the gap between individual investors and institutional platforms.

Within real estate, Sundial targets flex industrial, IOS, self-storage, and specialty/niche housing in tax-friendly, high-growth markets — focusing on deals in the $5M–$30M sweet spot that are too complex for individuals and too small for institutions. The firm's first ground-up development is the Auto Clubhouse in Jupiter, FL — a 19-unit luxury garage condo community with 1,400 SF hurricane-rated units, mezzanine-ready designs, and full customization potential, with national expansion underway including a second facility in Charlotte, NC and additional sites planned. Sundial employs a downside-first underwriting philosophy with a low-leverage emphasis, and invests as both GP and LP in real estate — actively soliciting JV partnerships with outside operators and sponsors through its platform. For a GP with a proven track record in niche industrial, self-storage, or specialty housing across Sun Belt markets, Sundial is a natural conversation: family capital, no fund-cycle pressure, co-invest alignment, and a stated appetite for new operator relationships.

Get more details on Sundial, including team contacts, deal activity, and investment preferences, inside the CapitalStack database.

—Brad and Paul