Alpha Buying: Real Estate May Be Cold, but Insider Confidence Is Heating Up

Real estate markets are still not getting a lot of love from the investing world. Even though sales and pricing have been increasing, there is still fear of what may happen if the bond market does not get its act under control. The price of real estate and REITs are very closely correlated to the yield of ten-year treasuries, and that is a concern.

I am comfortably in the camp of “Stagflation is inevitable” thanks to the current trade policy and high levels of uncertainty. However, I am not in the camp of “The end is nigh.”

Given the nasty bear market we have experienced and the levels of fear in the marketplace, it is quite likely that we are closer to a bottom than the markets want to accept. Even those who are bullish on the economy and the markets tend to overlook real estate.

Even though real estate has created more millionaires and even billionaires than any other asset class, there is a perception that owning REITs is boring. While REITs have languished in the past few years, it was hard to be comfortable with calling a bottom as we did not see insiders step up to the plate as they have at previous bottoms in the REIT market. That is starting to change. In recent weeks, buying activity by the officers and directors of real estate investment trusts has been picking up.

Americold Realty Trust (Ticker: COLD)

One of the largest rounds of insider buying recently was at Americold Realty Trust (COLD). Everything you buy requires storage at some point in its journey from the manufacturer to you. A lot of the things you buy, especially at the grocery store, require that storage facility to be temperature controlled—specifically, controlled to be cold.

Americold owns 238 cold storage facilities around the world. Its customers include some of the largest food producers and grocery chains in the world. Here in the United States, their locations cover 99% of the population.

There are key megatrends helping drive the demand for cold storage:

• We are trying to eat healthier, which requires fresh food
• Meal kits have seen a meteoric rise in popularity, and most of them have to be refrigerated at every step of the supply chain

Americold has seen revenues rise by 60% over the past five years, and net operating income has grown by 69%. The stock has fallen by more than 50% from its pandemic highs, and insiders are starting to buy shares in anticipation of a massive long-term rebound.

CEO George Chapelle bought $1.9 million worth of stock earlier this month. CFO Jay Wells spent $179,000 to add to his position in the REIT. Americold just raised the dividend by 5%, and the shares now yield about 5.5%.

BRT Apartments Corp. (Ticker: BRT)

It seems that every time there is even a hint of a lull in the real estate markets, Jeffrey Gould increases his stake in BRT Apartments (BRT). I bought BRT shares years ago when they made the transition from a mortgage REIT to an owner of apartments. It was insider buying that drew my attention to the stock, and we are still seeing strong buying today.

Gould has been in the real estate investment game for a long time and is also a director at One Liberty Properties (OLP), a net lease REIT.

BRT Apartments Corp. is a small-cap multifamily REIT focused on garden-style and mid-rise apartment communities across the Southeast and Texas. The company operates a portfolio of 29 properties with nearly 8,000 units. At the current price, the shares yield 6.29%. The REIT is also actively buying back stock to take advantage of the favorable valuation right now.

The Gould family owns about 40% of the REIT, but Jeffrey Gould just keeps buying. Notably, in May 2025, he purchased 25,238 shares valued at approximately $385,134. Earlier, in April 2024, Gould acquired shares worth over $625,000.

Pebblebrook Hotel Trust (Ticker: PEB)

Hotel REITs have underperformed all year, and the decline is starting to create the kind of bargain pricing that attracts insiders. Pebblebrook Hotels (PEB) Chairman and CEO Jon Bortz has been aggressively buying shares since March. His most recent purchases were in May when he purchased about $1.5 million in additional shares of the REIT.

Pebblebrook Hotel Trust (NYSE:PEB) is a lodging-focused REIT that owns a portfolio of upper-upscale, full-service hotels and resorts concentrated in high-barrier, urban and resort markets across the United States. Pebblebrook has carved out a niche investing in lifestyle-oriented properties in gateway cities like San Francisco, Washington D.C., Boston, and Key West. The portfolio includes over 50 hotels and resorts, featuring well-known properties like 1 Hotel San Francisco, Hotel Zena in D.C., and the Southernmost Beach Resort in Key West.

Real estate is out of favor with investors, but insiders are slowly but surely stepping up to the plate.