Deutsche-Bank-Tochter: Hohe Abschläge an der Börse: Zweifel an Immobilienfonds der DWS

Three open real estate investment funds – "Grundbesitz Global", "Grundbesitz Europa", and "Fokus Deutschland" – are currently being traded on the stock market with discounts of up to 27 percent in net asset value, according to a Deutsche Bank subsidiary. Critics such as Stefan Loipfinger from the Investmentcheck platform suggest that this indicates investors have lost confidence in the funds.

The discounts correspond to those of closed real estate funds, which cease accepting new investor money and stop paying out to existing investors. If the Deutsche Bank subsidiary must temporarily close one or more of these funds, it would be the first time a major fund has been affected. The three DWS funds together represent an asset base of over 8.2 billion euros.

The behavior of investors toward these funds is not new to Loipfinger, who has observed similar discounts in the past. Most other funds have discounts ranging from 9.5 to 18 percent. A smaller fund, Swiss Life European Real Estate Living, stands out with a 33 percent discount. Only funds that have been temporarily closed experience these larger discounts.

So far, the "Wohnselect" from provider Wertgrund and the "Fokus Wohnen Deutschland" from Industria have been temporarily closed, no longer accepting new investor money nor paying out to customers. The CanAm "Leading Cities Invest" is also being liquidated. All these funds share the fact that they have each collected only a few hundred million euros and are among the smaller on the market.

DWS stated to the Finanzszene portal that it had not explicitly authorized the stock trading of its shares. The crisis in open real estate funds began after the interest rate hike in early 2022, when credit rates skyrocketed and many institutional and private investors sought higher returns off the real estate market. Within months, real estate trading came to a near-complete standstill.

Many real estate funds that had collected billions of euros in the boom years had to repurchase shares, while few new investors were adding money to the funds. As open real estate funds have a one-year notice period, the scale of withdrawals became apparent with a delay. In 2024, the massive depreciation of the UniImmo Wohnen ZBI and legal disputes surrounding the fund added to further closures.

According to information service Barkow Consulting, evaluated by the Bundesbank, Germany's nearly 30 licensed real estate funds lost net roughly 14 billion euros in investor money over the past three years, nearly one-eighth of the assets invested in the funds at the beginning of 2023. Many funds are currently selling parts of their inventory to pay out investors who have canceled their shares.

Individual providers are regaining positive returns. According to the latest real estate fund study by rating agency Scope, returns are gradually improving compared to the past, but not uniformly across all funds. Investment expert Loipfinger advises investors unsure whether their shares are losing value or if the fund is postponing withdrawals to sell on the stock market, thereby protecting themselves from larger losses.

Even Steffen Sebastian from the University of Regensburg observes that investors are anxious, but cautions about the long-term nature of funds. "Real estate markets experience cycles. Long-term oriented investors should endure them instead of exiting due to losses," says the financial scientist.