A note to Insiders: We’ve been workshopping this theory here at The Promote that fundraising prowess has close to zero to do with investing prowess, at least once you’re minted. The biggest AUM Gobblers ™ are a black hole ⚫ of capital, despite putting up returns that might make a lesser manager squirm. Business media being what it is – something we think about a ton – the noise often drowns out the signal. But every once in a while, it’s right there, in black & white, printed on paper containing recycled fiber. Today, we look at a series of heavy CRE losses at the retirement giant for America's teachers and professors. Hope you find this interesting, and if you know someone who’d benefit from reading this and might want to become an Insider, forward it along – they can get 10% off here. - HS

The TIAA Real Estate Account, which manages ≈ $23B on behalf of educators, recently posted its prospectus. It details the account’s latest sales activity, and it’s been a rough go: From June ‘25 through Feb ‘26, the account (run by Chris Burk) sold 15 properties, across asset classes and markets. A dozen of them sold at losses, while 3 had modest gains – in total, the account realized net losses of $429M across those 15 deals, per a review of the prospectus by The Promote. Of course, one man’s loss is another man’s discounted buy, and diving into the prospectus shows both how hard the people actually bearing the risk — individual retirees — get hit when CRE turns, and what the buyers circling this market, the David Werners, Sakhais and Carmels of the world, have been feeding on. 🦈

Let’s take 440 Ninth Ave, a Manhattan office tower that TIAA, via its asset manager Nuveen, had bought with Taconic Investment Partners (Paul Pariser, Charlie Bendit) from Unizo for $269M ($650/ 🦶) in ‘18. At the time, Nuveen’s Nadir Settles described Taconic as a partner that “shares our vision to maximize investment returns and reimagine NYC’s office towers,” with the JV looking to position the property as a solid alternative to nearby Hudson Yards. MetLife 😭 financed the deal w/ a $137M loan, but the new owners just couldn’t make it work. Last summer, David Werner (See our snapshot of him here) swooped in w/ a $100M ($240/ 🦶 ) deal to buy the joint in a short sale. The equity was obliterated, and TIAA, which held an ≈89% stake, realized a $160M loss, the May ‘26 prospectus shows.

This week on the pod, we dive into the high-stakes, high-reward (not for shareholders tho) world of SL Green, the mighty REIT that is New York’s largest commercial landlord. From a deal junkie standpoint, SL Green is king of the hill, but no matter what it does, it can’t seem to get Wall Street to love it. Next, we convert our dollars to lek and head to Albania 🦩 , where Jared Kushner is trying to create the next St. Barths. And finally, we load up those 10-cent bags and go shopping - for grocery anchored retail with TPG and friends. Plus, our "Punch List" rundown of the newsiest industry happenings: Brookfield's DC shutdown; Amancio Ortega's CRE fixer; Bears to Indiana; LA mayoral race; and Paul Massey folds.

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“Looking only at realized gains and losses in isolation is essentially like taking just the expense side of an income statement and not including the income — it doesn't produce a meaningful picture of performance,” a Nuveen rep said in a statement to The Promote. “A complete and accurate view requires netting those realized amounts against the corresponding movements in the unrealized accounts over the same period.”

So, with that 🍒 -picking caveat, let’s continue, and look at Stella, a 244-unit multifamily building in Marina del Rey. The account bought the property in ‘13 for $167M (≈$680K/ 🚪 ), and in ‘20 made the iffy decision to bring on co-living operator Common (now defunct) to manage the joint. Last fall, Nuveen sold the property to Carmel Partners for $133M (≈$545K/ 🚪 ), realizing a $43M loss, per the prospectus. In ‘16, TIAA paid Clarion Partners $224M for a 5-property portfolio in Boston’s Fort Point neighborhood. This Jan., Nuveen sold the 4 office properties in that portfolio to Davis Cos. for just $56M, and per the prospectus realized a $47M loss.

Another big caveat: It’s obv not as simple as “Bought for A, sold for B, loss is A-B = C.” As Nuveen notes, “the Real Estate Account is marked to market, and life-to-date unrealized gains and losses accumulate over the entire hold period of an asset. Those unrealized gains and losses are reversed into the realized line at the point of sale.” Still, at the very least, the realized losses are valuable directional color. And the acquisitions in the period also highlight a stark trend, one also seen at Nuveen’s mega money-manager peers: Much of the account’s firepower was redirected into industrial: It made 17 buys for more than $640M in total, and didn’t buy a single new office deal.

We were curious about other high-profile haircuts, so we took a peek at earlier prospectuses (prospecti?). TIAA bought the 50-story Manhattan office tower at 780 Third for $162M (≈ $320/ 🦶) in ‘99, paying a near-record price to the Jameel family out of Saudi for the property. TIAA beat out the likes of Rockrose (Elghanayans) by doing the deal all-cash (retiree dry powder is a beautiful thing). They then marked up the value of the property by ‘08 to $341M ($680/ 🦶), levered up w/ MetLife, and in ‘22 embarked on a “biophilic” upgrade. By ‘24, the tower was in trouble, and MetLife drove a sale to the Brothers Sakhai (Darius & Cyrus, built quite a niche in these lender-driven deals 🫔) for ≈ the debt value. The TIAA account, per the prospectus, realized a $172M loss. And there was a lot more of that happening – here’s a snapshot of the overall disposition activity from that same period the year prior - you’ll note that the ≈$440M ($645/ 🦶) sale of a trophy office tower in Brickell to Elliott Management & Mukong Cho’s Morning Calm was a rare bright spot.

Look, investing is an adult game, and as Henry Hill says, “everybody takes a beating sometime.” The thing that you want to ensure though, is that people are going into such investments with eyes wide open. Though all the risks and losses are disclosed in the prospectus, do the end-investors have the wherewithal to digest these 162-page tomes and get a clear picture? 👀

On Thursday, 6/18 at 12pm ET, we’ll be hosting the 3rd installment of “In Conversation,” our Insiders-only series of unplugged discussions w/ CRE industry leaders (Highlights from our first 2 chats, w/ Lightstone’s David Lichtenstein here, and Naftali’s David Hochfelder here). Hiten’s chatting w/ Ran Eliasaf, founder of Northwind Group. Northwind is one of the most prolific debt funds out there, with action in office-resi, new dev, and one of our growing obsessions: SNFs. He’ll get in-depth about the Northwind playbook and what sponsors, lenders and brokers should be thinking about. Register here, and please hit us with any Qs you’d like Hiten to ask Ran by replying to this email.