April 2026 DST Landscape Review ~ The Lion is Still Roaring

We used the begin­ning of a tra­di­tion weath­er proverb last month (In Like a Lion) to ref­er­ence the mar­ket enthu­si­asm for equi­ty absorbed. The Lion is still Roar­ing.  We con­tin­ue our quick overview of the equi­ty raised pri­mar­i­ly in the Delaware Statu­to­ry Trust (DST) mar­ket.   This was report­ed by Moun­tain Dell Con­sult­ing who engages and tracks activ­i­ties from spon­sors of Delaware Statu­to­ry Trust (DST) and TIC Mar­ket Equi­ty invest­ment.   We add com­men­tary to dive a lit­tle deep­er into the num­bers. “Details make the dif­fer­ence”.

April 8, 2026
By Al DiNi­co­la, AIF®
Pri­vate Fund Advi­sor
DST 1031 Spe­cial­ist
Naples Asset Man­age­ment. LLC
Secu­ri­ties offered through MSC-BD, LLC, Mem­ber of FINRA/SIPC

Through Feb­ru­ary 2026 equi­ty raised was off to a fast start with $1,519,393,693 raised.  Through the end of March there has been $2,443,788,818 raised. This is over thir­ty (30) per­cent ahead of 2025. There are ear­ly indi­ca­tions that the total may poten­tial­ly reach over $10 Bil­lion.  This would sur­pass the 2023 record of $9.5 Bil­lion.

Trends in the past Two Years  

In look­ing back in 2025 there was an ini­tial con­cern that the inter­est rates would affect the flow of real estate sale that may pre­vent investors from com­plet­ing §1031 exchange. Many DST invest­ments involve a §1031 exchange.  The increase in 2025 may be due to peo­ple adapt­ing to the high­er rates. (Although I remem­ber my first mort­gage in Flori­da was 14%). It would appear the increase in inter­est rate may have been mit­i­gat­ed with the cur­rent suc­cess so far in 2026.  If the inter­est rates do con­tin­ue to loosen up, that may add more veloc­i­ty to the mar­ket.  There are oth­er macro­eco­nom­ic head­winds affect­ing many class­es of real estate (mul­ti­fam­i­ly, stu­dent hous­ing, etc.). The dras­tic rise in insur­ance pre­mi­ums and oth­er oper­at­ing costs affects the bot­tom line. The con­trac­tion of the DST mar­ket did not hap­pen even with a vari­ety of mar­ket dynam­ics, the least of which was the ris­ing inter­est rates.  The rise in inter­est rates may have caused an over­all slow­down in the real estate sales in cer­tain mar­kets. Investors hold­ing tra­di­tion­al real estate may have seen few­er buy­ers. These buy­ers may have need­ed access to cap­i­tal at an accept­able bor­row­ing rate. There has been lit­tle improve­ment in inter­est rates so far in 2026. There are also sev­er­al prop­er­ties still adjust­ing and get­ting back to nor­mal from the North Car­oli­na hur­ri­cane after­math. There are also a cou­ple of DST Spon­sors that are amid con­sol­i­da­tion and poten­tial merg­ers for mar­ket effi­cien­cies and reduc­ing ongo­ing costs.

Mar­ket Met­rics.

With three months in the books, we can draw com­par­isons month over moth. Although some of the com­par­isons may not be an exact sci­ence since spon­sors sub­scrib­ing (sell­ing) equi­ty in cer­tain offer­ings are not always replaced dol­lar for dol­lar nor the same asset class. The sum­ma­ry of the year-to-date activ­i­ty is shown in the chart below. At the end of March there was a mar­ket increase in avail­able equi­ty over $327 Mil­lion.   The avail­abil­i­ty of offer­ings (inven­to­ry) is always a con­cern for advi­sors who deal with investors seek­ing replace­ment in the case of a §1031 exchange. The increase in inven­to­ry since the end of Feb­ru­ary is encour­ag­ing. Espe­cial­ly when you cou­ple that with con­tin­ued equi­ty raise in March. We under­stand the urgency in iden­ti­fy­ing replace­ment prop­er­ties as well as hav­ing the abil­i­ty to close. Here are the results at the end of Feb­ru­ary (as report from Moun­tain Dell).

	End of Feb­ru­ary	End of Feb­ru­ary
Equi­ty Avail­able (all class­es)	$          3,479,333,815	$3,806,748,685
Num­ber of Pro­grams	94	103
Days on Mar­ket	216	224
Num­ber of active Spon­sors	56	62
Aver­age 1st Yr. Return	4.81%	4.80%

While there is more equi­ty cur­rent­ly avail­able com­pared to the end of Feb­ru­ary there are increas­ing shifts in avail­abil­i­ty. The num­ber of over­all pro­grams increased by nine offer­ings.   Hav­ing a vari­ety of asset class­es helps investors who seek a replace­ment prop­er­ty for a §1031 tax deferred exchange.  The days on the mar­ket moved up slight­ly by 8 days.  Again, depend­ing on the size of the offer­ings a few weeks shift may not be an indi­ca­tor of the mar­ket.  We have noticed pro­gram offer­ings of under $50 Mil­lion have a short­er days on mar­ket than much larg­er offer­ings. The short­er time may indi­cate investors look at all options soon­er.  There has also been a sta­ble pro­ject­ed aver­age first year dis­tri­b­u­tion. What does reduce the aver­age first year return is the intro­duc­tion of sev­er­al ‚”ZERO”, dis­tri­b­u­tion DST.  The zero DST are struc­tured with high LTV and no dis­tri­b­u­tion.  This struc­ture may pro­vide addi­tion­al tax ben­e­fits form cer­tain investors. One item that was not includ­ed in the over­all sum­ma­ry of the Moun­tain Dell Report is the num­ber of all cash DST.  There con­tin­ues to be an increase in the num­ber of all cash DST (an increase in pre­vi­ous years) as well as reduced LTV (Loan to val­ue) or reduced lever­age in the DST offer­ings.  Forty-nine offer­ings (out of 103) being all cash may not be all good news for investors who need to bal­ance their exchanges with debt.  Investors with high­er than 60% LTV replace­ment are most affect­ed.

Cur­rent Mar­ket Avail­abil­i­ty

Asset Class	Num­ber of Pro­grams	Avail­able Equi­ty	LTV
Mul­ti Fam­i­ly	39	$   1,217,736,965	39.9%
Indus­tri­al	18	$   1,425,382,949	14.17%
Retail	11	$          73,060,600	7.82%
Office	3	$       124,558,485	51.85%
Office/Medical	6	$       150,412,511	35.77%
Senior Hous­ing	4	$       182,747,486	13.20%
Hos­pi­tal­i­ty	1	$             4,730,507	0.00%
Stu­dent Hous­ing	4	$       247,383,830	35.38%
Self-Stor­age	3	$       167,874,638	15.32%
Ener­gy	2	$             5,629,659	0.00%
Oth­er	12	$       207,231,055	3.94%

Cur­rent Asset Class Met­rics

Spon­sors have entered a more con­ser­v­a­tive under­writ­ing mode, reduced the LTV, and increased the equi­ty need­ed for each DST.  Not­ed in the chart below is aver­age LTV for each asset class. There are no asset class­es with an aver­age LTV of over 40%.  Under­stand­ing that when dis­play­ing an aver­age there may be (depend­ing on the asset class) an LTV over 40%. Thus, for investors with a high­er LTV need we have a few alter­na­tives.  When we assist an investor with a larg­er §1031 exchange ($1M and above) espe­cial­ly when debt needs to be replaced, we typ­i­cal­ly blend mul­ti­ple DSTs with lever­age to diver­si­fy the replace­ment port­fo­lio for the investor.  As a side­bar there are cash investors who acquire DST with non-recourse debt for oth­er rea­sons. Please con­sult with us about those strate­gies.

 In 2026 there was more equi­ty avail­able in Indus­tri­al with half of the num­ber of offer­ings. The num­ber of indus­tri­al offer­ings has decreased true but the over­all size of the offer­ings gen­er­al­ly are larg­er. It should be clear that because there is more options avail­able in the Mul­ti­fam­i­ly cur­rent­ly the demand for Indus­tri­al asset class may still be a fac­tor.  Indus­tri­al rep­re­sents 37% of all equi­ty avail­able. Mul­ti­fam­i­ly rep­re­sents about 31% of the total vol­ume avail­able. Mul­ti­fam­i­ly and Indus­tri­al are still in much demand. Nec­es­sary retail (espe­cial­ly all cash) con­tin­ues to be sought after by cer­tain investors. One com­ment that we should make is that in the mul­ti­fam­i­ly cur­rent offer­ings there is one extreme­ly large sin­gle offer­ing that rep­re­sents over $300 mil­lion of remain­ing equi­ty. There are a vari­ety of offer­ings in the “Oth­er” clas­si­fi­ca­tion that pro­vide dif­fer­ent oppor­tu­ni­ties involv­ing net lease prop­er­ties as well as oth­er options with bonus depre­ci­a­tion oppor­tu­ni­ties for cer­tain investors.

Asset Class	# pro­grams	Avail­able Equi­ty	LTV	All Cash	Dol­las as % of Offer­ings	# as % of Offer­ing
Ener­gy	2	$  5,629,659	0.00%	2	0.15%	1.94%
Hos­pi­tal­i­ty	1	$  4,730,507	0.00%	1	0.12%	0.97%
Indus­tri­al	18	$  1,425,382,949	14.17%	12	37.44%	17.48%
Mul­ti­fam­i­ly	39	$1,217,736,965	39.99%	6	31.99%	37.86%
Mul­ti-Man­u­fac­tured					0.00%	0.00%
Mul­ti Stu­dent Hous­ing	4	$ 247,383,830	35.38%	1	6.50%	3.88%
Office	3	$   124,558,485	51.85%	0	3.27%	2.91%
Office-Med­ical	6	$   150,412,511	35.77%	2	3.95%	5.83%
Oth­er	12	$   207,231,055	3.94%	11	5.44%	11.65%
Retail	11	$     73,060,600	7.82%	9	1.92%	10.68%
Self-Stor­age	3	$   167,874,638	15.32%	2	4.41%	2.91%
Senior Hous­ing	4	$   182,747,486	13.20%	3	4.80%	3.88%
Total	103	$  3,806,748,685		49	100.00%	100.00%

Final DST Mar­ket Overview Com­ments

The indus­try and mar­ket are expe­ri­enc­ing sig­nif­i­cant growth. Over the past num­ber of years there was an aver­age equi­ty raise of $5.15 Bil­lion.    As we tracked 2026 we as well as oth­er indus­try experts rec­og­nized that 2025 was a very good year. The new 5‑year move aver­age is $7.10B. The under­ly­ing demo­graph­ics for investors want­i­ng to sell active­ly man­aged real estate and move into pas­sive own­er­ship will con­tin­ue to increase.  Moun­tain Dell is fore­cast­ing 2026 to hit over $10 Bil­lion in equi­ty.

We con­tin­ue to research, review, and mon­i­tor all the major DST spon­sors.  We speak week­ly with our spon­sor con­tacts and con­duct due dili­gence on DST offer­ings. Our con­tin­ued research enables us to pro­vide a quick response to investor ques­tions regard­ing their cash invest­ing needs as well as their §1031 tax deferred exchange.  We are espe­cial­ly skilled at bal­anc­ing the exchange debt equi­ty require­ments. We also spe­cial­ize in the §1033 exchange in the case of nat­ur­al dis­as­ter or emi­nent domain cas­es. The time­line for investors to decide on their uti­liza­tion of a §1033 may extend beyond the bench­mark 2 years as iden­ti­fied in the §1033 Code and poten­tial­ly extend to 4 years.  This may assist investors in Cal­i­for­nia, Flori­da, North Car­olin as well as oth­er spe­cif­ic areas of the USA.

What to Look for in 2026 and 2027

DSTs have been gain­ing broad­er insti­tu­tion­al expo­sure and accep­tance. The inclu­sion of the §721 UPREIT (after a safe har­bor peri­od) is a not­ed addi­tion that needs to be researched for spe­cif­ic investors.  Large insti­tu­tion­al investors have been step­ping into the space. Not only on the spon­sor lev­el but also the large insti­tu­tion­al play­er and advi­sors prospec­tive. Schwab and Fideli­ty have entered the par­tic­i­pa­tion via plat­form­ing DSTs.  Large wire hous­es are step­ping into the §1031 space on the wealth man­age­ment side of the busi­ness. We remain inde­pen­dent and have access to most all spon­sor assets. Our duty is to the indi­vid­ual investors. On a dif­fer­ent top­ic, but poten­tial­ly of vast inter­est was the tax bill signed into law in July 2025. The 100% depre­ci­a­tion (includ­ed with cer­tain DSTs) may be of inter­est for cer­tain investors seek­ing tax strate­gies. We have received requests to iden­ti­fy alter­na­tives to typ­i­cal tax deferred exchanges and strate­gies and we have made sig­nif­i­cant progress and due dili­gence in that area. There were also mod­i­fi­ca­tions and exten­sions to the Oppor­tu­ni­ty Zone (OZ) invest­ment oppor­tu­ni­ty that we will cov­er in oth­er posts.

NAMCOA™ is a SEC reg­is­tered invest­ment advi­so­ry firm that pro­vides com­pre­hen­sive port­fo­lio man­age­ment, finan­cial plan­ning, and fidu­cia­ry deci­sion-mak­ing ser­vices on behalf of retire­ment plan spon­sors. Our dif­fer­ence is sum­ma­rized by our fidu­cia­ry approach which enables us to bet­ter meet port­fo­lio and retire­ment plan objec­tives, result­ing in stronger risk adjust­ed returns for investors and peace of mind for Clients. We also focus on alter­na­tive real estate invest­ment. Many real estate investors are seek­ing tax deferred solu­tions uti­liz­ing §1031 exchanges or Oppor­tu­ni­ty Zones.

DSTs are not for all investors.  The acqui­si­tion of a DST is for accred­it­ed investors only.  Con­tact your invest­ment advis­er for addi­tion­al details on how a DST may be a solu­tion to your 1031 Exchange and suit­ed for your invest­ment future. For more infor­ma­tion on how to prop­er­ly set up an IRC 1031Tax Deferred Exchange or if you are an accred­it­ed investor and would like addi­tion­al infor­ma­tion on a DST con­tact Al DiNi­co­la at 239–691-8098 or email adinicola@namcoa.com.

This is not an offer to pur­chase or solic­i­ta­tion to pur­chase any secu­ri­ty, as such be made only through an offer­ing mem­o­ran­dum or prospec­tus.  Invest­ing in secu­ri­ties, real estate, or any invest­ment, whether pub­lic or pri­vate, involves risk, includ­ing but not lim­it­ed to the poten­tial of los­ing some or all your invest­ment dol­lars when you invest in secu­ri­ties. You should review any planned finan­cial trans­ac­tions that may have tax or legal impli­ca­tions with your per­son­al tax or legal advi­sor.   Naples Asset Man­age­ment, LLC is a Reg­is­tered Invest­ment Advi­sor, reg­u­lat­ed by SEC (Secu­ri­ties and Exchange Com­mis­sion). Our cor­po­rate office is locat­ed at 999 Van­der­bilt Beach Road, Suite 200, Naples Flori­da 34108. Secu­ri­ties Offered through MSC-BD, LLC, Mem­ber of FINRA/SIPC, 5 Cen­ter­pointe Dri­ve, Ste. 400 Lake Oswego, OR, 97035.  MSC-BD, LLC and Naples Asset Man­age­ment, LLC are inde­pen­dent­ly owned and are not affil­i­at­ed.

Thank you.