The German industrial and logistics real estate investment market reached a transaction volume of EUR 3.26 billion in the first half of 2026. This exceeded the result of the same period of the previous year by 24 percent. This was mainly due to several large-volume transactions, which stimulated the market so far this year. These are the results of a recent analysis by the global real estate service provider CBRE.
"The German logistics investment market continues to gain momentum. While international investors have been increasingly interested in Germany for some time now, we are now also observing a much more intensive market sounding on the part of German investors," says Kai F. Oulds, Head of Industrial & Logistics Germany at CBRE. "International investors in particular are once again assessing the German market more positively than many domestic market participants. At the same time, the number of concrete purchase audits is increasing continuously, which suggests an increasing willingness to invest."
"The prime yield for logistics properties has recently risen slightly to 4.5 percent," says Kristine Kühn, Senior Director Valuation Advisory Services at CBRE. "However, very few transactions were completed in the core segment during the reporting period. Accordingly, the market and price evidence is currently limited, so the yield development should be interpreted with a certain degree of restraint."
"After large-volume transactions were rather rare in recent quarters, we were able to observe more deals in higher volume classes again in the first half of the year," says Tom Franke, Head of Logistics Investments Germany at CBRE. "These transactions have contributed significantly to the higher investment volume and at the same time increased the average ticket size. In addition, we are seeing significantly higher activity on the buyer side than a year ago."
In addition to classic logistics properties, investor interest in Light Industrial has increased significantly. Almost a quarter of the total volume in the first half of 2026 was allocated to corresponding properties – a doubling compared to the same period last year. In addition, Industrial Outdoor Storage (IOS) is increasingly becoming an interesting addition to the investment market. Although this is still a comparatively small segment, the focus is increasingly on conveniently located areas outside the established top logistics regions. The main reasons for this are the lower land costs and a lower dependence on large regional labour potential.
Outlook for the rest of 2026
"The number of ongoing acquisition processes has continued to rise in recent months. If more core products come onto the market again, we expect the positive market development to continue in the second half of the year and a continued lively transaction activity," says Franke.
