Drooms Real Estate Trends Report 2026: More than 363 days for a transaction – stagnation as a trend reversal?

The due diligence platform Drooms publishes its Real Estate Trends Report for the fourth time in a row and analyzes the transactions processed via Drooms in terms of duration and scope. In 2025, 70 percent of transactions were in the real estate sector, while the remaining 30 percent were split between corporate finance, energy and legal deals. For the first time since the beginning of the surveys, the transaction duration in Europe remained stable compared to the previous year at 363 days. In addition to the data analysis, Drooms surveyed 80 real estate experts about their investment intentions and market assessments for 2026.

Most respondents want to invest a maximum of 20 million euros in real estate in 2026 (36 percent). 15 percent are planning an investment volume of between 20 and 50 million euros, 14 percent between 50 and 100 million euros, 11 percent between 100 and 250 million euros and 14 percent even more than 250 million euros.

One of the key findings of the report is that 53 percent of respondents across all European markets have noted an increased transaction duration in the past twelve months. 16 percent even report an increase of more than 20 percent, 27 percent an increase of between 10 and 20 percent. Likewise, 24 percent say that the probability of closing a deal after due diligence has decreased in the past year; 54 percent report a constant probability.

Stagnating transaction duration in Europe – trend reversal in sight?
The anonymized evaluation of the Drooms database, on the other hand, shows a stagnating transaction duration. Compared to 2024, the European transaction duration remained stable at 363 days. However, significant country-specific differences can be observed: In the UK, a transaction now takes 577 days – a new record compared to 499 days in the previous year. There is good news for Germany: There, the transaction duration fell for the first time to 398 days compared to 405 days in the previous year. France also saw an increase of 336 days compared to 329 days in the previous year, as well as Spain (244 days compared to 206 days).

The amount of data per real estate transaction has remained stable in 2025 after peaking at 3.6 gigabytes in 2024. The main reason for the continued high volume of data is the legal and regulatory requirements for real estate transactions.

According to Drooms CEO Alexandre Grellier, the stable transaction duration in Europe and the slight decline in Germany can be early signs of a trend reversal.

"The transaction duration in Europe has been rushing from record high to record high for years. Now, for the first time, we are observing stagnation. This can be an indicator of a brightening transaction environment. However, it must also be noted that despite the slight recovery, deal security is decreasing and the transaction duration remains at a high level despite everything," comments Alexandre Grellier, Co-Founder & CEO of Drooms. "It is a huge challenge to manage this complexity. This makes structured and digital processes for the exchange and processing of information and documents all the more important – especially in complex and cross-border transactions."

CEE and DACH region in focus
These regions remain highly popular with investors: 28 percent of respondents plan to invest 25 to 50 percent of their investment volume outside their home market. 58 percent said they wanted to invest a maximum of 25 percent abroad. Spain (43 percent), the DACH region (37 percent), the CEE region (34 percent), followed by Benelux (22 percent) are particularly in demand. At the same time, investors see challenges: 47 percent cite the different regulatory environment as the biggest hurdle, 28 percent the lack of market access.

Residential and logistics properties remain investors' favourites – infrastructure in demand
As in 2025, investors remain focused on residential (43 percent; -1) and logistics (15 percent; -5), followed by infrastructure (including data centers: 14 percent; ±0) and hospitality (11 percent; +1), retail (8 percent; +3), healthcare (7 percent; +3) and office (1.3 percent; -2.7). Despite the cautious classification as the most attractive asset class, 62 percent of investors want to expand their infrastructure commitment; only around 10 percent want to reduce it.

Financing remains a challenge
The financing situation remains the biggest challenge for the companies surveyed: 46 percent state that securing further financing is their greatest challenge. For 16 percent, the restructuring and follow-up financing of their liabilities is another major challenge. 39 percent cite a lack of investment opportunities; 28 percent each consider the shortage of skilled workers and dealing with regulation to be their top three challenges. Nevertheless, 60 percent of respondents want to be more active in the transaction market in 2026 than in 2025. Only 15 percent plan to limit their activities.

More deals thanks to AI
With regard to the impact of artificial intelligence on the transaction business, most respondents expect that they will be able to view and prepare more deals with the same number of employees thanks to AI (49 percent). 15 percent assume that deals will become faster and cheaper and/or that AI can be used to reduce the costs of transaction and legal advice. 12 percent expect that AI could reduce jobs in the transaction business and thus save costs.

"AI has the potential to make the transaction market fairer. While large deals today require appropriate structures and manpower, smaller boutiques will be able to compete with the large investment managers and investors in the future," explains Grellier. "AI won't do deal sourcing or due diligence on its own, but it can make it easier to access more and better deals. That's not bad news for a market in transition."

The complete Real Estate Trends Report 2026 can be downloaded here: https://drooms.com/resources/white-papers/real-estate-trends-report-2026/