Blackstone, Starwood to Merge Rental-Home Businesses in Bet to be America’s Biggest Home Landlord ( The WSJ)

From The Wall Street Journal

Two of the country’s largest rental-home owners have agreed to merge, one of the clearest signs that Wall Street is betting homeownership rates will remain low and that a growing number of U.S. families will rent.

Blackstone Group BX +0.20% LP’s Invitation Homes Inc. INVH -0.42% and Starwood Waypoint Homes said Thursday that they plan to combine in a bid for scale and operating efficiencies. The combined company would own about 82,000 homes in 17 metro areas, including Atlanta, Miami and Southern California.

The all-stock deal between the publicly traded real-estate investment trusts is the biggest yet in the rapidly consolidating institutional rental-home business, which sprouted from the foreclosure crisis when big investors raced to buy homes at steep discounts.

Photo and article credit : The Wall Street Journal https://www.wsj.com/articles/with-merger-deal-blackstone-starwood-bet-on-being-americas-biggest-home-landlord-1502361000