Wall Street investors form South Florida trade group

From left: Stephen Schwarzman, chief executive of the Blackstone Group and an Invitation Homes property
From left: Stephen Schwarzman, chief executive of the Blackstone Group and an Invitation Homes property

Property investors reportedly launched a trade group to represent Palm Beach County’s growing coalition of Wall Street homebuyers.

A spinoff of the Washington, D.C.-based National Rental Home Council will educate and give nonpartisan advise on renting out single-family homes on a corporate scale — a relatively new business model in the area, the Palm Beach Post reported.

Some of its founding members include Colony Capital, Starwood Waypoint Residential Trust, American Homes 4 Rent and a subsidiary of the Blackstone Group called Invitation Homes. Invitation has about 150 employees in its Plantation office and more than 1,000 properties in Palm Beach County.

Sign Up for the undefined Newsletter

“There hasn’t been anything like this done before,” Invitation chief marketing officer Andrew Gallina told the Post. “The council was a natural extension of what was happening.”

However, some investors suspect the firms are just trying to improve their public relations through the trade group. [Palm Beach Post]Angela Hunt