6 Overlooked Questions for Your Investment Advisor
In these uncertain times, there's a lot to consider.
As we reach the final quarter of 2026, brokers and advisors are getting the familiar wave of calls from owners who are weighing whether to sell or recapitalize in other ways before Dec. 31 or look to craft a plan for 2027.
Multifamily sales volume went up roughly 20 percent year-over-year, according to a recent Marcus & Millichap national report. But in a landscape where supply diverges sharply by region, financing costs are shifting and new tax regulations are taking effect, the headlines alone won’t give you a clear answer regarding what to do with your property.
In this kind of market, the advisor selected matters as much as the assets held. Here are some of the overlooked questions owners should be asking before signing a listing agreement:
1. Under what circumstances would you tell me not to sell?
This is the single most revealing question you can ask. A broker is compensated when a transaction closes. That alone doesn’t make the advice to sell wrong, but it does mean you should ask this question directly. An advisor with a specific, reasoned answer, tied to your basis, your timeline, or your tax position, is thinking about your outcome. One who can’t name a scenario is thinking about a paycheck.
2. Who Is pricing my asset, and against what data?
Ask for submarket-level numbers, not a metro average. An advisor who can explain where your asset sits, not just within the national or regional picture but block by block, is pricing on evidence. As an example, we work primarily throughout the Bay Area, where San Francisco and San Jose posted two of the fastest rates of apartment rent growth of any major U.S. market this summer. Yet in working on the ground, day to day, in these cities, we can see that strength is uneven by neighborhood. In that region, an advisor who can explain why Mountain View is outperforming East San Jose is pricing on evidence. One who only cites a metro-wide cap rate is guessing.
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3. How does this reset basis and depreciation across the portfolio?
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act permanently restored 100 percent bonus depreciation for qualifying property placed in service after Jan.19, 2025, and IRS guidance issued this year clarified how it applies to phased renovations, including a component election that lets an owner claim the deduction on parts of a renovation as they’re completed rather than waiting for the whole project to finish. It is important that an advisor can tell you exactly where your asset falls within that timeline, not just recite the rule in the abstract.
4. If I exchange, what is the replacement plan before the clock starts?
The 45-day identification and 180-day closing windows in a 1031 exchange are unforgiving. The right time to discuss replacement candidates, including what is available in your own submarket, is before your property is marketed—not after you have a buyer. Ask what markets and asset types an advisor is already tracking on your behalf before making it official.
5. What does this transaction set up for the next 10 years?
The best outcome is rarely the highest price today. It is the position it leaves you in after-tax five and even 10 years out. Ask how this sale, exchange or hold connects to your succession plans and the transaction after this one. If the answer stops at closing, the advice stopped too early. For example, we recently helped an investor sell Pacific Apartments, a 20-unit Livermore, Calif., property, for $5.6 million and utilize a 1031 exchange to invest in Briarwood Apartments, a 64-unit community two miles away, for $19.75 million. This not only more than tripled the unit count and reset depreciation but also kept our client in a submarket he already knew. Therefore, ongoing management is simpler and more efficient than taking on an unfamiliar market would have been. These are other considerations a true advisor can help you explore.
6. What’s ahead in 2027?
Fundamentals favor patient, well-advised owners over rushed ones. Depreciation rules have moved in the owners’ favor, supply-constrained metros are positioned to keep outperforming, and 42 of the country’s 50 major markets are expecting fewer multifamily deliveries, per Marcus & Millichap data.
While none of this guarantees the outcome for any property, what it does mean is that those looking to potentially make multifamily real estate moves over the next several months have much to consider, and the questions above are worth more than any single number a broker quotes on the first call.
Adam Levin and Robert Johnston are executive managing directors at Levin Johnston of Marcus & Millichap.
