Public pension investments: How we reported the story

To cover this story, Times reporters built a database of deals made by private real estate funds that received investment commitments from public pensions in California from 2015 to 2022.

Using information from data provider PitchBook, reporters identified so-called value add and opportunistic real estate funds that often purchase underperforming apartment complexes, renovate them and sharply increase rents to maximize their returns.

Real estate data provider CoStar tracks acquisitions of multifamily properties by investment funds, as well as rent data for individual properties and entire geographic areas. Using that information, reporters built a database that contained 133 deals from California and included average asking rents per square foot for vacant units at the properties and their surrounding submarkets.

By tracking both, the analysis was able to determine whether those apartment complexes were outpacing the local markets on rent.

In conducting its analysis, The Times reached out to 13 fund managers identified by CoStar and shared with them a list of buildings the real estate service said their funds bought. Four companies said their funds did not buy a total of four buildings CoStar said they did. The Times did not include the buildings in its analysis.