According to Mansion Global's Mareesa Nicosia, the wellness real estate boom heightened by concepts such as biophilic design and healthy building standards, including WELL, is more than a trend—the accumulated international wellness real estate market is now a $134 billion industry, according to researchers at the Miami-based Global Wellness Institute.
The number of wellness-oriented properties (including residential, mixed-use, and commercial) has grown 6.4% annually since 2015 and is expected to continue expanding at that pace through 2022, to reach $180 billion, according to the Institute. That's half the size of the green building industry, says Nicosia in citing the researchers' report.
The U.S. leads the market share at $52.5 billion, followed by China, Australia and the U.K. According to the report, there are more than 740 existing or planned residential projects in 34 countries that include large-scale master planned communities and urban/suburban mixed-use developments.
Particularly in the U.S., while health care spending soars, “we’re becoming more unhealthy as we live longer,” said Ophelia Yeung, a senior research fellow at the Global Wellness Institute who co-authored the report, called “Build Well to Live Well: Wellness Lifestyle Real Estate and Communities.” Naturally, Ms. Yeung said, this conflux has led to people asking themselves “why they invested their life savings in a home that is not keeping them well.”
