UNITED STATES - Los Angeles County Employees Retirement Association is now in the planning stages for a new global REIT manager search worth around $100m (€73.1m).

John McClelland, principal investment officer for real estate at the pension fund, said the search for global REITs investments will be done through a full-fledged and open RFP process.

Although the actual timing has yet to be established, LACERA will also be doing this with the assistance of its real estate consultant, The Townsend Group.

"There are several features that we like about investing in public real estate and one is liquidity," said McClelland.

"You can move in and out of owning shares in a company and investing in a certain part of the world. Another positive is that you can get daily information on the value of your public portfolio."

LACERA is expected to approve the RFP on August 8th and finalists will then be brought in for interviews at a later date as part of a total $400m allocation to Reits.

The pension fund has at this point committed a total of $91m into four commingled funds – two via CB Richard Ellis Investors, a third through AIG Asian Real Estate Partners and the other via New City Asia Partners.