Sector early indicator? Yes, Real Estate can be sometimes.

The Real Estate sector - here represented by iShares U.S. Real Estate ETF (IYR, in orange), Simon Property Group (SPG, in purple), Equity Residential (EQR, in red), - can sometimes act as an early indicator against the broader market (here represented by the DJIA in gray, and the NASDAQ in black)... falling from peaks in 1998, Feb 2007, Mar 2015, Nov 2017.