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Home prices have surged in major Chinese cities, leading to concerns of asset price bubbles and housing affordability. The policy of home purchase restrictions (HPR) has been one of China’s harshest housing market interventions to squeeze out speculative demand and dampen the soaring home prices. Beijing was the first city to implement the HPR. Employing the regression discontinuity design technique, we find that Beijing’s HPR policy triggered a 17–24 % decrease in resale price, a drop in the price-to-rent ratio of about a quarter of its mean value, and a deep (1/2 to 3/4) reduction in the transaction volume of the for-sale market, with no significant change in the rent or the transaction volume of rental units. In submarkets where housing supply was less elastic, the effects of the HPR were larger in price and smaller in quantity, suggesting that wealthy buyers likely benefited more from the HPR. The scope of the analysis does not allow conclusions regarding the persistence or longevity of these effects.

A common definition of liquidity in real estate investment is the ability to sell property assets quickly at full value, as reflected by transaction volume. The present paper makes methodological and conceptual contributions in the study and understanding of liquidity. First, we extend the Fisher et al. (Real Estate Economics, 31(2), 269–303, 2003) Fisher et al. (The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, 34(1), 5–33, 2007) methodology for the separate tracking of changes in reservation prices on the demand (potential buyers) and supply (potential sellers) sides of the asset market. We show how to apply the methodology to a repeat sales indexing framework, allowing application to typical commercial property transaction price datasets, which lack appraisal valuations or complete data regarding property characteristics. We also use a Bayesian, structural time series approach to estimate the indexes. These methodological enhancements enable much more granular supply and demand index estimation, including at the metropolitan level. Second, we propose a Liquidity Metric based on the indexes, and show that the normal liquidity dynamic in commercial property asset markets is “pro-cyclical”, that is, price and trading volume tend to move together, with demand tending to lead supply. Additionally, we observe an “anomalous” dynamic that occurs about 25 percent of the time, in which the Liquidity Metric declines while consummated prices are rising. This anomalous dynamic is often associated with the end of a period of rapid price growth.

The design of engineering systems like airports, communication infrastructures, and real estate projects today is growing in complexity. Designers need to consider socio-technical uncertainties, intricacies, and processes in the long-term strategic deployment and operations of these systems. Flexibility in engineering design provides ways to deal with this complexity. It enables engineering systems to change in the face of uncertainty to reduce impacts from downside scenarios (e.g., unfavorable market conditions) while capitalizing on upside opportunities (e.g., new technology). Many case studies have shown that flexibility can improve anticipated lifecycle performance (e.g., expected economic value) compared to current design and evaluation approaches. It is a difficult process requiring guidance and must be done at an early conceptual stage. The literature offers little guidance on procedures helping designers do this systematically in a collaborative context. This study investigated the effects of two educational training procedures on flexibility (current vs. explicit) and two ideation procedures (free undirected brainstorming vs. prompting) to guide this process and improve anticipated lifecycle performance. Controlled experiments were conducted with ninety participants working on a simplified engineering systems design problem. Results suggest that a prompting mechanism for flexibility can help generate more flexible design concepts than free undirected brainstorming. These concepts can improve performance significantly (by up to 36 %) compared to a benchmark design—even though users did not expect improved quality of results. Explicit training on flexibility can improve user satisfaction with the process, results, and results quality in comparison with current engineering and design training on flexibility. These findings give insights into the crafting and application of simple, intuitive, and efficient procedures to improve lifecycle performance by means of flexibility and performance that may be left aside with existing design approaches. The experimental results are promising toward further evaluation in a real-world setting.

Conventional real estate price indexes provide a single measure for the path of asset prices over time (controlling for the quality of the representative or average property). Properties could, however, have different price dynamics based on the price segment in which they are traded. On the demand side, investors at different price points are differentiated by the amount of capital they have at their disposal and the type and source of financing. Smaller, private investors cluster at lower price points, whereas large institutions dominate the high price points. On the supply side, properties at different price points may serve different space markets with different types of tenants and may reflect different supply elasticity and land/structure value ratios. In this article, the authors use an unconventional approach, quantile regression, to estimate price indexes for different price segments in commercial real estate. Their results show that there are indeed large differences in price dynamics for different price points. These differences are suggestive of a lack of integration in the property asset market because the authors find apparent differences in the risk-return relationship. Lower-price-point properties exhibit less risk (in the form of volatility and cycle amplitude) but have no evidence of lower total returns. Lower-price-point properties also show greater momentum and thus greater predictability.

This paper examines the magnitude of random disaggregate appraisal valuation error in institutional-grade commercial property. Unlike previous transactions-based studies of appraisal error, we use a much larger database that is not restricted to sold properties, and we employ a methodology that focuses on appraisal error rather than the difference between transaction price and previous appraised value. Our model gives a point estimate of 11.07% for the standard error of appraisals in the Russell-NCREIF database, with a robust range of 6% to 13%.

A Companion to Urban Economics provides a state-of-the-art overview of this field, communicating its intellectual richness through a diverse portfolio of authors and topics. Unique in both its rigor and international treatment An ideal supplementary textbook in upper-level undergraduate urban economics courses, or in master's level and professional courses, providing students with the necessary foundation to tackle more advanced topics in urban economics Contains contributions from the world's leading urban economists.

An examination is made of an alternative approach for facilitating owner-occupied housing-equity hedging and trading: the Home Equity Investment Trust (HEIT). A HEIT is simply an equity partnership, like a joint venture, in which the owner partner occupies and manages the house, while the other partner remains passive, providing most of the original capital in return for a regular income stream and a share of the house value. Instead of taking out a mortgage, a home buyer would take out a HEIT. An analysis considers the need for a vehicle to trade owner-occupied housing equity from the perspective of individual households, who would likely provide most of the underlying demand for the short (or sell) side of the market for HEITs. Then, the need for such a vehicle is examined from the perspective of institutional investors who, it is argued, should provide much the demand for the long (or buy) side of the market. The mechanics of HEITs are explained.

The humble parking lot, by virtue of being the immediate predecessor to most downtown structures, is a unique type of real estate investment. The central business district (CBD) surface parking lot is, in essence, an option - an asset that has the potential to be developed into something much greater. However, parking lots differ in an important way from the stock options familiar to security investors. While all options offer the prospect of very large capital gains when sold, parking lots provide the additional benefit of a positive cash flow while the owner holds them. Institutional investors might want to consider including CBD parking lots as part of their investment portfolios. Some key features of CBD parking lots that qualify them as income-producing urban land investments are described. In addition, the development of an index of the investment performances across time is presented, using a sample of such properties. Based on the index results, the optimal share of the CBD parking lot is suggested in a conservative real estate investment portfolio.

The humble parking lot, by virtue of being the immediate predecessor to most downtown structures, is a unique type of real estate investment. The central business district (CBD) surface parking lot is, in essence, an option - an asset that has the potential to be developed into something much greater. However, parking lots differ in an important way from the stock options familiar to security investors. While all options offer the prospect of very large capital gains when sold, parking lots provide the additional benefit of a positive cash flow while the owner holds them. Institutional investors might want to consider including CBD parking lots as part of their investment portfolios. Some key features of CBD parking lots that qualify them as income-producing urban land investments are described. In addition, the development of an index of the investment performances across time is presented, using a sample of such properties. Based on the index results, the optimal share of the CBD parking lot is suggested in a conservative real estate investment portfolio.