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Wharton News Nakahara Greets New MBA Class and Teaches in San FranciscoZell/Lurie Associate Director Asuka Nakahara taught a session in San Francisco for the School of Design's Center for Urban Redevelopment Excellence that focused on leadership issues and running a real estate development company. He also gave the faculty address at the Wharton Convocation, the formal welcome ceremony for the incoming MBA Class of 2008. Patrick Egeonu WG '07, Terence Cuaso WG '07, and Velin Mezinev WG '05 in New York Alumni and Students Get Together in New YorkThe fourth annual Wharton Real Estate New York Happy Hour in early August was a great success and very well attended, drawing alumni from the Classes of 1982 to 2006. The event created an excellent opportunity for alumni and current students to network. If you would like to be added to the Zell/Lurie Real Estate Center Alumni Directory, please send your contact information to Janice Leberman.SARS and the Property MarketGrace Wong, Assistant Professor of Real Estate, was cited in the Knowledge@Wharton article (5/31/06), "Epidemics in an Integrated Global Society: An Economist's View." "When Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) broke out in Hong Kong in 2003," said the article, "some media outlets predicted economic calamity for the city. But by one financial measure—real estate prices—Hong Kong hardly suffered, according to research by Grace Wong, a Wharton real estate professor. In two papers titled, 'Has SARS Infected the Property Market? Evidence from Hong Kong' and 'Is SARS a Poor Man's Disease? Socioeconomic Status and Risk Factors for SARS Transmission,' Wong looks at SARS' impact on real estate values and analyzes the role of income in determining who contracted the disease."Housing Bubble not WidespreadJoseph Gyourko, Director of the Zell/Lurie Real Estate Center was quoted in the Knowledge@Wharton (6/14/06) article, "The Millionaire Down the Street Was Right, But Now What's in Store for Real Estate?" The future is difficult to predict, said Gyourko. The article quotes him, "'I don't think there's a widespread bubble in housing markets in the U.S.,'" acknowledging that 2005 was "frothy" and that "in niche markets like condos there are crashes absolutely waiting to happen." Gyourko "sees no 'great collapse' on the horizon, though. In Gyourko's view, local economic factors—such as job growth and supply restrictions on residential real estate—justify the hike in real estate prices in many cities, particularly on the coasts." The article was also posted on Builder Online.Trends in City PopulationGyourko was a source for the article, "Thriving U.S. cities leave less room in the middle," by Janney Scott in The New York Times (7/23/06) "Some big American cities are flourishing as at no time in recent memory'" Janney wrote. "But middle-class city dwellers across the country are being squeezed." For instance, Janney wrote, quoting Gyourko's research, "In the San Francisco Bay Area, the percentage of households earning more than $100,000 a year rose to over 30 percent in 2000 from approximately 7 percent in 1970, said Joseph Gyourko. 'Is that area worse off?' he asked. 'At least so far, there's a lot of evidence that economically they're better off. Land prices are really high, lots of people want to move there.'"In the Opinion section of U.S. News & World Report, (5/10/2006) Michael Barone cited the research of Joe Gyourko in "Barone Blog: What makes vibrant cities grow," quoting an article in The New York Times: "The net population of Detroit usually decreases each year, but the city still attracts plenty of people drawn by its extreme affordability. As Gyourko points out, in the year 2000 the median house price in Philadelphia was $59,700; in Detroit, it was $63,600. Those prices are well below the actual construction costs of the homes. 'To build them new, it would cost at least $80,000,' Gyourko says, 'so there's no builder who would build those today. And as long as those houses remain, the people remain.'" New York's Plans for Penn Station and Madison Square GardenLynne Sagalyn, Professor of Real Estate Development and Planning, was quoted in The New York Times (6/20/06) in an article on the proposed plan to move New York's Madison Square Garden and to revamp Penn Station. The plan, according to Sagalyn, "is actually a real convergence of public benefits and private interests, assuming the Garden fits without breaching the grand historic space…There's the potential for another high-density cluster of commercial activity connected to transportation, like Times Square and Grand Central."Rybczynski Lauded as Writer and CriticReal Estate Professor and Editor of the Wharton Real Estate Review Witold Rybczynski was the subject of a featured interview in Residential Developer and The American Enterprise online edition. The article states that Rybczynski "is one of America's most accessible and thoughtful critics of the built world. He writes with grace and common sense on subjects ranging from city life to technology to house design." The interview touched on topics ranging from The New Urbanism to urban sprawl. Rybczynski lectured on Frederick Law Olmsted at the University of Colorado, Denver, and at Landmarks West in New York City. He recently received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Western Ontario, and has been invited to be a President's Scholar at the University of California Chico in September.Numerous Interviews, Citations and Presentations for WachterReal Estate Professor Susan Wachter was interviewed on National Public Radio's On Point program (7/31/06), talking about adjustable-rate mortgages and housing bubbles. She was also quoted in the following articles: "The Mercantile Exchange launches new (housing) futures (index) Monday," Chicago Herald Tribune (5/20/06); "Reverse Mortgages: Are They for You?" U.S. News & World Report (6/29/06); "Savvy 20-somethings emerging in housing market," Newsday (7/21/06); "Low-rate loan use defying warnings: Homeowners walk mortgage high-wire act: adjustable rate mortgages being refinanced with ARMs," Los Angeles Daily News (7/23/06); "Re-refinancing, and putting off mortgage pain," The New York Times (7/23/06); and "New law reaches beyond Wal-Mart, wage issues," Chicago Herald Tribune (7/28/06)Wachter also presented in the following academic conferences: "What is a Tree Worth? Green City Strategies and Housing Prices," with Grace Wong, at the Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy, New York University, April 19, 2006; "Exploring the Linkage between Residential Density and Housing Affordability," Urban Land Institute, Washington, D.C., May 25, 2006; and "Land Policies for Urban Development," Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Cambridge, Mass., June 5-6, 2006. Linneman on Trends in Global Real EstateReal Estate Professor Peter Linneman addressed the Strategic Research Institute's Institutional Real Estate Investing Conference at New York's Waldorf-Astoria, on commercial real estate pricing trends and market conditions and how institutions should manage their investments in the current environment. Later in the month, Dr. Linneman gave a speech on global real estate trends to the Chairman's Council of the Citigroup Private bank in Vienna, Austria. In August, he spoke to the Eastdil Secured Real Estate and Capital Markets Conference in Sun Valley, Idaho. He will speak at the fall conference of the International Council of Shopping Centers on September 26 in Chicago, and at the annual meeting of Cargill Value Investors on September 27 in Minneapolis, on commercial real estate trends.In the press, Dr. Linneman was quoted in the Estates Gazette commenting on the United Kingdom office market, and in the Palm Beach Post in reference to Florida office vacancy rates.
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