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Wharton News Residential Land Use Regulation Study Attracts Widespread AttentionThe Residential Land Use Regulation Study of Joseph Gyourko, Martin Bucksbaum Professor of Real Estate and Finance and Director of the Samuel Zell and Robert Lurie Real Estate Center; emeritus professor Anita Summers; and Albert Saiz, Assistant Professor of Real Estate, has been widely cited in newspapers, including "Building curbs lift housing cost here; Study ranks Hub high in regulation," by Kimberly Blanton, in the Boston Globe; the Philadelphia Inquirer; the Providence (R.I.) Journal; the Seattle Times; in "Survey: Zoning Drives Up Suburban Housing Prices" by William Mulgrew in the January 26, 2007 Philadelphia Bulletin; and in the Attleboro, Mass. Sun Chronicle. The study was extensively cited on the Web, on SeekingAlpha.com; in "Study Urges Broader View of Land Regulation" by Marita Thomas on GlobeSt.com; and on MAPuser.com, to name but a few. At the study's heart is a first-ever index that measures the degree of regulation in more than 2,600 municipalities nationwide.Anita Summers was quoted on GlobeSt.com. "The puzzlement is that, while you would think that the densest areas would have the most regulation, that's not the way it works here or across the country. Each community appropriately regulates as its citizens want it to. In general, where open space is a priority, citizens want more regulation and can afford it. The least dense places are not regulating more because they are in danger of running out of land." In the January 28, 2007 Philadelphia Inquirer, in "Zoning rules in Phila. region among nation's strictest," Andrew Cassel wrote, "The researchers also strongly suspect a link between tight land-use restrictions and regional economic growth. It's a matter of basic supply and demand, Gyourko said. In Boston or San Francisco, tight land-use regulations coincided with surging demand, as those regions took off during the tech boom of the 1990s. The result: housing prices that soared into the stratosphere." Gyourko's Research on "Superstar" Pricing Stimulates DiscussionProfessor Gyourko's work was cited in the Wall Street Journal (12/22/06) in "Land's Slippery Slope: Prices of Residential Lots Fall More Than Those of Homes; No Room for Wolfhounds. "Residential lot prices in or near many metro areas across the country . . . have plummeted in the past year—some as much as 29%. . . . the median price of parcels averaging between 40 and 94 acres is $162,000 per acre year-to-date, 28% below the 2004 price . . .lot prices have been far more volatile lately, buffeted by zoning laws, environmental regulations and other market forces. Meanwhile, adjusting for inflation, the cost to build a good-quality single-family house has remained relatively stable since 1980 at around $100 to $125 a square foot, according to Joseph Gyourko… "Land is a risky investment." Joel Kotkin also referred to Professor Gyourko's work in "The Myth of 'Superstar Cites'" on Undernews, the online report of the Progressive Review, 2/13/07). He was interviewed on Bloomberg News in February concerning the housing market.Rybczynski Feted with Seaside Prize; Vizcaya Book AvailableWitold Rybczynski, Martin & Margy Meyerson Professor of Urbanism, School of Design, received the 2007 Seaside Prize, awarded annually by the Seaside Institute to "individuals or organizations who have made significant contributions to the quality and character of our communities." He has also been honored by the American Institute of Architects, receiving a 2007 Institute Honors for Collaborative Achievement. His book, Vizcaya: An American Villa and Its Makers, written with Laurie Olin, Practice Professor of Landscape Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, concerns the magnificent Gilded Age Miami splendor and how it was built, landscaped, and utilized as a 180-acre estate on Biscayne Bay, complete with lagoons, canals, citrus groves, a farm village, a yacht harbor, and a 40-room Baroque mansion.Young Alumni Panel
Participants in the Young Alumni Panel included, from left to right, Neil Gupta, Joseph Spector, Kate Bicknell, Jim Vesterman, Seeta Shah, and Tony Ewing.
On December 8, 2006, the Wharton MBA Real Estate Club sponsored a Young Alumni in Real Estate Panel where students gathered to hear recent alumni share their experiences, including Kate Bicknell (WG '05) at Forest City Ratner in New York City; Neil Gupta (WG '04) with Deutsche Bank; Tony Ewing (WG '04) at Liberty Property Trust; Jim Vesterman (WG '06) at Toll Brothers; and Seeta Shah (WG '06) at The Reinvestment Fund. The panel moderator was Joe Spector (WG '07). Women in Real Estate PanelMore than 50 people attended a panel of female professionals from real estate private equity, development and asset management about being female in the real estate industry. Professor Lynn Sagalyn, Professor of Real Estate Development and Planning, moderated the panel, which was sponsored by CREW Philadelphia. The panelists were Joy L. De Jesús, Development Director, Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust; Jacqueline Buhn, President, Athenian Properties; and Rubyann Stewart, Associate Director of Asset Management, Grosvenor Investment Management. The panel took place in February and was entitled "Breaking Boundaries & Crossing Bridges." Professor Asuka Nakahara joined in with a male perspective.Phillips to Speak on Property Law and FinanceGeorgette Chapman Phillips, David B. Ford Professor of Real Estate; Professor of Legal Studies and Law, and Chairman of the Real Estate Department, will present a lecture on "Boundaries of Exclusion" at a Festschrift in honor of Professor Dale A. Whitman at the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Law in April. The conference will cover current topics in the law of property and real estate finance.Sinai on the Future of the IndustryTodd Sinai, Associate Professor of Real Estate, took part in an interactive conference on "The Future of Residential Real Estate" in conjunction with Wharton Executive Education and the Wharton Club of Northern California on January 17. This new event format was designed to allow Wharton professors to share their thoughts on current topics and keep Wharton alumni up to date on the biggest trends in various industries.International Housing Workshops on Securitization, and Housing FinanceMarja C. Hoek-Smit, Director of the International Housing Finance Program at Wharton, is preparing the annual executive education program, "Improving Housing Finance Systems" to be held June 4-14, 2007, and the "Workshop on Securitization," to be held June 16-17, 2007, both at the Wharton School. Hoek-Smit will conduct a Workshop on Housing Policies and Subsidies in Egypt for public and private housing professionals in April 2007. For more information or to register, please go to http://housingfinance.wharton.upenn.edu.Recently Hoek-Smit worked with several emerging market countries to improve their housing policies, including the new governments of Peru and Brazil. She was invited by the transitional government of Mexico in late 2006 to develop a white paper on housing subsidies and will continue as a special advisor to the new Mexican government. In November Hoek-Smit gave a keynote address at the KfW conference in Berlin on "Financing Housing for the Poor: Connecting Low Income Groups to Markets." She proceeded to South Africa, where she worked with the Treasury Department to develop incentives for private lenders and housing developers to expand the production of lower-middle income housing and discuss different tax credit and regulatory options. She was invited to give a speech on a similar topic at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. Hoek-Smit wrote two book chapters, one for KfW in Germany and one for the World Bank, and an article for Habitat. Wachter - "Earthquake" in Real Estate?"Susan M. Wachter, Richard B. Worley Professor of Financial Management, Professor of Real Estate and Finance is quoted in an article in Knowledge@Wharton (2/21/07) "Could Tremors in the Subprime Mortgage Market Be the First Signs of an Earthquake?"Wachter also spoke on "GSE Risk and Policy Choice" at a National Bureau of Economic Research on "Measuring and Managing Federal Financial Risk" at the Kellogg School, Northwestern University in Chicago, and at the National Panel on Housing Outlook at Real Estate Connect Conference in New York City in February. Professor Wachter was quoted in the San Diego Union Tribune (1/10/07) in "US Housing Seen Showing More Life in Second Half" expressing concern about risk of inflation: "If the Fed does raise interest rates in the second half, then we have a (mortgage) reset problem." She appeared in a CNBC Powerlunch interview in December, and spoke about the new house starts data and the housing market. Dr.Wachter was also quoted in the Philadelphia Inquirer in December in "Extras help seal deals on condos." Wachter said, "Historically, the residential market reacts to economic factors such as an increase in unemployment, this is a new phenomenon that the market has declined with no general economic decline." She was interviewed on the Smart City Radio Program by Tony Sorrentino and Carol Colletta on December 13, on "Rebuilding Cities After Disaster." She was quoted in The New York Times in December in "Subprime Loans Going From Boon to Housing Bane," on the differential default risk of subprime mortgages by geography: "…[subprime] mortgages are not uniformly dispersed across the United States." Wachter was interviewed on Bloomberg Newsroom in October on the housing market, on the local Philadelphia ABC station in November on full service real estate agents versus companies like Buy Owner. Wachter was also quoted in Big Builder Magazine in Washington D.C. about consumer confidence and the lack of it in the housing market.
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