While fully informed by urban economic theory and practice, this course is entirely practical in nature. The aim is to provide a logical and commercially relevant step-by-step guide to market analysis for successful real estate development and investment. Success is defined as sufficient profit, or return on capital, to justify the risks of the project. There are three key considerations for successful real estate market analysis: correct identification of local market area (size and spatial scale), correct allowance for market changes over the course of a development (forecasting) and elimination of bias from any source (accuracy and honesty). The four main real estate sectors: office, retail, multifamily and industrial and logistics will be studied in depth. Data centers, self storage, hotels and other emerging real estate sectors will be covered in a less detailed way. Basic real estate forecasting, namely of rents, gross and net absorption, and cap rates, with an emphasis on practicality and coping with limited data is included.

This course has an irregular schedule. Details will be provided in the course syllabus.