While the empirical evidence on the pricing of flood risk exposure in residential real estate held by uninformed households is mixed, this study shows that sophisticated investors in commercial real estate markets rationally respond to heightened flood risk by bidding down the prices of exposed...

This paper argues that at the heart of the failure to codify the law in England lies a series of ideological misconceptions associating codification with the Napoleonic era, together with the fear that codification will consequently herald the death toll of the commom law. The author examines...

Using equity REIT data, we show empirically that the use of unsecured debt, which contains standardized covenants that place limits on total leverage and the use of secured debt, is associated with lower leverage outcomes. We then show that firm value is sensitive to leverage levels, where lower...

While some evidence exists on the benefits of sustainable investment for publicly traded real estate firms, little is known as to how such benefits materialize within the firm, especially on an international scale. We decompose the effects of sustainable investment on the value and performance...

Prior research has identified various determinants of Equity REIT sector dynamics and investment performance. This paper focuses on Mortgage REITs (MREITs) instead. MREITs are subject to the same statutory requirements as equity REITs, but invest in mortgages and MBS, and thus resemble...

We provide theory and evidence to complement Choi's [RFS, 2013] important new insights on the returns to equity in 'value' firms. We show that higher future earnings growth ameliorates the value-reducing effect of leverage and, because the market for earnings is incomplete, reduces the...

We study how the Federal Reserve's quantitative easing (QE) influenced the behavior of Agency mortgage REITs – a set of institutions identified by the Financial Stability Oversight Council as posing systemic risk. We document that Agency mortgage REITs: (i) equity prices reacted to QE...

Flight to safety (FTS) affects the markets for risky assets such as stocks, corporate bonds, and commodities. Yet, little is known about the effects on commercial real estate. We show that REITs offer a partial hedge against FTS, with daily total returns being less sensitive to FTS than many...

A property's location is often considered to be the ultimate determinant of its investment performance. But how exactly does a property's location influence its risk and return? We focus on the effects of location density on the risk and return of commercial real estate investments. We do this...