Real Estate Market Research: Segmentation, Challenges, and Examples

1. Chapter 6: Forecasting Ownership Benefits and Value: Market Research

2. Multiple Factors Affect Real Estate Demand • Needs for access (“linkages”) • “location, location, and location” • Non-locational factors • Housing (style, design, size; financing available) • Commercial (tenant mix and character; parking facilities) • Offices (style, design, floor plate size; amenities and services; electrical and communications service)

3. Market Segmentation • Market segmentation: Differences in preferences or needs among market subgroups • Implication of market segmentation: Market research must focus on relevant market segments • Corollary 1: Most real estate data irrelevant in studying any particular property • Corollary 2: Most important data for a particular market segment may not be readily available

4. Challenges Posed byMarket Segmentation • Market segmentation is an empirical notion: • Cannot be described without investigating first • Important facts of segmentation may vary with location and property type • Research process must recognize this challenge • No simple, universal procedure

5. Real Estate Market Research as a Cycle Create Market Defining Story Competition? Product? Refine Research Collect Initial Data Customer Sensitivities? Customer? Where is Customer? No? End Research Sufficient? Evaluate Results Yes?

6. Writing a Market Story • All market research is someone’s particular story (Best to write down the assumptions of the story) • Clues about market segments can come from industry literature (Urban Land Institute) • Initial collection of data should depend on the assumptions about segmentation • Object: Estimate critical market parameters (rental rates, sales projections, etc.)

7. Writing a Market Story (continued) • First analysis • What range of critical parameters are implied by data? • Range narrow enough to be useful? • Refinement necessary? • Refining the research • What factors affect critical parameters the most? • What information illuminates those factors?

8. Story Approach vs. ConventionalMarket Research • Story approach begins with property and its market segments, and then builds links to larger economy • Conventional approach goes from the state of the world, to the nation, the state, and then the city, to the property

9. Three Examples of PropertyMarket Research • Elysian Forest – planned unit development • Palm Grove – proposed office building • Plane Vista – proposed apartment expansion • Why look only at development projects? • No difference in market analysis questions between existing and proposed properties • Much more market information for existing properties • Therefore, critical parameters should be clearer for existing properties • Development projects demonstrate more of the challenging data issues

10. Elysian Forest: ProposedPlanned Unit Development (PUD) • PUD characteristics • Mixed density (single family to townhouses) • Smaller individual lots for single family • Common areas and recreation facilities • Elysian Forest was bold and big (for University City) • First PUD • 900 units (several times the size of typical development

11. Elysian Forest: Projected Salesand Market * Condos, townhouses, patio homes, small-lot single family

12. Typical Elysian Forest Patio Home Pair

13. “Competitive Norm” from Local Parade of Homes

14. Typical Elysian Forest Patio Home Cluster

15. Market Defining Story for Elysian Forest • What is the product? (upper income, high-density ownership residences) • Who are the customers? (top 30% of household income, but not top 8%; not traditional family with children at home) • Where are the customers? (retirement buyers; “empty nesters”; single parents, other adults (mixed sources)) • What do customers care about in Elysian Forest? (good access to work; good recreation and social facilities; distinctive, contemporary design) • What is the competition? (no other comparable projects; Parade of Homes)

16. Core Market Segmentsfor Elysian Forest All Households in University City Owner Occupant Households Rental Households 99 92 Core Market Segments 70 House Price Percentile “Traditional” Families Unrelated Individuals Single Parents Empty Nesters Other family 0 In terms of %

17. Initial Data Collection • Basic source: U.S. Census Detailed Tables • Table HCT11: Tenure by Household Income in 1999 (income intervals for the 22% of households targeted for Elysian Forest) • PCT38: Family Type by Presence of Own Children Under 18 Years of Age by Family Income in 1999 (portion of each type of household that is income eligible; portion of traditional households with children at home)

18. Core Market Segments for Elysian Forest Owner Occupant Households: 48,084 10,121 99 92 Core Market Share 6,642 ÷ 48,084 = .1381 or 13.81% Core Market Segments 3,479 10,121 – 3,479 = 6,642 70 House Price Percentile “Traditional” Families Unrelated Individuals Single Parents Empty Nesters Other family 0

19. Implications of Analysis for Elysian Forest Sales

20. Actual Outcome for Elysian Forest • Built 20 speculative units • Staffed a sophisticated and expensive sales center • Never sold one unit • Project went to foreclosure • Firm went into bankruptcy

21. Case 2: Palm Grove Office Complex • Proposed Project: 2 office buildings: • Each one 40,000 sq. ft., 4 floors of 10,000 sq. ft. per floor • “Glass block” design • Located in mixed-use area (commercial, high school, car dealer, strip offices, no other large offices) • Largest “speculative” office project ever proposed in University City

22. Market Defining Story for Palm Grove Office Complex • What is the product? • General purpose offices: no special plumbing or equipment for medical or laboratory) • Who are the customers? • General purpose office users with at least 25 employees • Finance and insurance • Nonresidential real estate brokerage/management • Engineering and consulting • Accounting • Computer services and programming • Management consulting • Market and public opinion research

23. A Market Defining Story (continued) • Where are the customers? • Already within University City (Few large offices move to the city) • What do the customers want from Palm Grove? • Small firms: Street exposure and easy parking • Large firms: Employee commuting, proximity to office support services • Tentative market defining conclusions • General purpose office users • More than 25 employees • Prospective tenants will need to already be in city

24. Initial Data Collection • Alternative 1: Canvass the business community • Advantage: Could also serve as a marketing effort • Disadvantage: Time and cost • Alternative 2: Examine data in Census Bureau, County Business Patterns • Advantages: Free and no need to leave your desk • Disadvantage: May be dated information

25. Initial Market Analysis • From County Business Patterns: Fewer that 10 firms in the office market segments have more than 25 employees • Conclusion: No chance for the project • Actual experience: • Only one building completed which has mostly been half vacant • Developer has disappeared

26. Case 3: Plane VistaApartments • Proposed project: Add 400 units to present 500 units. • Existing project: • Four years old • High quality, wide variety of floor plans • Indoor gymnasium with large weight room • Diverse mix of tenants • Location: Immediately north of Orlando airport • Weakness: Perimeter of city; no special amenities

27. Univ. ofCentral Florida CBD Plane VistaApartments Orlando International Airport Disney World Location of Plane Vista in Orlando

28. Market Defining Storyfor Plane Vista • What is the product? • Standard design, broad appeal; high-quality apartments • Who are the customers? • Assume a broad spectrum of working rental households; upper third of rental household income distribution • Where are the customers? • Initial assumption: Persons employed throughout east, south and central Orlando • Influenced by commuting distance to work • What do customers like about Plane Vista? • Should be well known from existing project

29. Initial Data Collection • Concerned with commuter access of Plane Vista relative to competing apartment projects • Must see: locations of new, high-quality apartments and where jobs are concentrated • Obtained apartment locations from dominant apartment market research firm in Orlando • No solid information on job locations

30. Total county employmentper category Ratio of spaceper worker Total countybuilding space ÷ = Ratio of spaceper worker Est. no. ofworkers at property Space ÷ = Constructing Estimates ofJob Locations • Available job related data: • Property appraiser’s database on 43,000 business and government properties • Square footage of structures • Location by geographic coordinates • Classified by over 200 land use categories • U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics website: • County employment by NAICS category • For 20 major categories of land use compute: • For each property compute:

31. Where People Work in Orlando Univ. ofCentral Florida CBD Plane VistaApartments Orlando International Airport Disney World

32. Initial Market Analysis • Distribution of new apartments shows a discrepancy between initial story and map: • Most new apartments are very distant from Plane Vista • Suggests that Plane Vista is isolation from larger Orlando market • Jobs map shows a similar clustering: • Jobs concentrated at airport and on the arterial leading north • Jobs scarce to south, west, and east

33. Assumption: 75% of Plane Vista occupants work on “airport island.” Future of Plane Vista market depends on“airport island” CBD “Airport Island” Revised Market DefiningStory: “Airport Island”

34. Data Collection: Round Two • Total of jobs on airport island is 25,000 • Airport is 60% of total • New firms will add 550 jobs to airport island • Conclusion: Total job growth on airport island is about 5.2% per year for next two years; Metro Orlando job growth at 2.5% • Other apartments on airport island • Construction permits for other apartments are zero • Competitive apartments number about 3,500 units with 90% occupancy

35. Final Market Analysis: Key Assumptions • All else equal, apartment rental rates grow at the rate of inflation • Job growth drives apartment demand on airport island • No other new apartments for two years

36. Projections of Critical Parameters for Plane Vista

37. Questions about the Plane Vista Analysis • Which of the key assumptions seems most vulnerable to error? • What could be done to reduce it’s riskiness? • Does the projection of job growth on “Airport Island” seem safe?

38. Some Final Observations on the Plane Vista Analysis • A market analysis is always a story • No market analysis is purely numbers • Goal: Put together as much objective evidence as possible before making final judgments • Articulate the key assumptions as clearly as possible (Example: Airport growth was crucial to the Plane Vista story) • Next step: How to translate these into an estimate of value

39. A Perspective onReal Estate Value • James Graaskamp: “When you buy real estate, you are buying a set of assumptions about the future” • We have set out our assumptions about Plane Vista

40. Some Points about Real EstateMarket Cycles • Real estate markets differ in cyclicality • Office demand follow business cycles, and is very cyclical • Apartments are less so since households must live somewhere • Longer construction lead time means more cyclicality • Poorer market information means more cyclicality

41. High-Tech Tools for Real EstateMarket Research • Geographic information systems (GIS) • Made analysis of Plane Vista possible • Widely used in store location research • Psychographics • Market segmentation research seeks to relate product preferences to “attitudes, interests, opinions, and values, and to demographics • Used to date in retail real estate, but may also apply to housing

42. GIS in Store Location Research:Columbia, SC

43. Survey Research • Potentially powerful tool if used carefully • Example applications • Coastal Condo design: How many bedrooms do prospective buyers want? • Plane Vista: Where do current residents really work? • Risk: Ending up with meaningless questions or a meaningless sample • Key preventative tools: • Obtain review and advice from experienced survey researchers • Pretest

44. End of Chapter 6