Essentials of Real Estate Economics

This book is just perfect as introduction to real estate business, urban economic and their relation with urban (land) planning. It is really useful for me, who deal with local economic development planning. The book is divided into four parts: (1) Basic economic background for real estate analysis; (2) Understanding real estate markets; (3) Major influences on real estate development; (4) Real estate investment (the economic of parcels). With this systematic and step-by-step explanation, the reader is easily to follow and understand the content, even for a student without economic, planning or mathematic background. By reading this book I understand the whole system of real estate economy, especially roles of factors of: economic and monetary policy, inflation, tax, and interest rate; business cycles, markets; location (regional, local or site) and urban planning; development processes; related business and institutions. Understanding dynamic relationship among those factors is very helpful to understand the basic of current economic and financial situation, post sub-prime mortgage tragedy that create `tsunami' of global financial system. On government intervention, reader can compare John M. Keynes versus Milton Friedman point of view especially in dealing with unemployment, inflation and recession, even though in a short introductory version. Beside this book I also read Jack Harvey's "Urban Land Economics: The Economics of Real Property" (MacMillan Education). [Risfan Munir, Local Economic Development Planner in Jakarta, Indonesia]

I saw the one other review and thought I should comment. I took a Real Estate Economics course at my local community college a couple years ago and this was the textbook. My instructor did not suck and had his own tests and assignments, so I cannot comment on the tests or teachers edition. I do not dispute the apparent inaccuracies. They are discouraging, and if I chose not to ignore them, I might give the book 3 stars. But I will ignore these weaknesses and review this as a book for any reader or investor who might want to read it independently. Now, I'm an investor first and a real estate investor second. And I was actually an economics major in college. So I agree that this book was far from challenging material. The author takes the entire first chapter to explain what to expect and not to expect from the book. It's not an economics book. The book is actually a hodge-podge of introductions to several topics that all add up to a decent picture of how and why the real estate markets work the way they do: real estate fundamentals, taxation, development, government policies, and investments in general. In fact, I've used the beginning of chapter 16 "Basic Investment Principles" p379-383 when trying to teach people about investing in general. It's amazing how few "everyday people" understand the basic ideas of taxability, control, liquidity, risk, and return. And understanding the different kinds of risks: inflation risk, interest rate risk, market risk, policy change risk, etc. Anyway, some might interpret it as "off topic", but as long as you know that it's a hodge-podge book going in, I think it's a recommended read for any real estate investor. And the other review said it was written at a junior high level. That may be about right. But I didn't mind it. It was very easy to read. Now, it is a textbook and it's just over 450 pages. Mass-market real estate books pepper you with anecdotes and opinions and examples. There isn't much of that. It's pretty dry. But if you are interested in the topic, it's accessible and worth the time.