Research Guide for: Marketing and Real Estate

Indexes | Sources | Guides | Tools | Services | For Faculty | Collection

Real Estate

I. A carefully worked out search strategy - a logical, systematic and comprehensive approach to locating information - will save you time and should provide more than enough material for the research paper. As you locate your resources, keep notes and full bibliographic information on them. For help in planning your search strategy, or if you need assistance along the way, ask a REFERENCE LIBRARIAN.

II. Choose your topic. You need a good understanding of your business, so choose a business that really interests you!!! Are you researching a company [Post Properties (PPS]), an industry (REITs) or a particular small business opportunity (Duplexes)? If you know little about the business go to EBSCO Business Source Premier (Part of GALILEO) and read some popular type articles on the business.

III. Looking at the External environment, what types of information do you need?

A. Demographics
B. Economy
C. Political and legal concerns
D. Technology
E. Competition

A. BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Ingram Library Reference Collection:

The Ingram Library reference collection consists of business handbooks, encyclopedias, dictionaries and other quick reference tools. It is located near the Reference Desk in the center of the library's first floor. The reference works listed below are arranged according to call number and, since none of these books circulate, they should always be available--except when in use by a library user.
• Standard & Poor's industry surveys.
  This three-volume set provides 30-page profiles on 52 industries with a focus on the current economic environment, trends, regulation and outlook for each industry. Major companies in each industry are profiled, with references to sources of additional industry information.
  Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HG4915 .S65x

  See Real Estate Investment Trusts in the monthly reports section.

• Barron's real estate handbook.
  The book includes an up-to-date dictionary of more than 2,500 commercial and residential real estate terms with definitions, illustrative legal and financial forms, the most current information on mortgages and tax law, advice on buying and selling real properties, architectural styles and details, an overview of zoning regulations, etc. There are also updated quick-reference financial tables to help figure mortgage payments for a wide range of interest rates and time periods. Line drawings illustrate architectural styles and details.
  Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HD1375 .H349 2005.

• Core business Web: a guide to key information resources.
  It is divided into 25 areas of business, among them accounting, company information, industry information, labor, real estate, and taxation. Contributors searched the Web to find gateways, portals, directories, and metasites of business information. They identified, evaluated, and summarized the most useful sites based on timeliness, relevance and reliable content, ease of navigation, etc.
  Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HD30.37 .C67 2003
  

• Dictionary of real estate appraisal.
  Published by the Appraisal Institute, this new 448-page dictionary covers real property valuation, the real estate business, and real property.
  Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER HD1387 .D435 2002

• Dictionary of real estate terms.
  This handbook defines and explains more than 2,500 real estate terms related to mortgages and financing, brokerage law, architecture, rentals and leases, property insurance, etc. The text is supplemented with more than 200 line illustrations plus graphs, charts, and tables.
  Ingram Library. Reference, CALL NUMBER: HD1365 .F75 2004

• Dollars & cents of shopping centers.
  This somewhat outdated publication from the Urban Land Institute is a study of receipts and expenses for nearly 1,000 shopping center operations in the United States and Canada, published every other year, though this edition is the newest in the Ingram collection. It offers numerous tables but no index.
  Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HF5430.3 .U7 2004.

  Shopping center information is aggregated by groupings; there is no information for individual shopping centers (except to association members).

• Dollars & cents of multifamily housing.
  A curvey of income and expenses in rental apartment communities. It offers numerous tables but no index.
  Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HF7287.6 .U5 D65 2005-2006.

• English-Spanish real estate dictionary.
  quick-reference dictionary provides nearly 2,000 terms in BOTH English and Spanish covering all the essential areas for real estate. Comprehensive coverage, easy-to-find definitions, simple explanations, terminology used on licensing examinations, and numerous illustrations make this a handy reference tool. This up-to-date bi-lingual dictionary is a source for practicing real estate agents, licensees and consumers.
  Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HD1365 .o46x 2005.

• Market share reporter.
  Annual compilation of market share data on U.S., Canadian, and Mexican companies, products and services, arranged by SIC code and with indexes by product, company and topic.
  See the Real Estate chapter on pages 387 to 388. See page 416 for table #1808 Largest Shopping Center Managers and table #1809 for Largest Shopping Centers. Ingram Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HF4310 .M35 2004.

• The Rand McNally Commercial Atlas & Marketing Guide
  provides estimates of population, Effective Buying Income, retail sales, passenger car registrations, etc. The maps show Basic Trading Centers, cities which serve as a center for shopping goods purchases for the surrounding area. Ingram Library Reference in the Atlas Stand, CALL NUMBER:G1019 .R22 2007

• Sales & Marketing Management: Survey of Buying Power.
  offers information by city and county, such as population by age group, retail sales by store group and Effective Buying Income (Gross personal income less taxes). An annual supplement to the Sales & Marketing Management periodical, previous editions are shelved in the Periodicals Area under the journal title. The Survey of Buying Power.is available online in ABI/Inform . Search under the tab Publications as Sales and Marketing Management .

  Associations collect and provide an assortment of information for their members. To find the association pertinent to your business consult the Encyclopedia of Associations.
  on the Ready Reference (Main Floor) Shelf at CALL NUMBER: AS22 .E5 2002.

  For information about advertising media, the Gale Directory of Publications and Broadcast Media, Broadcasting & Cable Yearbook and Editor & Publisher International Year Book list newspapers and radio and television stations for geographic areas.

Databases:

The Ingram Library offers an extensive collection of business databases on its homepage; see under Business Databases.

If you are using the Internet off campus,you must have the password which is available from the Library Homepage http://www.westga.edu/~library/. Follow the instructions under Access Your Library Account and Current Passwords. Your 917 number from your student Id card is your barcode. The password is good for one semester.
The pass word for this semester is _____. Accessing GALILEO databases from the Library Homepage Databases button can be faster and easier.

• Hoover's Company Capsules and Profiles at ProQuest Under Business Databases on the Ingram Library homepage. Hoovers Online offers information about 15,000 public and private companies worldwide, with links to company homepages and annual reports, charts, company capsule, competitors, divisions, earnings, financials, Fortune and Forbes rankings, history, industry information, officers, products, SEC filings,subsidiaries, etc.

  If you are researching a company, you need to use Mergent Online . Mergent Online covers 10,000 public companies and their SEC filings. It offers International Company Data on more companies from more countries than any other international database.

• Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe:   To find company information, go to Business and then to Company Financial where you can obtain financial and other data by for companies. Information is available from twenty different sources (each of which must be searched separately). S.E.C. filings, particularly company 10K annual reports, are a particularly rich source of company as well as industry information. Use your browser's Find command (or Control-F) to locate references to particular terms of interest in 10K filings such as trends, strategy, competitors, industry, etc. (This database is available widely on campus and may be accessed from home via the GALILEO password.)

  Real Estate is one of the industries about which news can be searched in Industry & Market News in the Business section of this database.

• Statistical Universe:   Statistical Universe is an index to statistical data in commercial, international and U.S. government publications.

  This database has over 1,000 tables of statistical data on Real Estate; use the Subject List function to narrow your search.

Real estate-related journal and newspaper titles in the Ingram Library collection include:

• Appraisal Journal v.45- (1990 - 1998) Full text in ABI Complete and Business Source Premier
• Journal of Real Estate Literature v.1 - (1993- )
• Journal of Real Estate Portfolio Management (v.1, 1995 - )
• Journal of Real Estate Practice (v. 1, 1998 - )
• Journal of Real Estate Research (v. 7, 1992 - )
• National Real Estate Investor (v. 15, 1973 - v. 40, 1998) Full text in ABI Complete & Business Source Premier
• Real Estate Economics. Full text in ABI Complete & Business Source Premier
• Real Estate Finance & Investment. Full text in ABI Complete & Business Source Premier
• Real Estate Review. Full text in ABI Complete & Business Source Premier

In addition to the paper journals in the Ingram Library Periodicals Collection the Ingram Library offers access to over 12,000 full text periodical articles through its full text article databases such as: ABInform , , Business Source Premier and Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe. These article databases may be found on the Ingram Library databases page, listed alphabetically under Business Databases.

ABI/Inform offers full text articles for over 1800 journals. To find articles on specific topics, search by word or phrase by keying your search phrase into the search box. ABI/Inform includes journals, but also contains news and analysis, information on local markets, and more gathered from major business tabloids, magazines, daily newspapers, wire services, and city, state, and regional business publications. The Wall Street Journal is included.

Your search terms will be highlighted red in each article.

This database includes about two dozen periodicals on real estate, for which full text is available. For example, a search in this database, in all databases (which includes major Georgia newspapers), for Real Estate, produced a list of over 10,000 articles.

Going to Topic Guide and searching for the subject Real Estate also retrieved a list of over 10,000 articles. There are also subject searches available for other real estate subjects such as Real estate agents & brokers, Real estate appraisal, Real estate closings, Real estate companies, Real estate developments, Real estate financing, Real estate sales, and Real estate syndication. In addition, there are related subject terms:   Mortgage backed securities, Mortgage banks, Mortgage bonds, Mortgage brokers, Mortgage companies, Mortgage insurance, Mortgage rates, Mortgage servicing, and Mortgages. All of these subjects (and many others) can be combined to target article searches, as for example SUB(Commercial real estate) and SUB(Mortgage backed securities) which produced a list of over 2,000 articles, searching in all collections, and 49 articles, searching just in peer-reviewed publications. A search for SUB(Commercial real estate) and SUB(Mortgage backed securities) and Seattle produced a list of just four articles, searching in citations and abstracts, and 16 articles, searching in the full text of all articles. Help:

Web Resources:

Unlike library databases, these Web resources are available wherever you have web access; they do not require that you access them via the GALILEO password. When using web resources, be sure to evaluate the credibility of these resources.
Local Demographics:


West Georgia Economic Outlook by the Economics Dept. of UWG


Definitions:
• Real Estate and Mortgage Glossary & Definitions:   Short definitions of terms in real estate and mortgage transactions.

  Resource Guides:

• Real Estate (University of Wisconsin, Madison):   This library research guide, from the Business Library at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, provides information on resources for this topic, including key journals, articles, government sources, and websites.

• Real Estate (University of Pennsylvania):   This library research guide, from the Lippincott Library at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, also provides information on resources for this topic, including general works, market profiles, cost/expense guides, government reports, taxation and regulation, directories, periodicals, and websites.

• Real Estate (Columbia University):   This library research guide, from the Watson Business & Economics Library at Columbia University, also provides information on resources for this topic, including directories, background information, handbooks, general periodicals, indexes and abstracts, and internet resources.

• Real Estate (University of California, Berkeley):   This library research guide, from the Long Business & Economics Library at the University of California, Berkeley, also provides information on resources for this topic, including directories and listings, indexes, market surveys and analysis, statistical data sources, reference sources, and California resources.

• Real Estate Web Links (New York University):   This library research guide, from the Brause Library, at the Real Estate Institute at New York University, provides web links for this topic, for both commercial and residential real estate, on the internet.

• Real Estate Sites (American Real Estate Society):   This collection of real estate website links is provided by the American Real Estate Society, "a society of and for high-level practicing professionals and real estate professors at colleges and universities throughout the United States and the world." The links include real estate associations, investment advisors, commercial real estate information, and journals in the field.

• Runstad Center for Real Estate Studies (University of Washington):   "The University of Washington's Runstad Center for Real Estate Studies is the focal point for real estate activities on campus. This initiative consists of two major components: the academic program, and the research /service program. The Runstad Center is based in the Department of Urban Design and Planning in the College of Architecture and Urban Planning. It is a self-sustaining, interdisciplinary operation drawing from, collaborating with, and serving, other colleges and departments across the campus." See their Publications, Real Estate Links, and Research.

• Center for Real Estate Research (Washington State University):   See their Real Estate Links section, including Market Data and Research Summaries.

• Legal Information Institute (Cornell University):   The "Law About" section of this organization's homepage organizes the law about a great many topics into an alphabetic sequence by topic, from administrative law through workplace safety. See their Real Estate Transactions: an Overview.

• National Research Bureau:   This site bills itself as the "premier provider of retail real estate information in the United States," supplying information about the shopping center industry for more than 45 years. Much of the information on this site consists of products for sale.

• Gary Price's List of Lists:   This site, developed by a librarian, is devoted to lists of the largest or top or leading companies or individuals in a wide variety of industries, culled from an enormous number of magazines. See the list for Real Estate Rental & Leasing.

  Trade Associations:

• International Council of Shopping Centers:   Trade and industry associations are often excellent sources for information about their industries, with statistical data and research that is more detailed and comprehensive than in governmental sources. This association represents 40,000 shopping centers in the United States. Some information, the most valuable and useful, is restricted to members only. See also the Location Reports where data such as demographics, businesses, consumer spending, purchase potential, shopping centers, traffic volumes, projections, etc. can be purchased.

• National Association of Realtors:   "Working on behalf of America's property owners, the National Association of Realtors provides a facility for professional development, research and exchange of information among its members and to the public and government for the purpose of preserving the free enterprise system and the right to own, use, and transfer real property." See their Research and Industry News webpages.

• National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts:   "NAREIT is the national trade association for real estate companies. Members are real estate investment trusts (REITs) and other businesses that own, operate and finance income-producing real estate, as well as those firms and individuals who advise, study and service these businesses." See their News and Data Library sections; some items are available to members only (where you see the padlock icon).

• National Association of Industrial and Office Properties:   This organization "is a national association with 10,000+ members and an extensive network of 48 chapters that represent the interests of developers and owners of industrial, office and related commercial real estate throughout North America. NAIOP provides communication, networking and business opportunities for all real estate related professionals; provides a forum for continuing education; and promotes effective public policy, through its grassroots network, to create, protect and enhance property values." See their Industry Resources pages for links to information about fifteen topics in this field.

  Real Estate Market:

• Regional Economic Conditions:   This extensive collection of reports and tables, updated eight times a year or quarterly, depending on the data, is provided by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. This data "was originally designed to assist the FDIC in the examination process by providing economic information at the state, MSA (Metropolitan Statistical Area), and county levels." This site allows anyone with internet access to drill down to any state, MSA, or county to view standard graphs, tables, and maps depicting economic conditions and how they have changed over time. Economic data is arranged by geography. Start by choosing a state, such as Washington, from the dropdown menu on the left-hand side of the screen. Data includes industry activity, employment and income, real estate activity, selected commodity prices, and more. For a quick state summary, see the Georgia State Profile.

• U.S. Market Data (Cushman & Wakefield):   This worldwide real estate firm offers useful brief quarterly reports on the U.S. office and industrial real estate market, for many municipalities. The reports are in Adobe Acrobat PDF format and usually just one page in length.

• OfficeSpace.Com:   This company "researches, compiles, and publishes basic building information (size, year built, number of floors, address and leasing company) and detailed information regarding specific spaces available (floor, size, asking rate, and comments) on all major buildings in a particular market without charge." "CSO currently tracks approximately 15,000 buildings totaling over 865 million square feet of office, retail and industrial space in the market areas of Cincinnati, Columbus, Denver, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Portland and Seattle." See their Office Space in Seattle and their Property Search - Seattle Region.

• Commercial Brokers Association:   This Kirkland, Washington based organization is a "member owned cooperative which has provided commercial multiple listing services to its members since 1977. Currently CBA has over 600 member offices with more than 2,600 commercial real estate agents, plus 65 associate member offices participating in our commercial multiple listing organization which serves the Northwest." Their website is set up to enable searches by area and other parameters for properties and businesses for sale or for lease. See also their Links.

• EconStats:   This site is difficult to categorize. It offers a gigantic amount of economic data, for the U.S. and the world, plus forecasts, stock markets and exchange rates, culled from a huge number of sources. The site includes a Real Estate section under its Data category in the upper left menu area, with REIT's in the U.S., property value by city, prices of farm land by state, mortgage fund flows, European property value by city, with the same for selected cities in Asia.

  Real Estate News:

• Retail Traffic:   This webpage is the online site for the magazine Retail Traffic, formerly known as Shopping Center World. The site offers information, news and trends, demographics, consumer behavior, retail real estate development, and more, much of it readily available and free. See the tabs for news, design, finance, research, retailing, and development for collections of articles on these topics, from sources beyond Retail Traffic itself.

• Business Full Coverage (Yahoo! Daily News):   Yahoo! Daily News for business includes Business Full Coverage webpages for four dozen important business topics of high interest, including many industries. These full coverage reports collect articles, webpages, and links to relevant organizations, audio, video, and recent news stories. See their Business Full Coverage page for Real Estate and Housing.

  Government:

• HUD in Washington:   The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has a regional office in Seattle, which offers information on housing in the state and city. See their Consumer Information, Community Information, and Resources.

  Help:

  The Ingram Library Reference Desk is staffed all the hours that the library is open. The staff at the desk will be happy to help you find research tools on any business subject.

  ---

  Return to Top Return to: Marketing and Real Estate Research Guide | All Library Research Guides