This paper investigates the composition of REIT board committees in terms of the real estate expertise of the directors, type of director, gender, and tenure and the impact of these characteristics on REIT performance. The sample comprises data at the director level for 65 U.S. equity REITs during the period of 2010-2019. Using chi-square tests and logistic panel regressions, I provide evidence that the profile of REIT board members varies depending on their assignment to different committees and that, overall, the average REIT director does not match the expected director profile of having significant real estate expertise or long board tenure. I also find that finance and investment committee members are directors with very different characteristics despite tat these committees are function-related advisory committees and real estate expertise is associated with investment committee membership only. Furthermore, using panel fixed effects regressions, I find that the composition of REIT committees matters for REIT performance, especially in the case of investment committees for which the presence of outside and inside directors with real estate expertise and long tenure is associated with higher REIT performance. To the best of my knowledge, this is the first study that investigates the composition of REIT board committees and its impact on REIT performance. The findings are of interest to researchers and practitioners as they show the key characteristics of directors for REIT monitoring and advisory committees and their effect on REIT performance, and this information can assist in the understanding of REIT board functioning and the designing of the optimal REIT board.

This study investigates the factors that affect voter turnout in local elections in Korea by using a panel fixed effects model. Cross-sectional analyses for each election compare the influence of these factors over time. In the panel fixed effects model, the coefficients for non-urban and urban areas point in the opposite directions. From an urban perspective, owner-occupied housing rates positively affect voter turnout, while apartment resident rates negatively affect it. Thus, increasing apartment supply without a rise in owner-occupied status can reduce voter turnout. Among the social factors, an aging population positively affects turnout, while an increase in foreigners has a negative effect. With urbanization continuing globally, promoting housing finance markets and effective housing supply policies to increase owner-occupied housing can enhance housing welfare and democratic development.

This study aims to investigate whether there is a causal relationship between public housing provision and private housing prices in Turkey. Using the Emirmahmutoglu-Kose approach, a panel data set that covers 26 regions in Turkey is analyzed. The results reveal the presence of a two-way causal relationship between public housing provision and private housing prices for the entire panel. Further investigation reveals that in four of the regions, public housing provision has a causal impact on housing prices, while in three of the regions, housing prices have a causal impact on public housing provision.

Using real estate transaction data, we provide the first empirical test of the comparative cheap talk model in Chakraborty and Harbaugh (2010), which predicts that a real estate agent can credibly reveal information of a house by making comparative statements that make the house more appealing in some areas but less along others. Consistent with the prediction, we find that comparative statements are associated with a 0.8% price premium, with all else being equal. The premium is larger for houses with more potential buyers, but switches sign and becomes a discount when there are too few buyers.

Understanding the trends and patterns of the relationship between housing prices and disasters is crucial for economic impact assessment, risk management, and policy formulation, driven by the unpredictable and urgent nature of disasters. Despite its significance, the conceptualization of these terms remains unclear, with no consensus on their interconnectedness. To address this gap, our study uses a bibliometric analysis of peer-reviewed literature from the Scopus database from 1967 to early 2024. The results show that the literature on the relationship between house prices and natural disasters is still limited, with only 144 articles available. The topic shows a trend of linear increase in annual publications. There are two clustered network maps generated from an analysis through VosViewer. The first cluster focuses on disaster risk assessment and prevention, while the other cluster highlights the relationship between housing prices and natural disasters in the same network. The relationship between housing prices and natural disasters is generally negative, and different disaster impacts require different mitigation strategies based on the socioeconomic conditions of a region. This study emphasizes the need for comprehensive research with the use of region-based cluster analyses to gain deeper insights into the various impacts of natural disasters on housing prices.