Price Formation and Real Estate Characteristics Residential Real Estate, Lisbon - Portugal

Análisis del proceso de formación de precios en el mercado residencial de Lisboa desde el punto de vista de la eliminación de los aspectos subjetivos de la apreciación por el tasador de las características de los inmuebles

Infrastructure Finance in Developing Countries by State and Multilateral Development Banks

Infrastructure concession is an alternative widely used by governments to increase investment. In the case of the road sector, the main characteristics of the concessions are: long-term projects, high investments in the early years of the contract and high risks. A viability analysis must be carried out for each concession and consider the characteristics of the project. When the infrastructure is located in a developing country, political and market growth uncertainties should be add in the concession project analysis, as well as economic instability, because they present greater risks. This paper is an analysis of state bank participation in road infrastructure finance in developing countries. For this purpose, we studied road infrastructure financing and its associated risks, and also the features of developing countries. Furthermore, we considered the issue of state banks and multilateral development banks that perform an important role by offering better credit lines than the private banks, in terms of cost, interest and grace period. Based on this study, we analyzed the Brazilian Development Bank - BNDES – and their credit supply to road infrastructure concessions. The results show that BNDES is the main financing agent for long-term investment in the sector, offering loans with low interest rates in Brazilian currency. From this research we argue that a single state bank should not alone support the increasing demand for finance in Brazil. Therefore, we conclude that there is a need to expand the supply of credit in Brazil, by strengthening private banks in the long-term lending market.

A study of four listed micro finance institutions

Compared to the size of the microfinance market, the number of Microfinance Institutions that are professionally ran like commercial banks is still scarce, and even more scarce are the MFI listed in public stock exchanges. This document focuses on four listed MFIs and reviews its business model and funding sources. The document also analyses the market price evolution of the listed shares and investigates whether investors are assigning a premium to the MFIs compared with its respective market indices. Keywords: Microfinance institutions, Micro-credits, Financial Institutions, Equity; Stock Exchange.

Prototipos experimentales modernos: la colonia de Schorlemerallee y las villas Am Rupenhorn de los Luckhardt y Anker. Berlín 1924-1930

La colonia experimental de Schorlemerallee y las villas Am Rupenhorn son dos proyectos concluidos en 1930 por los hermanos Wassili y Hans Luckhardt con Alfons Anker en Berlín. Ambos proyectos forman parte del mismo proceso, que comienza en la Colonia -una exploración sobre el lenguaje moderno en una serie de fases sucesivas- y culmina con las Villas. Éstas últimas, realizadas inmediatamente después de la Colonia, son la síntesis de esa experiencia, aunque finalmente acabaron trascendiéndola, ya que se convirtieron en un modelo sobre la casa en la naturaleza, sobre la idea de la villa clásica y sobre los nuevos modos de habitar, alcanzando con el tiempo la condición de canon moderno. A pesar de ello, no es esta condición lo más importante. Lo singular en este caso, es el propio proceso de proyecto –Colonia versus Villas- un verdadero experimento en su concepción, método y resultados, a través del cual sus autores investigan nuevas tecnologías aplicadas a nuevas formas de habitar y desarrollan un nuevo lenguaje, cuyo resultado son unos prototipos tecnológicos, con los que pretenden, como diría Mies van der Rohe: “Me he esforzado por construir una arquitectura para una sociedad tecnológica. He intentado que todo resultara razonable y claro.....para que cualquiera pueda hacer arquitectura.” El momento y lugar no pueden ser más propicios: Berlín entre 1924 y 1930, en el mismo origen del Movimiento Moderno. El experimento se plantea con auténtico rigor científico. Los arquitectos diseñan, construyen y financian su proyecto, controlando todas sus variables. Especialmente, por lo insólito, es el control de la variable económica. Porque este factor, la economía, es para ellos una clave fundamental del proceso. Se trataba de demostrar que la Nueva Arquitectura (o Neues Bauen, como les gustaba denominarla) era capaz de construir mejor y más rápido la vivienda para una nueva sociedad. La revolución y la vanguardia van de la mano: son el Zeitgeist o espíritu de la época, un contexto que es parte sustancial del proceso, y como lo calificarían los Smithson, un contexto heroico. El concepto se centra en la tríada Bauhaus: diseño + tecnología x economía. En cuanto al método, se fijan una serie de parámetros –las variables del experimento- que se agrupan en tres categorías distintas: topología, tipología y tecnología. La combinación de las variables de cada categoría dará lugar a un sistema con unas características determinadas: una definición del espacio, una forma, un lenguaje y una tecnología, características que permiten establecer las reglas para su desarrollo. Los sistemas resultantes son tres, denominados según su doble condición tipológica/ tecnológica: 1. Sistema de muro de carga: Viviendas adosadas en zig-zag o Mauerwerksbauten. 2. Sistema de esqueleto de acero: Viviendas aisladas o Stahlskelettbauten 3. Sistema de hormigón armado: Viviendas en hilera recta o Betonbauten Las villas Am Rupenhorn se plantean a continuación como verificación de este proceso: la síntesis de las categorías desarrolladas en la Colonia. Pero llegan en un momento de gracia, justo cuando los Luckhardt y Anker se encuentran profundamente implicados en el proceso de desarrollo de un nuevo lenguaje y con la reciente experiencia de la Colonia, que ha sido un éxito en casi todos los aspectos posibles. “En 1930, están en la cumbre”, como diría su mejor crítico y antiguo colaborador: Achim Wendschuh. En las Villas, los arquitectos integran su lenguaje, ya plenamente moderno, con sus experiencias previas: las que los relacionan con su reciente expresionismo (que se podría calificar como Kunstwollen) y con la tradición clásica de la cultura arquitectónica alemana: el sentido del material que deben a Semper y la sensibilidad hacia el paisaje, que toman de Schinkel. El extraordinario interés de las Villas se debe a factores como el tratamiento de la relación dual, poco habitual en la arquitectura moderna, la síntesis de lenguajes y las circunstancias de su momento histórico, factores que las han convertido en una propuesta única e irrepetible de una de las vías experimentales más interesantes y desconocidas de la Modernidad. ABSTRACT The experimental Housing Estate of Schorlemerallee and the Am Rupenhorn Villas are two projects completed by the brothers Wassili and Hans Luckhardt with Alfons Anker in Berlin in 1930. Both projects are part of the same process, starting with the Housing Estate --an exploration of the modern language in a series of phases- which culminates with the Villas project. The Villas Am Ruperhorn, designed immediately after the Housing development, are the synthesis and crowning point of this experience, even finally over passing it, since they have become a model of the house in nature, related with both the ideal of the classical villa and the new ways of life, reaching the condition of a modern canon. However, this is not its most important issue. The most remarkable condition is the project process itself -Housing versus Villas- a true experiment in concept, method and results, in which the authors research new technologies for new ways of living, developing an innovative language, with results in new prototypes, in the way Mies van der Rohe was looking for: “I have tried to make an architecture for a technological society. I have wanted to keep everything reasonable and clear… to have an architecture that anybody can do." The time and place could not be more favourable: Berlin from 1924 to 1930, in the very origin of Modern Movement. The experiment takes place with genuine scientific accuracy. Architects design, build and finance their own project, controlling all variables. Especially, and quite unusual, the control of the economic variable. Precisely the economic factor is for them a fundamental key to the process. It was shown to prove that the new architecture (or Neues Bauen, as they liked to call it) was able to build not only faster, better and more efficient dwellings for a new society, but also at lower cost. Revolution and Avant-garde use to move forward together, because they share the Zeitgeist --or time's spirit--, a context which is a substantial part of the process, and as the Alison & Peter Smithsons would describe, an heroic context. The concept focuses on the Bauhaus triad: Design + Technology x Economy. For the method, a number of variables are fixed --the experimental parameters-- that are later grouped into three distinct categories: Topology, Typology and Technology. The combination of these variables within each category gives way to several systems, with specific characteristics: a definition of space, a form, a language and a technology, thus allowing to establish the rules for its development: The resulting systems are three, called by double typological / technological issue: 1. Terraced Housing in zig-zag or Mauerwerksbauten (bearing wall system) 2. Detached Housing or Stahlskelettbauten (steel skeleton system) 3. Terraced Housing in one row or Betonbauten (reinforced concrete system) The Am Rupenhorn Villas are planned as the check of this process: the synthesis of the categories developed all through the Housing Estate research. The Am Ruperhorn project is developed in a crucial moment, just as the Luckhardts and Anker are deeply involved in the definition process of a new language after the recent experience of Schorlemerallee, which has been a success in almost all possible aspects. "In 1930, they are on the top” has said his best critic and long-time collaborator, Achim Wendschuh. In the Villas, the authors make up their fully modern language with their own background, related with their recent Expressionist trend (Kunstwollen) and with the classical tradition of the German architectural culture: the notion of material related with Semper and the sensible approach to the landscape, linked with Schinkel. Its extraordinary interest lay on diverse factors, such as dual relationships, unusual in modern architecture, synthesis of languages and circumstances of their historical moment, all factors that have become a unique and unrepeatable proposal in one of the most extraordinary experimental ways of Modernity.

Explanation of changes in real estate stock market

The aim of this study is to explain the changes in the real estate prices as well as in the real estate stock market prices, using some macro-economic explanatory variables, such as the gross domestic product (GDP), the real interest rate and the unemployment rate. Several regressions have been carried out in order to express some types of incremental and absolute deflated real estate lock market indexes in terms of the macro-economic variables. The analyses are applied to the Swedish economy. The period under study is 1984-1994. Time series on monthly data are used. i.e. the number of data-points is 132. If time leads/lags are introduced in the e regressions, significant improvements in the already high correlations are achieved. The signs of the coefficients for IR, UE and GDP are all what one would expect to see from an economic point of view: those for GDP are all positive, those for both IR and UE are negative. All the regressions have high R2 values. Both markets anticipate change in the unemployment rate by 6 to 9 months, which seems reasonable because such change can be forecast quite reliably. But, on the contrary, there is no reason why they should anticipate by 3-6 months changes in the interest rate that can hardly be reliably forecast so far in advance.