ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of the financial analysts’ toolkit and explains how it can be applied to real estate markets. Real estate assets deliver a range of physical and financial services. Rental income streams and capital values are real time indicators of the services that real estate provides to owners, lessees, investors and developers. In addition, the real estate sector provides a stream of payments to the public sector in the form of rates, stamp duties and taxes on income and capital gains. The bottom of the capital stack represents the highest priority of claims in the event of a default and therefore the lowest risk to financiers, with risk rising as the column is ascended. Required rates of return are linked to ‘seniority’ – the greater the seniority, the lower the risk and therefore the lower the required return.
