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Home > BizTimes Daily > Archives > September 4, 2008
Marquette creates Center for Real Estate
Published September 4, 2008 - BizTimes Daily
Marquette University has approved the establishment of a Center for Real Estate. The center will be housed in the College of Business Administration under the direction of Mark Eppli, Ph.D., Bell Chair in Real Estate.
"The CRE will focus on advancing real estate knowledge and enhancing business practices through education, research, and outreach to the Milwaukee and Wisconsin business communities, as well as regional and national audiences," Eppli said.
Real estate programming has been a focus for the college since 2002 when the Bell Chair was created. A real estate major also was established that year. Marquette's program is the only commercial real estate program taught at Jesuit colleges and universities.
In 2003-04 a real estate concentration in the Master of Science in Applied Economics was approved.
Joining Eppli in the center will be associate director Nicole Truog, whose past experience includes eight years in the banking industry with LaSalle Bank in Chicago. A Marquette University alumna, Truog received her master's degree in urban development and public policy from Loyola University Chicago. She's also an adjunct faculty member in Marquette's Graduate School of Management.
The center's faculty includes Anthony Pennington-Cross, Ph.D., associate professor of finance and former senior economist in the research division at The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, as well as others from the College of Business Administration and Marquette Law School.
Eppli said the new center will focus on the undergraduate experience through the Real Estate Club, site visits, job shadowing and mentoring, and applied classroom assignments. An MBA specialization is planned for the future.
"We will focus on applied empirical research in both commercial and residential real estate," Eppli said. "In doing so we will engage the real estate community and provide continuation of outreach efforts, including the successful Associates in Commercial Real Estate program, will also be part of the center's programming."
The Real Estate Center is entirely supported through external funding from more than 40 companies and individuals, mostly from the commercial real estate sector.
The center will foster research in predatory lending, credit availability, the effects of tax incremental financing districts, the determinants of retail sales and rents in planned shopping centers and other topics.
