Real Estate Commons^™

The Effect Of The Unemployment Rate On The Homeownership Rate With Focus On Recent Graduates, Lixiao Shan

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

How does the ownership of dwellings by recent graduates reflect the business cycle? This paper focuses on the relationship between the unemployment rate and the ownership of dwelling for recent graduates. Scholars have been analyzing the relationship between the ownership of dwellings and unemployment for decades. Most studies find out that home ownership seems to constrain the labor mobility and therefore, it can result in higher unemployment. However, in this paper, the focus is on recent graduates, which means there will be limited influence of labor mobility. The ownership of dwelling data is obtained from the IPUMS CPS and the …

The Experience Of A Lifestyle, Brian Lonsway

School of Architecture - All Scholarship

This essay traces the evolution of themed environment design from theme parks to a series of new architectural types – Urban Entertainment Destinations, Lifestyle Enhancement Centers, and Lifestyle Villages – as a chronicle of spatial mediation from urban décor to urban design technique. Culled partly through semiotic deconstruction and partly through ethnographic investigation, this history examines the environmental design techniques employed in these spaces in order to better understand the relationship of design practice to the cultural practices of work and leisure.

From spatialized branding strategies to the neo-urbanist configurations of location-based entertainment, leisure/entertainment ventures use these narratively motivated techniques …

The Social Embeddedness Of Transactions: Evidence From The Residential Real Estate Industry, Steve Sawyer, Kevin Crowston, Rolf T. Wigand, Marcel Allbritton

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

Information and communications technologies (ICT) are becoming pervasive in the residential real estate industry and affecting the work lives of real estate agents. Drawing on data from a regional study of the residential real-estate industry in the United States, we focus on the disintermediation or, more accurately, the re-intermediation of real estate agents in the sales process. We examine how real estate agents are (1) taking advantage of new ICT in their work, and (2) protecting themselves from others wishing to displace their position in the real estate value chain. Our analysis draws on two contrasting theoretical approaches to better …

Information And Communication Technologies In The Real Estate Industry: Results Of A Pilot Survey, Rolf T. Wigand, Kevin Crowston, Steve Sawyer, Marcel Allbritton

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

We have been studying the growing use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in the residential real estate industry and the effects of this use on how realtors work. Earlier stages of our project involved qualitative research to develop a better understanding of the industry, the work of realtors and their use of ICT. In this paper we report on the results of qualitative research and a pilot of a survey intended to gather large-scale data on realtors and ICT use.

How Do Information And Communication Technologies Reshape Work? Evidence Form The Residential Real Estate Industry, Kevin Crowston, Steve Sawyer, Rolf Wigand, Marcel Allbritton

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

We are exploring how ICT use affects the work lives of real estate agents, the process of selling/buying houses and the overall structure of the residential real estate industry. Earlier stages of our work involved intensive field research on how real estate agents use ICT. In this paper, we report on the design and analysis of a pilot survey of 868 agents intended to investigate their ICT use more generally. Analysis of the 153 responses to this survey sheds light on how ICT use supports information control, enables process support, and helps agents to extend and maintain their social capital.

Real Estate War In Cyberspace: An Emerging Electronic Market?, Kevin Crowston, Rolf T. Wigand

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

In this paper, we explore how electronic commerce, the World-Wide Web in particular, is affecting the real estate industry. Real estate is a promising setting for studying electronic commerce because it is an information-intensive and information-driven industry; transaction based, with high value and asset-specificity; with many market-intermediaries (agents and brokers who connect buyers and sellers rather than buying or selling themselves); and experiencing on-going information technology (IT) related changes. We analyze a real estate transaction to suggest where IT might change the process of buying or selling a house and discuss several current ventures in this area. This analysis suggests …