published_or_final_version / Real Estate and Construction / Master / Master of Science in Real Estate and Construction

Real Estate Investment Trusts (REIT’s) provide certain benefits for investors as opposed to them directly investing in property. Many countries worldwide have already established tax systems for REIT’s which give natural persons and companies the benefit of not outlaying substantial capital, and provide certain tax dispensations to them. The concept of a REIT is new to South Africa. The vehicles that have been used by investors in the past to invest indirectly in property have been Property Unit Trusts (PUTs) and Property Loan Stock Companies (PLS). These different types of entities have had different taxation rules applied to them, as they differed in legal entity, i.e. a trust versus a company. The different types of entity were historically a deterrent to foreign investors who preferred to invest in countries that had the REIT structure and certain tax dispensations. The National Treasury and the South African Revenue Service (SARS) decided to collaborate in this matter so as to encourage foreign property investment, and launched with effect from 1 April 2013, a new REIT tax dispensation for investors in property portfolios. The REIT created a unified regime in South Africa. All portfolios wanting to call themselves REITs had to qualify under certain requirements, and then they would be eligible for the new section 25BB tax dispensation. The South African REIT market is relatively new when compared to the Australian REIT market, which is the second largest in the world. The Australian REIT market has been around for approximately forty three years more than the South African REIT market. The Australian REIT regime is analysed in terms of how REITs are taxed in that country. The final chapter provides a comparison between the South African and Australian REIT regimes. The major differences are identified as to how each country taxes the REITs and the respective shareholders, and from these a few proposals are made which could improve the South African REIT regime in order for it to stand up to worldwide scrutiny.

The first essay of this dissertation investigates the relationship between downside risk and returns of real estate investment trusts (REITs) and assesses the performance of real estate mutual funds (REMFs). We measure the asymmetric risk through downside and upside betas and through the measures incorporated higher moments such as coskewness and Leland's beta. We do not find significant contemporary relationship between the asymmetric risk and returns of REITs. There are only a small portion of REITs reacting to up and down market conditions differently. We find weak evidence that this asymmetric movement of REITs to market may be due to small and value components embedded in REITs. We evaluate the performance of real estate mutual funds (REMFs) from the asymmetric risk perception. According to our results, most of REMFs do not outperform the market. The downside risk helps to explain some of the abnormal returns associated with REMFs. However, the evaluation may be sensitive to the choices of the model and the market index being used. The second essay examines the liquidity of Asian REITs. We use various measures to assess the liquidity of JREITs and SREITs. The overall evidence indicates that the liquidity of JREITs is greater than that of SREITs. Comparing to non-REIT stocks, JREITs are less liquid than Japanese common stocks while there is no significant difference in liquidity between SREITs and Singaporean common stocks. There is also strong evidence that US REITs have smaller spreads and are traded more often than both JREITs and SREITs. We also find that the primary determinants of JREIT spreads are turnover and return volatility. The secondary factors that affect the spread of JREITs are life and property holdings. The dominant factors affecting SREITs' spreads are price, return volatility, and life. The significance of life suggests that there is a learning effect existed in both JREIT and SREIT markets in 2005.

On 1 May 2013, real estate investment trusts (REITs), a listed property product, had legislation about it introduced in the South African property market. Prior to the introduction of this REIT legislation, property unit trusts (PUTs) and property loan stocks (PLSs) were the two predominant types of listed property investment products in South Africa. However, both the PUT and PLS are subject to uneven regulation and taxation, and they lack flexibility. The REIT legislation was introduced to eliminate some of the problems of the PUTs and PLSs, by creating: a more unified tax treatment of listed property companies, more stringent regulatory requirements and uplifting the South African property market to a level that is internationally competitive. It is therefore considered valuable to empirically investigate whether or not the introduction of the REIT framework into the listed South African property market will be advantageous to investors, and whether or not it would lead to improvement in the efficiency, regulation and taxation of the listed property market. A questionnaire was used to collect primary data to analyze the research problem. The questionnaire used a Likert scale format that consisted of 20 questions. There were a total of 58 useable respondents, each of who fell into 1 of 5 occupational categories. The questions were divided into 4 unifying themes and the findings were analyzed according to these themes. From the analysis of the responses it was found that the REIT legislation is perceived as a welcomed and suitable introduction to the South African listed property market. We could also infer that REITs allow for a more favorable tax dispensation, improved regulation, increased international competitiveness and enhanced liquidity within the listed property market. Overall, there is a perception that investors, especially fund managers, would find it potentially advantageous to include South African REITs or a higher proportion of such REITs in their investment portfolios.

Listed property entities on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange fall under the category of ‘Financials - Real Estate’. There are four types of property entities that a prospective investor can consider namely: Property Unit Trusts, Property Loan Stock Companies, Real Estate Holding and Development Companies and Real Estate Investment Trusts. The listed property sector allows investors to enter the property investment market in a uniquely affordable and secure way without the added risk, expense and administration that comes with direct property investment. This study evaluates the investment performance of the various property fund types through the implementation of Jensen’s alpha, the Sharpe ratio and Treynor ratio in an effort to establish whether there is a significant difference in the returns that can be obtained from the diverse funds given the associated risks. An analysis of the total returns and standard deviation of the property industry shows that the real estate market is affected by changes that take place in the macro economy. It is also investigated whether there is a differential risk associated with investing in these funds. We find that there is no significant difference between the performances of the various funds and there is no differential level of risk associated with investing in the property funds. An analysis of the fluctuation of total returns and standard deviation of the property funds over the eleven year period shows that the property sector is affected by changes in economic conditions however the changes are not enough to cause colossal volatility. For instance, the global recession of 2008 had an impact on the property industry returns but the sector has since made a steady recovery.

A research report submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of Master of Commerce, University of the Witwatersrand. / As the objective of investing is the maximization of wealth, it is imperative for investors to find instruments which will help them achieve their goal. A real estate investment trust can be a form of wealth maximization if an investor is knowledgeable about its long-term performance and the drivers of this performance. This study employed the use of panel regression models to isolate the performance of South African REITs, in order to compare the risk-adjusted returns of REIT segments over the long term and to identify the determinants of REIT risk-adjusted returns. Risk-adjusted performance ratios were used to measure return on real estate investment funds to conclude on the performance of SA REITs. The Sharpe ratio, Treynor index and Jensen’s Alpha were performance measures of 55 JSE-listed and delisted REITs over 18 years (2000 – 2017) thus incorporating 433 firm-years.The empirical evidence suggests that size, book-to-market, property asset intensity, dividend yield and real GDP growth influence the performance of South African real estate investment trusts and Hotel and Resort REITs as well as Retail REIT significantly underperformed the other REIT sectors, under the Sharpe ratio and Jensen’s Alpha. Furthermore, the REIT performance during the financial crisis outperformed their performance during the other market phases. / PH2020

The Asian REIT market has been developing quickly in recent years and gradually attracted attention of international investors. However, compared with other developed markets such as the US and Australia, very little is known about the Asian REIT market. This research examines the impact of the quality of corporate governance on the performance of two major and similar REIT markets - Hong Kong and Singapore. In this research, the quality of corporate governance is measured by a scoring system that is based on the APREA Corporate Governance Scoring Framework (APREA CGSF) developed by Lecomte and Ooi (2012) for Singapore REITs but modified to suit the characteristics and regulatory requirements of both Hong Kong and Singapore REIT markets. Firm performance is measured by Tobin’s Q. The empirical analysis is based on panel data during 2007-2011 from Hong Kong and Singapore REIT markets. The empirical results show that the quality of corporate governance (as measured by the Integrated Corporate Governance Index or ICGI) has a significant and positive impact on firm performance, holding other factors constant. However, closer examination shows that only about 20% of all the governance provisions included in the ICGI have significant impact on firm performance. This research also finds that REITs with corporate governance that takes into consideration of the interests of other stakeholders in addition to those of the shareholders (such as provision for corporate social responsibility) do not perform better. Incidentally, the empirical results strongly suggest that Singapore REITs perform better than Hong Kong REITs after controlling for all known factors including the quality of corporate governance. This result calls for a deeper explanation. A more detailed study from a new institutional economics perspective may shed light on this issue. / published_or_final_version / Real Estate and Construction / Master / Master of Philosophy

The commercial value for Bed and Breakfasts and Country Inns did not kept pace with other lodging establishments. Lodging real estate investment trusts (REITs) grew in the 1990's by acquiring hotels and motels but not the smaller Inns. This study investigated what sale terms and conditions an Inn owner would sell their property to a REIT. The study examined what conditions an innkeeper would manage the property for the REIT once the sale was closed. This study concluded that a REIT was not a feasible exit strategy for Inn owners.

A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Finance. 28th September 2015 / National real estate markets are globally recognized as essential segments of an economy and major contributors to national aggregate outputs. However, Africa’s national real estate markets are largely underdeveloped mainly because capital is in short supply. In this study, we examine the effects of foreign direct investment (FDI), foreign portfolio investments (FPI) and remittances on Africa’s real estate markets. We also sought to establish the financial market channels of capital inflows that are especially important for the real estate markets. In 1980s and 1990s, the widespread influence of the Bretton Woods institutions’ policy prescriptions saw many African countries implement far-reaching financial liberalization reforms. These reforms were meant to address low domestic savings and investments by opening the capital accounts of nations as to enable inflow of foreign capital. In this study, we test the externalities of these inflows. Specifically, we examine the effects of foreign capital inflows on African real estate markets by estimating a structural investment model using a pooled feasible generalized least square and general method of moment estimators in a panel set-up. We use data from Botswana, Kenya, Morocco, Namibia and South Africa for this test. Second, we examine causality relationships between real estate investments and foreign capital inflows using vector autoregressive (VAR) models and the Bai-Perron threshold test. Third, using the optimal general method of moment estimators and interactive term approach, we model the most important channel for foreign capital inflows’ externalities on the real estate markets. The panel results show that FDI and remittance do not have favourable associations with residential and non-residential real estate investments during their initial period of inflow, but in later periods, they correlate positively and significantly with real estate investments. The relation between FPI and the real estate investments is inconclusive. The VAR test suggests that the effects of foreign capital inflows on both residential and non-residential real estate investments vary across countries and markets. In some cases, the effects are time-varying and size-dependent, but in the majority of the cases, the effects are contingent on the size of the inflows. In respect of the most important channel(s) reflective of effects of cross-border flows on real estate markets, the results appear largely country-dependent: the credit market channel appears to stand out in reflecting most favourable externalities from cross-border flows. Further, evidence on the direct channel effect also varied from country to country. The indirect channel of the equity market is only important in South Africa, especially, when remittances are funnelled via the equity market channel. Based on the forgoing, it appears clear that in order to fast-track growth in national real estate markets, we should recommend that African countries put policies in place to motivate direct foreign capital inflows, encourage channelling of foreign capital inflows, particularly remittances and FDIs through the financial markets, with emphasis on credit markets. / MT2016

A research report submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Building Science in Property Development and Management to the Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2018 / In April 2013, the South African listed property sector converted from Property Unit Trust and Property Loan Stock investment structures into a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) structure that is understood globally. This conversion spurred consolidations in the property market in the form of mergers and acquisitions. Research shows that mergers and acquisitions tend to have high failure rates as growth strategies. It remains unknown how sufficient traditional due diligence is and how it can be improved to enhance the chances of successful corporate marriages within the South African REIT market. This paper reviews the aspects of the traditional due diligence scope which generally comprises of financial, legal and commercial due diligence in order to determine its adequacy as a decision making tool that helps reduce the risk of failure in REIT merger and acquisition transactions in South Africa. There is consensus in the literature that due diligence is a means to reduce the risk of merger and acquisition failure, some studies suggest that failure occurs when due diligence is not done well. This paper uses interviews conducted with due diligence professionals from seven REIT companies listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange who were involved in large merger and acquisition transactions in the preceding four years. The interviews were used to ascertain how the professionals perform due diligence, whether or not they think that traditional due diligence is sufficient for REIT mergers and acquisitions and to solicit their views on how the due diligence scope can be expanded. Transcribed data from each of the interviews was analysed based on three concurrent sub-processes adapted from the works of Miles and Huberman (1994) which consist of data reduction, data display and drawing and verifying conclusions. The results show that the traditional due diligence scope is not sufficient for REIT merger and acquisition transactions, a majority of the respondents agree with this observation. Encouragingly the professionals within the South African REIT market have a due diligence scope which is already much wider than the iii traditional scope, be that as it may, there is still a high failure rate of 59% observed in the sample analysed. Due diligence professionals have a low regard for understanding and resolving the different companies cultural issues, this is cited in the literature as one of the contributing factors for merger and acquisition failure. This is an area that can possibly augment the due diligence cycle and professionals should focus on it in order to improve the chances of success. The research proposes expanding the due diligence scope by incorporating strategic due diligence which is forward looking and it overcomes the challenges of traditional due diligence of relying on historic information. Strategic due diligence assists the acquirers understand the target’s future prospects, and it allows the acquirers to determine if the target prospects fit with their own strategic objectives. This together with a higher focus on understanding and resolving cultural issues of the merging companies should augment the traditional scope and ultimately lead to transactions that yield higher shareholder value. / XL2018