Nareit and two other partners are sponsoring the first annual Real Confidence University Portfolio Challenge™, in which teams from 15 universities vie to create the best-performing portfolio from a mixture of real estate investments.
Under the terms of the challenge, each team chooses how it would allocate $1 billion to four quadrants of commercial real estate investment: public equity, private equity, public debt and private debt. The best-performing portfolio over a four quarter period will be declared the grand prize winner on July 30, 2016. The winning university will receive $50,000 for use within their real estate or business program, or towards scholarships.
Nareit has partnered in the challenge with Altus Group Ltd., a provider of independent advisory services, software and data solutions to the global commercial real estate industry, and the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries (NCREIF).
“We believe it will help encourage the study of real estate and its role in investment portfolios, and we look forward to feedback from the students who participate in this first competition of its kind,” said Steven A. Wechsler, president and CEO of Nareit.
Robert K. Ruggles III, president of Altus Group’s Research, Valuation and Advisory division, underscored the importance for students to “understand how to holistically construct a portfolio containing various real estate investment options.”
The 15 universities competing for the prize include: College of Charleston; Florida International University; Georgetown University; Georgia State University; Harvard University; Johns Hopkins University; Lehigh University; Middle Tennessee State University; Pennsylvania State University; Texas A&M University; Texas Christian University; University of Chicago; University of Denver; University of San Diego; and University of Wisconsin.
Additional information, including portfolio performance updates, is available at http://realconfidence.com/universityportfoliochallenge/.