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- Tough Year for Mexico, but Business Remains
- Africa: Less Aid, More Investment
- Dos and Don'ts in Russia
- The Culture of Green
- DR Property Market Benefits from Flu Outbreak
- EU Economy Matters
- Marketing to Luxury Home Buyers
- Top Performing Housing Markets
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Between the H1N1 flu virus and border city violence due to the drug war, Mexico is having a tough year. The country's FDI was down 46% in 2008 and a shrinking economy has resulted in significant job losses. The slump is due almost entirely to the global recession, however, and investment remained strong up until the point the entire world market went into decline. The future is looks much brighter. AMR Research reports that companies looking to expand in Mexico outnumber those planning to cut back by 5 to 1, compared to outsourcing competitor China where the ration is 2 to 1. In April, Business Week took an extensive look at investment in Mexico.
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While Africa remains a leading target for foreign aid and the debate continues whether aid helps or hurts the developing country. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development reports foreign investment into Africa surpassed the amount of aid going into the country in 2006, and the gap has since widened reflecting the quadrupling of FDI since 2000. Africa may escape the current world banking crisis given that Africa's banks did not venture in sub-prime mortgages and other high risk loans. The largest source of inbound FDI? China. According to a recent TIME Magazine article, trade between the two countries topped $106 billion in 2008. Learn more about African property markets.
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NAR sent a small delegation to Moscow this month to participate in the Russian Guild of Realtors XII Congress. After being one of the hottest investment markets the past few years, Russia has been hit hard by the global recession. Due to the overall weakness of Russian rouble and history of currency fluctuations Russia has traditionally been a strong cash market, though, and there remain plenty of Russians looking to put their money in a more stable market. REALTORS® who find themselves working with Russian nationals take note of some cultural faux pas. Avoiding these missteps could help seal the deal.
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With green being all the rage there has been much focus on LEED certification offered by the U.S. Green Building Council, based, to an extent, on UK's BREEM certification. A less onerous U.S. recognition is Energy Star, a technical assistance program that provides tools and resources to help evaluate energy performance and reduce energy use and GHG emissions. Simply put, LEED rates how a building was built and Energy Star rates how a building operates. While buildings can be both LEED certified and Energy Star rated (the EPA believes that energy efficiency is the first step to green, and that all green buildings should be energy efficient), Energy Star appears to be gaining traction, according to accounts from the 2009 ULI Developing Green conference
, where participants report a focus on near-term cost cutting associated with energy savings. Currently there is no international standard, but that may soon change. BREEM, LEED and Australia's Green Star program, all available internationally, have agreed to develop common metrics for measuring the CO2 emissions. This will make it easier for international property developers and building owners to monitor the energy performance of their global asset portfolio. Read more about these three programs.
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With recent flu outbreaks in Mexico, Caribbean destinations--including the Dominican Republic--are on the rise for summer vacationers. Both Thomas Cook and European TUI Group report an increase in bookings to the Dominican Republic. Good timing for the real estate industry, which typically benefits from increased tourism through exposure to investment properties. International travel to DR has increased steadily in the past decade. DR is host to the Americas Real Estate Expo, July 1-4. ARRExpo will howcase developments, properties, mortgage companies, banks, retirement service plans and life insurance companies from throughout the Americas. The Expo targets developers, buyers, brokers, investors, financial institutions and other services and support organizations for real estate investments. CIPS and TRC courses will be offered.
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How is the economic crisis affecting the European Union? This interactive map from the Dutch news site NRC shows the figures for all the member states by year and quarter and lets you compare budget deficit, unemployment rate, national debt and economic contraction. Click on the map to select an EU country and figures will be updated by country, or click on 'Show EU Figures' for entire region. Not doing business in the EU? Doesn't matter. Europe's troubles are the world's troubles. The EU accounts for almost a quarter of the world's economic activity, and its sluggish emergence from the crisis is likely to slow any rebound in world trade and foreign investment. Read more.
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If you missed the live webinar on how real estate professional can grow their business through social media from RealEstateConnections.tv, you can still listen and view the recorded session. Research by the Institute of Institute of Luxury Home Marketing suggests that there's a strong tie between high-end buyers and social media. More than 80% of luxury home specialists use social media to reach prospective clients. LinkedIn was most popular at 58% followed by Facebook at 30.1%. More than 70% report they expect to continue using social media as a business development tool, and 20% reported having given or received a referral or other business via social media.
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Globally, housing markets continue to struggle against economic stagnation or decline, according to Knight Frank's Global Housing Index for 1Q 2009. There are some growth markets, however, with 15 countries showing positive average price increases, year on year. Israel was the top performer over the 12-month period recording growth of 10.9%, followed by the Czech Republic at 9.9%. The worst performers were Dubai and Latvia which recorded falls in average prices of 32% and 36%, respectively. View the full index and read analysis from Nick Barnes, head of international residential research for Knight Frank.
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Report compiled by NAR International Operations, narglobe@realtors.org.
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