Date of Completion

5-5-2016

Degree Type

Honors Thesis - Campus Access

Discipline

Finance (FNCE)

First Advisor

Susan Elkinawy

Second Advisor

Christopher Manning

Abstract

LMU’s 90045 ZIP code is one of few in Southern California that has seen housing and investment real estate markets return to pre-crash levels. In fact, the rental market is the least affordable it has ever been, and residential single-family housing prices in the area have climbed 25% in the last two years alone. One significant contributor is the emergence of Silicon Beach, the tech and real estate phenomenon that is rapidly gentrifying areas just north of Westchester including Santa Monica, Venice, Marina del Rey, and especially Playa Vista. At the moment, over 1000 technology start-ups reside in or have relocated to this ‘Silicon Beach’ region joined by large tech players such as Google, Yahoo!, YouTube, and Snapchat. This has increased the population in the vicinity, the demand for housing, and in turn, rent levels. For the LMU student, what do rents currently look like living off-campus compared to living in dorm or apartment on-campus? For the real estate investor, what might rates and prices be in this new market? Additionally, what trends might help to understand where rates and rents may go in the future? Using a combination of real estate fieldwork with CoStar data and analytics, this thesis seeks to be a comprehensive report of the apartment real estate market for both students considering leasing off-campus and investors wishing to finance a property complete with building descriptions, amenities comparisons, rent/vacancy forecasts, and investment feasibility analyses.

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