Mortgage

I work as a consultant for banking clients. Hope that does not influence this review too much.

The authors have prepared the best summary available of the economic and statistical evidence regarding potential racial discrimination in approving mortgages. This book is a replacement for approximately two file drawers of published and unpublished studies that I have collected for approximately five years.

It has its limitations though. Most of all, it is a specialized monograph for a specialist audience. Even though it is aimed at influencing the behavior of the banking industry, most managers and policymakers in that industry will find this volume tough going.

Second, the authors seem to have the opinion that the financial industry rather actively seeks to avoid lending to certain minority groups. This seems naive, in that there are lots of laws that make such policies risky and also because the industry has invested heavily in compliance managers and employee training to resolve such problems. The industry may not be perfect but it is not actively avoiding its responsibility for equitable lending policies. I don't think their perspective mars their analysis but I do think that the same outcome could have been produced with a less accusatory tone.

Third, the policy recommendations offered may not be as workable as the authors imply, since the data requirements for implementing their proposed statistical tests would actually be quite demanding and perhaps beyond the legal authority of the banking regulators.

Nonetheless, this is a very valuable book because it is the first to make an authoritative stab at consolidating the economic knowledge about a very difficult topic. If you're just trained as a generalist in this topic, the policy chapters will still be useful but you'll need to pass the book along to a colleague specializing in economic and statistical research to gain full value from both the critique and the recommendations for new statistical tests.

I think this is a wonderful text. However, let me state up front this is NOT a general book about real estate as an investment vehicle in the broad sense. It is a text that provides the knowledge and techniques to ANALYZE commercial real estate as a financial investment. So, yes, the book is heavy on financial analysis and the many way markets and techniques that exist for investing in commercial real estate.

You won't learn a thing about how to pick or manage properties. Those are topics for other books and courses. This great book does have a rather specific focus, but it needs that because the topic it does cover is so large and there is a great deal to learn.

I find the book to be clearly written with the bare minimum of mathematics to make the content extremely valuable. Because the authors have a practical focus the reader is not overwhelmed or bogged down in abstruse topics or arcane formulae.

The book has thirty chapters grouped into eight parts. The eight parts are 1) Into to real estate economics, 2) Urban economics and real estate analysis, 3) Basic financial economic concepts and tools, 4) Real estate valuation and investment analysis at the microlevel, 5) Completing the basic investment analysis picture, 6) Mortgages from an investment perspective, 7) Macrolevel real estate investment, 8) Real estate development and other selected topics.

From this list of topics you can understand the nature of this book. If these are issues you are interested in I think you will find this book really delivers the goods and I am glad to have on my shelf of valued business texts.

This book is not for the faint-hearted or for readers who want to skim a few paragraphs and then think they'll get rich quick.

If you read this book, chapter by chapter, and do the exercises at the end of each one, you'll probably know more about Real Estate Finance than many people in Real Estate boardrooms. This will take a few weeks as a minimum, but it will have immense value.

The writers Geltner and Miller really choose to go "in-depth" with each topic, almost to the point of annoyance when you're reading it, but afterwards you realize why, and importantly, realize what you've learned by doing it.

This book is immensely valuable, and requires some work to achieve that value. It's value will be with you permanently however, because you will have absorbed the true principals of what's going on it real estate and the associated financial markets, and not just have memorized some glib cookbook answers which many people may instead be hoping for.

This is a book for thinkers and practicioners who want carry lasting value with them.

This is a very good book. It covers urban economics and market analysis very well. The chapter on real estate and portfolio theory is more than worth the readers time. Text also covers commercial mortgages very well. This is not a get rich quick book but if you want to learn about commercial real estate, then this book is what you are looking for.

Squires and O'Conner argue that the lending gap is narrowing in Milwaukee, WI. However, this is a slow process. The authors highlight that the narrowing of the lending gap has come about in response to advocacy at the local and national levels. Despite progress, efforts to improve access to capital in inner-cities are complicated by persistent opposition in policy circles and consolidation in the banking industry. If current trends continue, the outlook for inner cities is bleak, at best it may take in excess of 140 years for blacks and whites to have equal access to capital. However, Squires and O'Conner map out a course for improving the odds. In their chapters they indicate that the solution to the lending problem lies in a combination of: new lending products, mortgage counceling, affirmitive action hiring in banks, the location of more branches in inner city communities, and stronger CRA legislation.

I have been in the business for almost 2 years without understanding the finer details of the processes and the legal issues involved. When I borrowed this book from a library, this opened windows of information. I really appreciate that someone has finally dealt with such a topic in so much detail yet keeping it simple for a beginner. I would recommend this book to anyone who has anything to do with collaterals.

Yes, put me down for 5 stars. It seems the reviewer below neither read this book (or any of Ms.Tavakoli's other books, since I noticed a non-substantive negative review by the same person on her other book, "Credit Derivatives") nor ever heard Ms. Tavakoli speak.

I've had the opportunity to hear her speak on structured finance (twice) and read both her books. I'm also a former colleague. I like this book's forthright style. It gives important topical information, but it also clearly explains critical fundamentals of structured finance. It is in explaining the nuts and bolts that this book excels. Tavakoli explains structures that do not give fair value, but she also explains which structures provide fair value so that investors can avoid the pitfalls while enjoying the rewards.

The easy to understand - yet very effective - cash flow analysis allows readers to get a clear grasp of the money flows to more easily understand the explanations of various structures. Tavakoli ranks the various structures for their relative worth, and that is the most valuable part of this book.

This book combines expertise and readability in the style of Tavakoli's "Credit Derivatives". I would expect it to become a classic in this market as is her other book in the credit derivatives market. This book has particularly nice coverage on SPEs. Her explanation of the evolution of CDOs from balance sheet deals to arbitrage deals includes lots of practical examples and clear graphics.

Tavakoli's insights are especially valuable when highlighting caveats introduced by the rapid growth of credit derivatives technology in structured finance. She recommends structural approaches to getting fair value for both structurers and investors. Much of the information on synthetics is new material, and losses that are just now being realized in the market place might have been avoided had this book been available six months ago.

Tavakoli also predicts products that will wane and the products that will experience a growth spurt - such as the secured trust -in the Basel 2 environment.

For investors who need to know more about structured finance including new synthetic securitizations using credit derivatives technology, this book is a great resource.