RICS advises Real Capital Analytics on database

RICS Americas, the New York City-based division of the London-headquartered Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) recently advised Real Capital Analytics (RCA) on the creation of one of the first global commercial real estate transaction databases. The subscription-based database, which is available on the RCA's website, represents RICS' and RCA's commitment to increasing the exchange of industry information worldwide to promote global market transparency. The RCA database focuses primarily on the main income-producing commercial property types: office, industrial, retail, apartment and hotel, plus the sales of commercially developable land sites. The company captures sales of properties and portfolios of $2.5 million or greater in the U.S. and $10 million and greater outside of the U.S. Three or more independent sources are consulted for each transaction which is also separately reviewed by two or more skilled RCA researchers. The information is continuously updated and revised for accuracy. With 140,000 members in 146 countries, RICS specializes in pooling international data from top real estate leaders to provide the public with trusted information. RICS participated in the creation of RCA's global database by offering guidance and access to RICS' international resources. In addition to exclusive deal information, RCA will generate a summary of trends and facts revealed by the database in the Global Capital Trends report that is scheduled to come out eight times per year. This month's inaugural issue tracked 114 'billion dollar' cities, each with over $1 billion in transactions in 2007. It also revealed that in 2007 worldwide acquisitions of commercial property surpassed the $1 trillion mark for the first time. The study found that while 50% of the 2007 sales tracked occurred in U.S. and 30% in Europe, commercial property sales in Asia could surpass transaction volumes in the U.S. or Europe in 2008. Underscoring this is the fact that half of all land acquired by developers in 2007 occurred in China.