The interests of stakeholders when valuating commercial property

The attractiveness of commercial real estate has grown again since the financial crisis of 2007-2008, whereas almost all institutional investors such as credit institutes, insurance companies, investment funds and even public sector entities continue investing in real estate assets. The importance of real estate valuation rose accordingly and besides the standard regulated procedure there is a need for transparent information between parties, in order to control the investment risk and reach a maximum investment yield.Valuation is conducted in different real estate cycles, either during the construction phase having as purpose a Forward Purchase Deal, for completed and rented buildings that are purchased by an investor as classic investment or with the scope of own utilization. The focus of this paper is on all these phases and four main asset categories: shopping centres, office buildings, logistics and industrial properties as well as hotels, with the target of investigating the interests of the particular stakeholders at the valuation of such assets. The following question will be answered: "How can the interests of stakeholders (developers, institutional investors, real estate agents, public sector entities) be presented according to the asset class and real estate cycle?"The valuation regulations (standards according to the law; e.g. ÖNORM in Austria), the valuation recommendations (not regulated; e.g. RICS standards) and the ethic codes of international real estate organisations - as answer to the principal agent problem - will be analysed and presented from a theoretical point of view. This will be the basis for the research which will be carried out based on anonymized interviews with more than 150 international stakeholders.The aim of the paper is to create transparency and develop a better understanding of the views and decisions of shareholders when evaluating commercial property. Transaction Managers as well as Asset and Portfolio Managers will have a better picture of the stakeholders’ interests, of the business ethics and of the entire needed (side) information when a real estate valuation is conducted. Moreover, this will be a further scientific input to the literature on moral hazard in the real estate sector.