Benchmarking In Real Estate Journalism - A Multi-National Online Survey

In the past, academic relationships in real estate were confined within national boundaries. However, the globalization of the real estate markets is increasingly apparent. The number of international real estate transactions is growing and international academic meetings have been established. This ìinternationalî trend didnít affect solely the real estate industry, it may have affected the journalists reporting on real estate subjects as well. Journalists are nowadays confronted with an increasing public demand for high quality real estate information ñ both about national and international issues. However, there is no research on real estate journalism until today: We know virtually nothing about the journalists working in this domain, about their demographic data, their employment situation, about their working principles or market interactions. There is no information about real estate coverage in newspapers, magazines and special interest literature. To close the gap in scientific knowledge about real estate journalism the Department of Real Estate at the European Business School in Oestrich-Winkel and the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication at the Johannes Gutenberg-University in Mainz ñ both in Germany ñ are currently conducting a multi-national online survey. The survey, directed by Prof. Dr. Karl-Werner Schulte (Oestrich-Winkel) and Prof. Dr. Hans Mathias Kepplinger (Mainz), started in September 2004 in Germany, Great Britain, France, Spain, Austria and Switzerland. The paper presented will deal with the following topics: (a) the sampling procedure and questionnaire design used in the study; (b) the survey implementation; (c) selected results of the study. // The results will give insight into the differences and similarities of working procedures and market interactions of real estate journalists in Europe. This knowledge helps both real estate markets players and real estate journalists to improve their daily working structures and communication procedures.