Todd Sinai Faculty Profile

Todd Sinai
Associate Professor of Real Estate

PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1997; BA, Yale University, 1992

Research Areas
Risk and pricing in housing markets; taxation of real estate and capital gains; commercial real estate and real estate investment trusts; air traffic delays; real estate and public economics

Recent Consulting
Authored expert report on the demographic makeup of Low Income Housing Tax Credit recipients.

Current Projects
How households respond to housing risk; house price bubbles; “superstar” cities; why airlines do not report accurate flight times

Academic Positions Held
Wharton: 1997-present (Abraham Mitchell Term Assistant Professor of Real Estate, 2000-2005).

Other Positions
Faculty Research Fellow, National Bureau of Economic Research, 1999-present; Visiting Scholar, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, 2000-present

Career and Recent Professional Awards; Teaching Awards
Edwin S. Mills Best Paper Award, 2004 Post-Doctoral Fellow, Homer Hoyt Institute, 2001; Ballard Teaching Award, 2001; HUD/AREUEA Best Paper Award, 2001

Professional Leadership 2003-2007
Co-organizer, Public Policy and Real Estate sessions at NBER, 1999-present

Representative Publications
(with N. Souleles)
“Owner-Occupied Housing as a Hedge Against Rent Risk.” Quarterly Journal of Economics (May 2005).

(with J. Waldfogel)
“Do Low-Income Housing Subsidies Increase the Occupied Housing Stock?” Journal of Public Economics (forthcoming).

(with J. Waldfogel)
“Geography and the Internet: Is the Internet a Substitute or Complement for Cities?” Journal of Urban Economics (July 2004).

(with C. Mayer)
"Network Effects, Congestion Externalities, and Air Traffic Delays: Or Why Not All Delays Are Evil." American Economic Review (September 2003).