Rental Property Research Consortium

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About This Site

This site was launched on February 19, 2021, near the end of the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

We aim to provide a user-friendly tool to visualize the impact that the pandemic is having on rental housing stability within cities in the US through the lens of rental housing providers. Tenants face particular challenges in the face of disasters, and those challenges have been amplified in the current pandemic. Post-disaster stability requires that landlords remain solvent and interested in continuing to provide rental housing. We anticipate that the study findings will contribute to the national conversation about rental housing access and stability and will assist local government officials and planners in evaluating existing disaster policy responses and developing new and innovative rental housing stability strategies.






Current Contributors

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Jane Rongerude

Associate Professor of Community and Regional Planning, Iowa State University

Dr. Rongerude is an Associate Professor in the Department of Community and Regional Planning at Iowa State University where she teaches classes in planning theory, housing, community planning, and planning and social justice. Her research investigates how housing policy and planning practices shape and maintain poverty places and contribute to or inhibit opportunities for community transformation. Within this frame, her work addresses a range of topics including rental housing instability, housing and disasters, the redevelopment of public housing, and community engagement practices. Her research has been published in the Journal of Community Practice, Planning Theory and Practice, Urban Affairs Review, and the Journal of the American Planning Association. She earned her MCP and PhD in City and Regional Planning from the University of California at Berkeley.
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Daniel Kuhlmann

Assistant Professor of Real Estate and Planning, Univeristy of Arizona

Daniel Kuhlmann, PhD is an Assistant Professor of Real Estate and Planning at the University of Arizona. Before coming to Arizona, he was an Assistant Professor of community and regional planning at Iowa State University, where he helped launch a new Master of Real Estate Development degree. He has an MA and Ph.D. in Community and Regional Planning from Cornell University and a BA in International Relations from Carleton College. In his research, he examines issues related to housing, zoning, and real estate development. As part of the Rental Property Research Consortium, Daniel is helping to design and analyze the landlord's survey and working to develop new methods to identify rental properties from existing data sources.
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Elizabeth Mueller

Associate Professor of Community and Regional Planning, The University of Texas at Austin

Elizabeth Mueller is an Associate Professor of Community and Regional Planning and Social Work. She holds master's and doctoral degrees in City and Regional Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Mueller is primarily interested in questions of social equity in cities and regions. Her research focuses on social and political inclusion in cities, and how city planning and development policies shape the quality of life and opportunities available to historically vulnerable residents and communities. Her current work focuses on these topics through investigation of tensions between housing and planning goals in current strategies for building sustainable cities. Her work has appeared in both academic and popular publications. Past and current research funders include the National Science Foundation, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development as well as many national and local foundations. Dr. Mueller is also an active participant in state and local affordable housing policy discussions, serving on various state and local task forces concerned with housing issues.
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Jake Wegmann

Associate Professor of Community and Regional Planning, The University of Texas at Austin

Jake Wegmann joined the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin in 2014 after completing his PhD at the University of California at Berkeley. His research lies at the intersection of housing unaffordability, land use regulation, and housing production with a focus on fast-growing markets. He teaches graduate-level courses on quantitative methods, real estate development, real estate finance, survey methods, and research design. At present he is at work on a book titled From Enclave to Haven: New Futures for the North American Single-Family Block. Before entering academia, Jake worked for for-profit and nonprofit affordable housing developers in Denver and San Francisco. He lives in Austin with his wife and daughter and in his spare time enjoys cycling and spending time in the great outdoors.
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Lily Wang

Professor of Statistics, George Mason University

Lily Wang is a Professor of Statistics at George Mason University. She earned her PhD in Statistics from Michigan State University in 2007. Prior to joining Mason in 2021, she was on the faculty of Iowa State University (2014-2021) and the University of Georgia (2007-2014). Her primary areas of research include non/semi-parametric modeling and inference, statistical learning of data objects with complex features, methodologies for functional data, spatiotemporal data, imaging, survey sampling, and data reduction methods. Working at the interface of statistics, mathematics, and computer science, she is also interested in general issues related to data science and big data analytics. The methods she developed have a wide application in engineering, neuroimaging, epidemiology, environmental studies, economics, and biomedical science. Dr. Wang is a fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and the American Statistical Association and an Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute.
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GuanNan Wang

Associate Professor of Statistics, William & Mary

GuanNan Wang is an Associate Professor of Statistics at William & Mary (W&M). She earned her Ph.D. in Statistics and M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Georgia in 2015. After graduation, she joined the faculty in the Mathematics Department at W&M as an Assistant Professor. In 2021, she was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure. With a proven track record in driving innovation in research, she is always keen on integrating her expertise in statistics and computer science to develop novel statistical learning methods. Specifically, she develops cutting-edge methodologies for functional data, imaging data, spatial/spatiotemporal data, and general data science. She designs fast, efficient, and scalable computational algorithms to realize the methods. These statistical methodologies and computational algorithms have critical applications in many areas, such as neuroimaging, epidemiology, public health, social studies, and environmental science. Dr. GuanNan Wang is an Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute.
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Taylor Cook

Graduate Researcher, PhD student, The University of Texas at Austin

Taylor is a PhD student in Community and Regional Planning at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focuses on housing and homelessness. Before enrolling at UT, Taylor was a Project Manager for the City of Austin then at the University of Texas Dell Medical School where she specialized in the research, design, and testing of health and social service interventions. Prior to joining the City, she was the founding Executive Director of Farmshare Austin and a healthcare policy consultant for the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. Taylor is currently an Officer on the Board of the Texas Homeless Network and is active in local and statewide homeless advocacy. She has a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from Hollins University and an M.A. in Economics and Public Administration from the University of Montana.
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Wanying Zhu

Graduate Researcher, PhD Student, George Mason University

Wanying Zhu is a PhD student in Statistics at George Mason University. She is doing research with Professor Lily Wang and Guannan Wang on methodologies for high/ultra-high dimensional data and imaging data. Before joining GMU in 2021, she earned her Bachelor's degrees in Chemistry (major) and Mathematical Statistics (minor) at Xiamen Univeristy in 2017. Then she finished her Master's degree in Statistics at The Wang Yanan Institute for Studies in Economics, Xiamen University in 2020. After graduation, she worked on data science as a reasearch assistant for one year at the Department of Statistics and Data Science, Southern University of Science and Technology.
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Yuchun Wang

Graduate Researcher, PhD Student, George Mason University

Yuchun Wang is a PhD student in Statistics at George Mason University. He is now advised by Dr. Lily Wang and Dr. Guannan Wang on nonparametric modeling. He received his M.S. degree in Statistics from George Mason University, M.S. degree in Operational Research with Computational Optimization from the University of Edinburgh, and M.S. degree in Industrial Engineering and Enterprise Information from Tunghai University. He also has experience working in information system, including database, data warehouse, and coding.
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Addison Williamson

Graduate Researcher, Master Student, Iowa State University

Undergraduate Researchers

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Kristen Hoss

Undergraduate Research Assistant

While working on my research project, “Residential Rental Property Owners: Post-Disaster Decisions and Industry Representation” I learned a lot of things regarding research in general and the rental property industry. The first thing I learned about doing research, was that research takes more time than you think. Most of the goals I set were not realistic because I underestimated the amount of time that it would take to accomplish them. I also learned, that throughout the process of completing research, I learned a lot more than I realized. When starting this research project I knew close to nothing about the rental property industry, but now I know a lot more than I previously did. When presenting at the National Conference for Undergraduate Research at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, I was able to convey my knowledge and the results of this research in a professional way. I talked to multiple people at the conference whose profession has them working with, or at least interested in, residential rental properties. During my conversations with them I would highlight one of the most important conclusions I gained from this research: Residential property owners need more say in policy decisions. The policies that directly impact residential property owners will inadvertently impact their tenants as well. When policies are able to help out residential rental property owners, they are able to help out the tenants who rent from them. This was the main conclusion I would talk about with people at the conference, and it would bring up the topic of the lack of affordable housing as well. Not only do I now know more about the process of conducting qualitative research, but this research project has made me more informed on the rental property industry as a whole. It has also opened my eyes to the future careers that I can pursue in the housing field. Housing is a human necessity and I am grateful for the past opportunity I had to work with the Rental Property Research Consortium and my research mentor Jane Rongerude to further expand my knowledge on this topic.
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Laura DuPuis

Undergraduate Research Assistant

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Quinn Margrett

Undergraduate Research Assistant

Past Members

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Biswa Das

Associate Professor of Community and Regional Planning and Specialist with ISU Extension and Outreach, Iowa State University

Dr. Das is a faculty member in the department of community and regional planning at Iowa State University (ISU), and an extension specialist with ISU Extension and Outreach. Besides teaching courses at ISU, as part of ISU Extension, Dr. Das is the program leader of a public finance outreach initiative (Iowa Government Finance Initiative) targeted at Iowa cities and counties. He also delivers outreach programs relating to the community and economic development of Iowa communities. His main areas of research interest are in applied public finance, economic development, and natural resource and environmental economics. He received his Ph.D. in Agricultural and Applied Economics from Texas Tech University.
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Lin Quan

Graduate Researcher, PhD Student, Iowa State University

Suggested Citation

Rongerude, J., Das, B., Kuhlmann D., Quan, L. and Wang, L. (2021). Keeping shelters in place: Understanding landlord decision-making during the COVID-19 Pandemic. https://covidrental.design.iastate.edu


Disclaimer

This disclaimer informs readers that the analysis, views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the site belong solely to our research group, and not necessarily to the contributors' employers, organization, government agency, committee, or other group or individual.

Note: Our research and data will be continuously improved. Thank you very much for your time and support.
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