The performance of public sector companies, using housing companies in Germany as an example

Mathias Hain

2008

The privatization of public housing properties has developed a special dynamic over the past few years thanks to the involvement of international financial investors. This privatization has so far taken place without an assessment of the efficiency of public housing companies. That is because there have been no comparable empirical studies on the national or international level regarding the performance of public and private housing companies.

Using a comprehensive data set, Mathias Hain tests differences in the performance between public and private housing companies in Germany. Through univariate and multivariate analyses, he demonstrates that public housing companies have certain performance disadvantages compared to private housing companies in terms of profitability and productivity. His results yield specific recommendations for improving housing companies' performance for value-oriented real estate management.