Essays on Shariah Compliant Real Estate Investments

Abstract

This thesis examines the role that Shariah principles and compliance play in firm value and firm performance. The thesis comprises four essays which include: (a) Shariah compliance in real-estate investments in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) (b) leverage choice of Islamic and Shariah-compliant real-estate firms (c) the idiosyncratic risks of Shariah-compliant real-estate investment trusts, and (d) the corporate real-estate ownership of Shariah-compliant firms. Overall, this thesis highlights the effects of Shariah compliance to firm value and firm performance from a real-estate investment perspective. The first and second essays focus on the role of Shariah compliance in the Gulf Cooperation Council including an understanding of Shariah-compliant real estate investments and the leverage choice of Shariah-compliant real-estate firms; while the third and fourth essays investigate the effect of Shariah compliance on firm performance by examining the firm?s idiosyncratic risks and corporate real-estate ownership on firm returns.