Hans G. Nordby, Managing Director

Hans Nordby, Managing Director, PPR: Leads a team of 70 professionals, including 47 economists located in Boston; Washington, D.C.; and the United Kingdom.

Hans has been with PPR since 2002. Most recently he was Director of Advisory Services, managing custom strategic research efforts for large public and private pension funds, pension fund advisors, bank holding companies, and REITs. Nordby has extensive experience providing clients with commercial real estate insights on portfolio strategy, target market selection, relative value and custom scenario analyses, and acquisition/disposition studies.

Media in which he has been featured include The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, The New York Times, Investment Dealers Digest National Real Estate Investor, and Fox News, among others. Hans is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and also speaks at client-sponsored events for the clients' investors and customers.

Hans is a prolific writer and has contributed to The Journal of Portfolio Management, The RMA Journal, Real Estate Portfolio, The Journal Of Real Estate Portfolio Management, and ICSC Research Quarterly.

Ruijue Peng, Chief Research Officer

Dr. Ruijue Peng is the Chief Research Officer at PPR. Since joining the company in 1994, Dr. Peng has been charged with overseeing research and the development of econometric forecasting models and analytical tools. Dr. Peng built PPR’s forecasting model and the related platform, which is the underpinning of PPR's analytical research. She also directed PPR’s global expansion, building the PPR Asia Service from the ground up. After CoStar’s acquisition of PPR in 2009, she spearheaded the development of the CoStar Repeat-Sale Price Indices and presented the results at the 2010 American Real Estate Society Conference. The paper on the subject won the award for the Best Paper for a Practicing Professional.

Dr. Peng earned an M.S. and Ph.D. from MIT with a concentration in urban and real estate economics. Her doctoral thesis on land supply and property prices won the American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association's Best Dissertation Award. Prior to joining PPR, Dr. Peng was a research fellow at the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University. She also served as a consultant to the World Bank.

Steve Miller, Director Debt Research Risk Management

Stephen Miller, Director of Debt Research and Risk Management, is responsible for PPR’s real estate capital market research, credit risk analytics, and relative value assessment. Steve brings more than 30 years of experience in commercial real estate to the PPR team, predominantly in managing real estate portfolio exposures for pension funds, life insurers, and depository institutions. His background includes domestic and international transactional experience of more than $6 billion in both the public and private sectors, and across the equity and debt investment spectrums.

Capital formation, credit risk exposure measurement & management, and market pricing are the focus of Steve’s research and analysis at PPR. The capital markets team extensively tracks and forecasts commercial real estate loan performance for the industry: banks, life insurers, and the CMBS market. Recent market dislocation and the numerous government response initiatives are being rigorously evaluated, with emphasis on the commercial real estate market impact. The team’s assessment focuses on lender and borrower behavior in response to evolving economic conditions, government stimulus efforts and the revised regulatory framework.

Steve has more than 15 years of real estate capital markets teaching experience, including the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Irvine. He served as a trustee for a privately held institutional apartment REIT for 10 years. A CFA charter-holder, he earned a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of Southern California. He is also a CPA.

Sotiris Tsolacos, Director European Research

Dr. Sotiris Tsolacos, the Director of European Research for Property and Portfolio Research, is responsible for delivering the company’s research and portfolio strategy services in Europe. He works closely with clients to resolve complex issues by creatively applying PPR’s data and research techniques.

Sotiris has years of experience in strategic investment research and risk management. He has consulted with investment managers and real estate funds on business planning and strategy. He also spent seven years with Jones Lang LaSalle in London, leading the investment research group. Prior to that, he was a lecturer in Economics at Reading University.

Sotiris holds a B.A. degree in Economics and Econometrics from the University of Athens and both an M.A. degree in International Finance and a Ph.D. in Economics from Reading University. He has carried out extensive real estate modeling and forecasting work in the European context, publishing over 35 papers in major international real estate research journals. A regular commentator on topical themes and contributor to practitioners’ magazines, he is a frequent speaker at industry events. He is on the editorial board of the Journal of Property Research and the Journal of Property Investment and Finance and is a past president of the European Real Estate Society. Sotiris is also a fellow of the European Union Business Cycle Network.

Brian Hare, Director Sales and Client Service

Brian Hare, Director Sales and Client Service, manages PPR’s client relations team. Prior to joining the firm, Brian held a variety of sales, sales management, and business development roles with Reed Elsevier, D&B, and The McGraw-Hill Companies. Brian has a B.S. in Organizational Studies with a concentration in Economics from Northwestern University.