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Real Estate Investment: Search for Information

How to search for and find information on real estate investment

Finding real estate information

 

In the sample assignment question you have to discuss the challenges and opportunities associated with implementation of Strategic Asset Management within an organisation

To do this you'll need to find academic theory and case studies on strategic asset management being implemented in a corporate situation. 

Finding books & articles

 

Use the Library catalogue to find books and journal articles on your topic.

Books are good for theory, meaning you can usually search just for the principle idea in your topic, in this case strategic asset management.

Articles are good for more applied literature, meaning you can add additional terms to your principle idea, like implementation

Example Search: 

A Library Catalogue search for the keywords: strategic asset management found the following book: 

Adapting leading practices and associated tools : strategic asset management communication and implementation - book found in the library catalogue

A Library Catalogue search for the keywords: strategic asset management implementation found the following article: 

Developing a strategic asset management framwork - article found in the Library catalogue

Tips for searching... 

  • Books

Books are good places to get a quick grounding on the areas that sit at the periphery of your expertise, or to see complex topics explored in a thorough and holistic way.

  • Journal articles

Try restricting your search to peer reviewed articles. Because peer reviewed articles have been double-checked by academic experts, it's easier to be sure that the words and ideas you're using are of sufficient quality for a university assignment. 

Other places to search

 

In addition to the library catalogue, try running your search in more than one database. The three databases linked below all contain useful literature. The image below is an article found in the Google Scholar database. 

Strategic aspects of asset management: An overview of current research - article found in Google Scholar

If you can't find what you're looking for

 

If you are really getting stuck you can try a Boolean search to maximise the amount of results you get when you search.

The Boolean search we developed for this topic in the Plan Your Search page was:

("strategic asset management" OR SAM) AND (organisation OR organization OR company OR corporation OR "real estate" OR property) AND (implementation OR framework OR challenge OR opportunit*)

That search in Google Scholar found this article

Understanding motives for and barriers to implementing asset management system: an empirical study for engineered physical assets - article found in Google Scholar

For more information about Boolean Searching, take a look at this video 

Evaluating your results

 

Not all the information you get from a search will be useful. A successful search will show results relevant to your topic. If your results are not relevant go back and try different keywords in your search.

To evaluate whether your source is of sufficient quality use the S.I.F.T Test. Click on the letters of the acronym to learn more: