A concept for measuring real estate sustainability from the investors' perspective

Although there is an increasing demand for sustainable investment products accompanied by increasing regulations regarding sustainability disclosures, people suffer from a lack of information concerning the offered investment products' sustainability. Despite hundreds of ESG indicators for standard investment products available in the literature, there is no holistic approach to assessing real estate sustainability to date. However, as the real estate sector is responsible for 40 % of energy consumption and 29 % of greenhouse gas emissions in the European Union, it is critical in meeting the Paris Agreement's climate targets. This paper presents our ideas for developing a concept for a real estate sustainability metric and real estate specific sustainability indicators. We aim to develop a metric that offers a transparent sustainability assessment for real estate based on the triple bottom line, thereby enabling (potential) investors to assess the sustainability of offered assets for themselves.