An Examination of the Role of Geneva and Zurich Housing in Swiss Institutional Portfolios.

Swiss intitutional investors hold approximately 19% of their wealth in property, and the bulk of the allocation to property is housing. The financial reasons which are often given to motivate this investment strategy are twofold. Firstly, property returns are hypothesised to be lowly correlated with the returns on stocks and bonds, and the inclusion of property in portfolios fo financial assets should lead to diversification benefits. Secondly, property is viewed as acting as an effective hedge against inflation. The aim of this paper is to empirically investiagte these two assumptions on the basis of hedonic price indices for Geneva and Zurich apartment buildings.