CHICAGO-Commercial real estate may be viewed inthe public eye as a wholly male-dominated industry, but femaleexecutives in the REIT space are beginning to catch up. A new studyfrom consulting firm Ferguson Partners Ltd. showsthat real estate investment trusts that have had a female boardmember for more than three years have seen materially higherreturns than their counterparts.

Data from Ferguson revealed that firms with at least one femaleon their board garnered higher shareholder return growth rates,specifically, 2.6% higher than peers over a three-year horizon;3.6% higher than peers over a five-year period; and 3.4% higherthan peers over a 10-year horizon.

William J. Ferguson, chairman and CEO ofFerguson Partners Ltd., tells GlobeSt.com that these data are areflection of boards being more ‘enlightened.’ “When you look atthe REIT world in particular, there are certain asset classes thatare very consumer-driven, such as multifamily, such as retail,” hesays. “You could even look at hospitality, and in some of thosesectors, their workforce is quite large and quite diverse. When youthink about the businesses that those REITs do in particular, whenyou are selling to consumers in a highly diverse workforce, itmakes a lot of sense to have women on the board, simply becausewomen are obviously part of any key consumer decision that is made,and when you are managing a very diverse workforce, having peopleon the board who understand some of those diversity issues areincredibly important.”