Richard K. Green

Biography

Richard K. Green, Ph.D., is the Director of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate. He holds the Lusk Chair in Real Estate and is a Professor at the USC Sol Price School of Public Policy and the Marshall School of Business.

Prior to joining the USC faculty, Dr. Green spent four years as the Oliver T. Carr, Jr., Chair of Real Estate Finance at The George Washington University School of Business. He was Director of the Center for Washington Area Studies and the Center for Real Estate and Urban Studies at that institution. Dr. Green also taught real estate finance and economics courses for 12 years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he was Wangard Faculty Scholar and Chair of Real Estate and Urban Land Economics. He also has been principal economist and director of financial strategy and policy analysis at Freddie Mac. He was a visiting professor of real estate at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Dr. Green also is a member of the faculty of the Hoyt Institute for Advanced Studies in Real Estate. He was President of the American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association.

Dr. Green earned his Ph.D. and M.S. in economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He earned his A.B. in economics from Harvard University.

His research addresses housing markets, housing policy, tax policy, transportation, mortgage finance and urban growth. His work is published in a number of journals including the American Economic Review, Journal of Economic Geography, Journal of Economic Perspectives, Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Journal of Regional Science, Journal of Urban Economics, Land Economics, Regional Science and Urban Economics, Real Estate Economics, Housing Policy Debate, Journal of Housing Economics, and Urban Studies. His book with Stephen Malpezzi, A Primer on U.S. Housing Markets and Housing Policy, is used at universities throughout the country. His work has been cited or he has been quoted in the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, the Christian Science Monitor, the Los Angeles Times, Newsweek and the Economist, as well as other outlets. He gave a presentation at the 31st annual Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City Economic Symposium, where his work was cited by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke. 

In 1995, Dr. Green was honored as “Teacher of the Year” by the University of Wisconsin Graduate Business Association, and soon thereafter was inducted into that University’s Teaching Academy. Most recently, Dr. Green received two awards from the American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association (AREUEA): the George Bloom Service Award for distinguished career service and the Edwin Mills Best Paper Award for research on housing regulation and urban migration in India.

Selected Publications

• Dutta, A., Gandhi, S., & Green, R. K. (2025). Do housing regulations affect rural–urban migration? evidence from rent control in India. Journal of Economic Geography.
• Dutta, A., Gandhi, S., & Green, R. (2025). Do urban regulations exacerbate rural-urban inequality? Evidence from rent control in India. Journal of Economic Geography, Article lbaf021.
• Choi, J. H., & Green, R. K. (2022). The Heterogeneous Effects of Interactions between Parent’s Education and MSA Level College Share on Children’s School Enrollment. Journal of Housing Economics, 57, 101843.