PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the total direct costs of raising external equity capital for US real estate investment trust (REIT) initial public offerings (IPOs).Design/methodology/approachThe study provides recent evidence on total direct costs for a comprehensive dataset of 125 US REIT IPOs from 1996 until June 2010. A multivariate OLS regression is performed to determine significant factors influencing the level of total direct costs and also underwriting fees and non‐underwriting direct expenses.FindingsThe study finds economies of scale in total direct costs, underwriting fees and non‐underwriting expenses. The equally (value) weighted average total direct costs are 8.33 percent (7.52 percent), consisting of 6.49 percent (6.30 percent) underwriting fees and 1.87 percent (1.22 percent) non‐underwriting direct expenses. The study finds a declining trend of total direct costs for post 2000 IPOs which is attributed to the declining trend in both underwriting fees and non‐underwriting direct expenses. Offer size is a critical determinant for both total direct costs and their individual components and inversely affects these costs. The total direct costs are found significantly higher for equity REITs than for mortgage REITs and are also significantly higher for offers listed in New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). Underwriting fees appear to be negatively influenced by the offer price, the number of representative underwriters involved in the issue, industry return volatility and the number of potential specific risk factors but positively influenced by prior quarter industry dividend yield and ownership limit identified in the prospectus. After controlling for time trend, the paper finds REIT IPOs incur higher non‐underwriting direct expenses in response to higher industry return volatility prior to the offer.Originality/valueThis paper adds to the international REIT IPO literature by exploring a number of new influencing factors behind total direct costs, underwriting fees and non‐underwriting direct expenses. The study includes data during the recent GFC period.
