Tallahassee, Fla. – January not only brings the New Year to the Florida State University College of Business, but also an addition to the faculty as world-renowned real estate researcher and professor C.F. Sirmans becomes the J. Harold and Barbara M. Chastain Eminent Scholar Chair in Real Estate at FSU.

"Sirmans is widely regarded as one of the nation's leading real estate economists," said Dean Gatzlaff, FSU's Mark C. Bane Professor and director of the Center for Real Estate Education & Research (www.fsurealestate.com). "The range of his scholarship is unparalleled. His productivity is off the board; it's incredible."

As the J. Harold and Barbara M. Chastain Eminent Scholar Chair in Real Estate, Sirmans will continue to produce research, teach undergraduate and MBA students, bolster the work of the real estate center and strengthen the relationships of the College across other disciplines, including economics, law and planning.

"His addition to FSU's real estate faculty raises our overall research rankings to top-tier status among the nation's universities and places us alongside programs located at such great institutions as (the University of California) Berkeley, Illinois and Wisconsin," Gatzlaff said.

Sirmans has long been familiar with the stature of the Florida State real estate program. Sirmans will be amongst family as he joins his brother, Dr. Stacy Sirmans, a professor in the Risk Management/Insurance, Real Estate and Business Law department and his nephew, Stace Sirmans, an undergraduate business student studying finance.

"I have been impressed with the commitment by the college and the program's alumni and friends to real estate education and research," Sirmans said. "With this continuing support, we can build the program into one of the nation's best. I am extremely pleased to be part of this process."

Sirmans has spent the past 17 years at the University of Connecticut as the William N. Kinnard Jr. Professor of Real Estate and Finance and director of the Center for Real Estate and Urban Economic Studies. In addition, he serves as co-editor of the Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics — one of the discipline's premier journals.

He comes to Florida State from Brigham Young University where he taught as a visiting professor. Sirmans has also taught at the University of Illinois, the University of Georgia and Louisiana State University. His research interests include real estate securitization and spatio-temporal modeling of real estate prices.

Hiring Sirmans fulfills dreams for the Chastain Chair, which was originally established from a 1999 gift by J. Harold and Barbara Chastain. A 1955 graduate of the College of Business, J. Harold Chastain served as president of First Environmental Services, a division of First City Federal Savings and Loan Association of Bradenton. He also was chief real estate appraiser for that institution before becoming a private real estate investor.

For more information about the College of Business, please go to www.cob.fsu.edu.