Dave Harstad

The IU real estate program is growing and with it our class offerings are expanding. Current real estate faculty member Dave Harstad has recently been hired as a full-time lecturer. Harstad is Managing Broker of the Colliers Bloomington office. With 17+ years of real estate and legal experience, his current practice includes office, industrial, retail, and investment. He received his J.D. in 2001 and worked as a real estate attorney in Minneapolis, MN and Bozeman, MT before going into real estate development with Pedcor Investments and Denison Properties. Harstad, who has taught a section of R440-Real Estate Development & Appraisal for several years, will begin teaching full-time this fall with a larger class load to include two sections of R440 and a newly added second section of R314-Commercial Real Estate Workshop (CRW). In the spring semester, Harstad’s class load will further increase to include one section of R440, two sections of R443-Real Estate Finance & Investment Analysis, and one section of R314-CRW.

The pool of qualified applicants for the CRW has steadily increased in recent years along with the overall number of students enrolled in the real estate program. Adding a second section of the Workshop this fall will allow us to increase CRW enrollment, bringing 60+ students through the rigorous case-based Workshop curriculum in two class sections. These two class sections, taught by Chris Cockerham and Dave Harstad, will combine for guest lectures. Every CRW member will receive the same instruction and guest lectures, but with two faculty available they will be able to split into smaller groups for case presentations. Cockerham and Harstad will be Co-Directors of the Commercial Real Estate Workshop going forward.

Students majoring in real estate have historically had to plan their schedules carefully to take R440 in the fall and R443 in the spring as these were the only semesters the courses were offered. This fall, we are happy to announce that both classes will now be available both semesters making scheduling easier for those in the major and enabling more students to enroll in the courses each year.

We are so pleased that these additional course offerings will allow our real estate students more flexibility in reaching their educational goals. Serving our students and helping them get to where they want to go is our number one priority. These changes are an important step toward fulfilling that goal.

Fisher at a 1980s Annual Conference

In 1937, after graduating from the University of Chicago with a Ph.D. in Economics, Art Weimer was hired as a professor in the School of Business at Indiana University. In 1939 he became Dean of the business school succeeding Herman B. Wells who became President of IU. Real estate was the focus of Weimer’s research and teaching, and thus began the real estate program at Indiana University –one of the first of its kind in the nation.

The same year Weimer was hired at IU, George Bloom started as a freshman. Bloom took Weimer’s classes as an undergraduate. Aside from his distinguished military service in World War II, Bloom was associated with the University for the remainder of his life. After being discharged from the Marine Corps as a captain, he returned to Indiana University where he received both an MBA and a doctorate degree. In 1953, he became a Professor of Real Estate. He was responsible for the academic real estate program at IU from 1963 until his death in 1983, and for many years oversaw the University’s real estate.
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