Women in commercial real estate still make less than their male counterparts despite holding nearly 40% of positions in the industry, a new study finds.
Little improvement has been achieved in seeking parity for women at the top rungs of the commercial real estate industry over the past 20 years, according to the report released Thursday by the Commercial Real Estate Women Network, an advocacy and networking group for female professionals in the sector.
Gender pay gaps have decreased since 2020, when the group released its last report, but women still make 4% less than men in base salaries and 35% less in compensation from commissions, bonuses and profit-sharing.
"Collective efforts to achieve parity in the industry are far from complete — in fact, little progress has been made" in the 20 years since the group began doing the survey, it noted in a statement.
Women comprise 38% of the commercial real estate industry overall, up slightly from the 37% in 2020, according to CREW. Women hold a far smaller number of jobs in the top rungs of the industry, occupying approximately 9% of C-suite positions, a statistic that has also remained almost constant in the last two decades.
In recent years, several women have joined the top levels of some of the world's largest commercial property firms. In May 2023, real estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield named Michelle MacKay as its new CEO, and she took the reins two months later. In July 2021, CBRE, the world's largest real estate services firm by revenue, tapped Emma Giamartino to serve as its global chief financial officer. And one of the co-heads of Blackstone's real estate group is Kathleen McCarthy, sharing the position with Nadeem Meghji.
Still, a 2024 survey by nationwide real estate executive search firm RETS Associates reflected no significant change in advancement to the top ranks. Principal Kent Elliott previously told CoStar News that while the industry has made progress in diversifying at the executive level, "it's nowhere near what it should be."
Slightly smaller gap
CREW releases the study every five years with the MIT Center for Real Estate. This year, it surveyed 2,450 industry professionals across commercial real estate sectors. For the first time in the 20 years since the group has been doing the poll, women reported that gender discrimination in the workplace is their primary obstacle to career advancement.
“This continues a concerning trend — gender discrimination has emerged as a greater barrier with each study,” noted the authors. The study added that women were far more likely to say that family and parenting responsibilities were an obstacle to their careers, while men generally did not.
Gender pay gaps have shrunk, with the difference in total average earnings across genders decreasing by more than 60% compared to the 2020 study. But most of that was driven by a drop in compensation across the board, as men’s average commission and bonus revenues declined. Some executives for the largest commercial real estate brokerages received pay cuts last year as their firms dealt with slowing sales and profits caused by high interest rates and low deal volume.
The data also reflects a stagnation in the career ambitions of younger women in commercial real estate. Only 31% of women under 40 now report aspiring to a C-suite position, compared to 36% in the 2020 study.
While 6% of women said they experienced sexual harassment in the workplace in the last year, nearly one-third experienced what the study described as offensive, sexist behavior.
“Although these data points represent a decrease from 2020, such behavior remains unacceptably prevalent,” noted the study.