Kaushik Vardharajan, an associate professor of the practice, leads SHA’s Master of Science in hospitality real estate program, the first US program of its kind to be housed in a school of hospitality.

School of Hospitality Administration

Building Hospitality

New master’s degree teaches the real estate side of the hospitality industry

When Dean Arun Upneja arrived at SHA in 2013, he made an observation: many students were interested in areas of the hospitality industry beyond hotel or restaurant operations. They wanted careers creating financial projections and property valuations or evaluating and funding new hospitality developments. But if those students planned to pursue a master’s in real estate, they had to go elsewhere, Upneja says.

Something had to change.

Since 2013, Upneja has expanded SHA’s scope beyond the customer-facing aspects of hospitality, adding an undergraduate concentration in real estate development as well as a real estate development and finance concentration in its Master of Management in Hospitality program. In fall 2024 SHA began offering, for the first time, a Master of Science in hospitality real estate. The new degree program—the first such program in the United States that is housed in a hospitality school—will meet the needs of both undergraduates seeking a career in hospitality real estate and industry leaders looking to hire, according to Kaushik Vardharajan, an associate professor of the practice and program director.

“It’s not just about bringing students into the program; it’s about helping them learn and then helping them find great jobs at the end of the day,” Vardharajan says. “What does the industry need? How’s the industry evolving and changing in the future? And instead of playing catch-up, can we speed up so that we’re there before the change arrives?”

What Is Hospitality Real Estate?

Real estate is central to the hospitality industry, whether it’s planning, managing, or investing in a hotel, senior living center, golf course, or any number of categories of developments. The global hospitality market grew from $4.4 trillion in 2022 to $4.7 trillion in 2023 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7 percent, and is expected to grow to $5.8 trillion in 2027 at a CAGR of 5.5 percent, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council. Still, the uncertainty of the pandemic era—when hotel occupancy dipped as low as 25 percent and business travel dropped 85 percent between 2019 and 2020—looms large. Plus, rising interest rates increase the cost of construction, dampening new development.

One of the ways operators are maximizing revenues and planning for a future shrouded in uncertainty is by diversifying their real estate holdings—a mixed-use development featuring a hotel, apartments, and retail, for instance—or outsourcing property management to outside firms, Vardharajan says.

In developing SHA’s MS in hospitality real estate, Vardharajan leaned heavily on the advice of industry leaders like Rachel Roginsky. For more than 30 years, Roginsky has been a go-to for hospitality companies seeking counsel on a development, expansion, or critical decision. The firm she founded in 1991, Pinnacle Advisory Group, has become one of the nation’s leading hospitality consultancies. Roginsky, a SHA adjunct professor, has observed that hotel operators need to be considerably more knowledgeable on a variety of topics that extend beyond operations—like real estate and valuation—than they were in the past. At the same time, many hospitality companies are looking to hire real estate specialists.

“My clients and other employers are requiring employees in this industry to understand everything from feasibility through return on investment through asset management to disposition—the entire cycle of real estate, for hotels,” says Roginsky, who also is chair of the SHA Real Estate Advisory Council, which provided feedback during the development of the MS program. “Students who graduate from this new program at SHA will get more involved in hotel real estate, as opposed to just hotel operations.”

Training Hospitality Professionals for a New Landscape

To build a credible MS program in hospitality real estate, SHA needed someone credible to lead it, Upneja says. So, in 2019, he hired Vardharajan, who had worked with clients in 66 countries while at the global hospitality consulting firm HVS and who led Hilton’s growth in South Asia after that.

“For us, it had to be more of a practitioner-oriented program, where we wanted to send students into the world of real estate,” Upneja says. “That’s why we hired someone as highly qualified and networked as Kaushik. He was a perfect fit for us and has been a key asset.”

Vardharajan oversees the new 36-unit program, which will take a full-time student 12 months to complete. Courses cover the hospitality real estate life cycle, facility design, finance and feasibility, financial management, asset management, financial reporting, and transactions and deal-making. Capping the program off is a course in which students work in teams to simulate a real estate transaction to better understand the goals and motivations of developers, bankers, investors, and other stakeholders. Finally, each full-time student will get practical experience by completing a 300-hour internship in the real estate sector.

Graduates of the program will possess the tools to help guide real estate decisions for international hotel brands, ownership groups, or management companies, and to conduct feasibility and valuation studies for proposed developments or fund new developments with an investment bank, Vardharajan says.

“You’ll learn the basic concepts of real estate, and we will teach you how to apply the laws of finance to all types of real estate,” Vardharajan says. “I want you to leave this program not just knowing about hotels, but if someone asks you to lead a project that is a hotel and a resort and a golf course and a residential project and has office space on it—you know exactly how to make it happen.”

SHA’s location in a vibrant, growing city like Boston gives this master’s program a leg up, Upneja adds. “We are able to attract and engage extensively with the industry, and the education that students are getting is not only theoretically sound, but practical as well,” he says. “Students come in, and whatever they want to do, we are able to provide them with those classes and the network so that they can be successful in their careers.”

What’s more, he adds, it’s in the periods of flux in the hospitality and real estate markets when the value of a master’s degree can truly shine.

“There is always uncertainty, so you’ve got to choose a school very carefully that is keeping a close eye and a close engagement with the industry, so that those models that the industry is relying on are being conveyed to students,” Upneja says. “There’s lots of uncertainty, but the future of anyone graduating from SHA is going to be strong. I have zero doubt on that.”