Asset-Class Studios
Tourism & Leisure Destinations Studio
A studio on tourism and leisure destinations — resorts, entertainment districts and integrated giga-projects where the demand is manufactured rather than captured. You will read a destination thesis against source markets and a competitive set defined by substitution, structure the master developer, operator and public-sector relationships, sequence phasing, cross-subsidy and enabling infrastructure, size and structure the hotel component, build the visitor economy around dwell time and per-visitor spend rather than visitor numbers, and plan how the capital comes back out — with emerging-market realism across the Gulf, Egypt and the Red Sea.
The promise
Analyse tourism and leisure destinations end to end - the demand thesis and competitive set, structuring and phasing, enabling infrastructure, the hotel component, the visitor economy, and how the capital comes back out.
By the end you can
- Build a destination demand thesis against source markets and a substitution-defined competitive set
- Structure the master developer, operator and public-sector relationships, and sequence enabling infrastructure
- Size and structure the hotel component, and negotiate the provisions that decide the outcome
- Build the visitor economy on dwell time and per-visitor spend rather than visitor numbers
- Appraise the business case, ramp-up and execution risk, and plan the capital return
Where this course takes you
This course is part of 1 role track, which ends in a professional deliverable.
Curriculum
Destination Real Estate
What destination real estate is — resorts, entertainment, theme parks and integrated destinations — and why a destination must manufacture demand rather than merely capture it, through anchor-and-ecosystem logic.
The Destination Thesis & Demand
Building the demand thesis: source markets, seasonality and year-round strategies, and the giga-destination bet across Saudi Arabia and Egypt.
Structuring a Destination
How destinations are structured and phased — master developer and operators, phasing across hospitality, residential, retail and entertainment, and cross-subsidy through the sales engine.
Feasibility, Risk & Value
Appraising the destination business case — the combined pro forma, absorption and the ramp-up problem, and giga-project execution risk.
The Hotel Inside the Destination
How hotel assets actually earn, what a brand does and costs, and which operating structure transfers which risk — because in most destinations the hotel is the anchor everything else is sized against.
Leisure Assets & the Visitor Economy
The non-hotel assets that make a destination — attractions, food and beverage, retail, marinas and clubs — how they earn, and why dwell time and per-visitor spend matter more than visitor count.
Investing in Destinations & Exit
How destination assets are priced once they trade, who buys them, and how a master developer gets its capital back out of something it spent a decade building.
Course assessment
Sign in to open lessons and track your progress.
The capstone project
This course ends in a real professional deliverable. Use the brief and the five criteria below to check your own work against the standard a competent professional would be held to.
Your final deliverable
Tourism & Leisure Destination Capstone
Check your work against five criteria
- Method & rigour: The right framework, applied correctly, with the working shown — not just an answer.
- Data honesty: Every figure is sourced, triangulated, or explicitly flagged “requires local market data”. Nothing is invented.
- Analysis & judgment: Assumptions are explicit, at least one alternative is weighed, and the key risks are quantified.
- Recommendation: A clear, decision-useful conclusion a professional could act on — with the conditions that qualify it.
- Communication: Structured, concise, and client-ready — the argument lands.
When it's ready
Your deliverable is ready when it meets the bar on all five criteria — work a competent professional could put in front of a client or committee.
Revising your work
The capstone is self-directed: you check your own work against the rubric. Where a criterion isn't met yet, revise that part and check it again — as many times as you need.
More in this academy
Residential Studio: Market, Product & Sales
Apply the core toolkit to residential: reading residential demand, designing product and unit mix to demand, running an off-plan launch with pricing, payment plans and absorption, and then the decisions that follow — build-to-rent, the affordability and mortgage constraints that decide who can buy, and the development appraisal that settles whether the scheme happens at all.
Office Studio: Occupier Demand & Grade-A Value
Apply the core real estate toolkit to the office asset class: what drives office demand, the occupier and the workplace, office leasing and value, how to read regional office markets from Riyadh's RHQ-driven Grade-A shortage to Cairo and the wider GCC, and then the owner's side — diagnosing and repositioning an underperforming building, judging flexible space and operational income, and underwriting an acquisition.
Retail Studio: Catchment, Tenant Mix & Turnover
Apply the core real estate toolkit to retail: catchment and demand, formats and tenant mix, turnover-based leasing, and repositioning underperforming schemes.