| Prakash Loungani Assistant Director Independent Evaluation Office, IMF  |
Dr. Prakash Loungani is assistant director in the IMF’s Independent Evaluation Office. He is also adjunct professor of management at Vanderbilt University Owen School of Business, where he has taught since 2001. He also has affiliate positions at Johns Hopkins University’s Carey School of Business and American University’s School of International Service. He is the co-author of Confronting Inequality: How Societies Can Choose Inclusive Growth (Columbia University Press, 2019). He blogs as The Unassuming Economist.Dr. Loungani developed the IMF’s Global Housing Watch, a website dedicated to showcasing the institution’s work on housing markets. He is the author of “Global Housing Cycles” (IMF Working Paper 12/217) and several articles on housing markets that have appeared in the IMF’s flagship publication, the World Economic Outlook. In 2015, he co-edited a special issue of the Journal of Money, Credit and Banking on “Housing, Stability, and the Macroeconomy: International Perspectives” based on a conference organized with the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. He has given talks on housing markets to the European Commission, the International Housing Association, the Urban Land Institute, among other venues. Dr. Loungani is well-known for his work on the difficulty of forecasting recessions, which has been featured in the Financial Times, The Guardian, and on the BBC. He has nudged the IMF towards championing the goal of “inclusive growth” through his research on understanding and lowering unemployment, documenting the impact of austerity on inequality, and uncovering the role of unfettered capital mobility across national borders in lowering labor’s share of income. Prior to joining the IMF in 1998, Dr. Loungani worked in the Federal Reserve System and at the University of Florida. He graduated from the University of Bombay with a bachelor’s degree in economics and earned his master’s and doctoral degrees in economics from the University of Rochester. |
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| David Zanaty Division GM East Opendoor  |
David Zanaty is East Division GM responsible for all eastern markets and various strategic initiatives at Opendoor. He has twenty years of real estate experience in both entrepreneurial and institutional settings, working on a variety of asset classes in all phases of the investment cycle. Prior to joining Opendoor, David was SVP Operations for Starwood Waypoint (NYSE: SWAY; now part of Invitation Homes) where he was responsible for a $2.5B portfolio and 330-person team across twelve markets. Before that, he was VP Development for AIG Global Real Estate where he led development and asset management of various investments, including nearly 1M SF of Class A office space. He also assembled, entitled and master planned large land holdings. As an entrepreneur, David has executed a range of developments and boutique office investments. David received a BA in Economics and Philosophy from Emory University. He also holds a Master of City and Regional Planning from Georgia Institute of Technology, and an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. He is involved with HOPE Atlanta, ULI, ANDP and GSU. |
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| John Hunt President MarketNSight & ViaSearch  |
John is the Principal of MarketNsight and President of ViaSearch. An industry leader for almost 30 years, John has surveyed home buyers across the country, predicted the housing downturn as early as September 2005, provided the data that helped pass the Home Buyer Tax Credit in 2009, accurately predicted national housing starts in 2016, and has been on the leading edge of Millennial and Active Adult buying trends. With expertise in markets across the Southeast and beyond, John is a highly sought-after speaker on the economy and real estate and is regularly quoted and published in national publications and news outlets. |
