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Impact investments are investments made into companies, organizations, and funds with the intention to generate measurable social and environmental impact alongside a financial return.

A rapidly growing supply of capital is seeking placement in impact investments across geographies, sectors, and asset classes, with a wide range of return expectations.

This investment interest is sparking the emergence of a new industry that operates in the largely uncharted area between philanthropy and a singular focus on profit-maximization.

To date, however, the industry has yet todevelop standards to evaluate ESG datathat compare to its traditional evaluation o portolio perormance.

  5 Responsible Property Investment [RPI] is anemerging investment strategy and disciplineconcerned with integrating environmental,social, and governance [ESG] data intoinvestment decision-making

Real estate investment plays a undamentalrole in determining how society usesresources, how the built environmentshapes social lie, how economic activitycan be sustainable over time. As an assetclass, real estate oers especially tangibledemonstrations o the importance o ESGanalysis in creating value or investors andsociety alike. We believe that a robustmetrics system can help shape the marketto better create sustainable outcomes or allstakeholders

It is my pleasure to introduce you to Michigan Impact. The University of Michigan is having tremendous impact throughout our communities. From the downtowns of Detroit and Grand Rapids and the shorelines of Traverse City and Muskegon, to the community colleges of the Upper Peninsula and the medical clinics in mid-Michigan, U-M is committed to improving the quality of life in the Great Lakes State.

A new $9 million U-M Great Lakes research and education center will guide efforts to protect and restore the world's largest group of freshwater lakes by reducing toxic contamination, combating invasive species, protecting wildlife habitat and promoting coastal health.

Nearly $1.7 billion in support for the U-M comes from donors and gifts from every county across Michigan. Support also comes from alums, and that happened in a significant way this year in the arts at U-M.

The two most common laments from impact investing devotees were the enormous difficulty of generating positive impact at the necessary scale, and the related fear that there simply weren’t enough investable projects to absorb the level of capital potentially interested in investing in them.

People are fundamentally resistant to change, argue Chip and Dan Heath in Switch, but there are ways to make positive behavior easier and more likely. One method: shrink the change. It’s easier for people to take a small step like washing the dishes than a large step like cleaning the whole apartment. But once they take that small step and reap the rewards, they’re more likely to continue and expand on that initial behavior.

We’ve already been blown away by the excitement and energy exhibited on campuses across the world. More than 1,100 students are taking actions like riding their bikes instead of driving, getting a dose of inspiration from a Ted Talk, and volunteering with a local nonprofit. They are competing against each other for prizes big and small. The competition feeds the program’s growth, expanding the impact of each small step,

Far from being a faddish niche, SRI is now very much part of the investing world, with more than $3 trillion in assets under professional management in the U.S. alone, according to the 2010 Report on Socially Responsible Investing Trends in the United States from U.S. SIF, the Forum for Sustainable and Responsible Investing. SRI hinges on use of ESG (environmental, social, governance) analysis, shareholder advocacy, and "community investment" strategies.

That $3 trillion in publicly traded securities in the U.S. represents a more than 13 percent increase in assets under management between 2007 and 2010. Over the same period, the broader universe of professionally managed assets grew by less than 1 percent. So, here is the $3-trillion question: Why has the SRI space enjoyed such robust growth, during a period of global economic slowdown?

First, socially conscious investors have benefited from an expansion of quantity and improvement in quality of investment products and services designed to make money and make a difference.

To integrate sustainability metrics into their real estate investment strategies, institutional investors need to have qualitative and quantitative information on the sustainability performance of direct and indirect property investments. The GRESB Survey is the only sustainability benchmark that captures more than 50 data points to reflect the sustainability performance of an institutional investor’s real estate portfolio. These metrics are divided between seven sub-categories within the environmental and social dimensions, with an additional category added for members with property development activities which is not included in the total GRESB score. The weight of each dimension depends on how it may affect the risk-return profile of the investment portfolio and the individual metrics are scored to represent the relative impact to investors.

Similarly, Intel has achieved global market leadership in the growing global technology education market through its rigorous approach to measuring shared value. Key to Intel’s success, says Barbara McAllister, is understanding “what works” for students and teachers and to incorporate that knowledge into product design and deployment. Ongoing tracking of product performance in the classroom, as well as post-sales measurement of educational outcomes, provides insights to improve the product design and delivery, which ultimately improves the effectiveness of Intel’s education technology solutions and leads to additional sales and greater market share.

There’s a new era of social networking that’s taking shape around charitable giving. Younger people are rapidly adopting these new tools, and learning to use them in more and more substantive ways, to go beyond mere socializing and make these tools extremely productive. We’re seeing the sphere of social networking mature in a way that’s very exciting. People who continue to dismiss these social platforms as "a waste of time" or "just social chatter" are missing the boat. This is how people interact with each other and get things done. They share their personal and professional lives online. It should be no different when it comes to their philanthropic lives. More and more, we’re seeing the Crowdrise community share their charitable efforts with their social networks, both as a way to highlight their own commitment to a cause and as a very efficient way to turn their friends and family into new supporters.

They say “time is money,” but time is also an irreplaceable and personal connection to a cause.

It includes the standard socio-economic and demographic factors – age, occupation, education, income – but importantly, in addition to behavioral factors, uses values and attitudes.[1]

New Economic Order: This group comprises about 24 percent of the adult population of developed economies. There are 59 million NEOs in the US, 6 million in Canada, 12 million in the UK and 4 million in Australia. NEOs exhibit progressive social values, have high social intelligence and are motivated by authenticity, design, quality, experience, provenance and the path less travelled. Almost all (93%) of NEOs are in the top third of discretionary spenders.[4]

Evolving Economic Order

Why have endowments outperformed traditional investments?

The alternatives effect By investing in less liquid alternatives, endowments are typically able to construct a higher yielding portfolio with less correlation to the broader markets. The quality of the manager Illiquid, alternative investments are more difficult to evaluate than publicly traded securities. Skilled managers that are adept at taking advantage of pricing inefficiencies in illiquid securities will have a greater impact on returns than skilled managers operating in the public markets, where price inefficiencies are fewer in number and there is generally less return potential.

If you use appreciated property to fund the trust, you avoid capital gains tax liability on the transaction, the beneficiary’s income may be taxed at ordinary and capital gains rates, and some income may be tax-free.

the endowment may outperform other investment strategies over the long term