In Memoriam

                                  M. Chapman Findlay

M. Chapman "Chap" Findlay died June 17, 2008 at his home in Los Angeles. He was 63 and died of cancer, which had been diagnosed a few months earlier.

Chap Findlay was born on July 16, 1944 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. When Findlay was a young child, his family left Michigan for San Antonio, Texas. Chap earned a bachelors degree, a masters degree, and a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin. During the course of his academic career, Chap served as a faculty member at the University of Houston (1968 - 1971), the University of Connecticut (1971 - 1972), McGill University (1972 - 1974), and the University of Southern California (1974 - 1982), where he also served terms as chair of the department and as executive director of the Center for the Study of Financial Institutions.

Chap Findlay was a prolific scholar with roughly 100 articles and books on financial management and analysis, financial theory, investment and capital markets, real estate and mortgage markets, insurance and pension issues, accounting issues, and legal issues. Perhaps the most significant of his early academic work was with Stephen D. Messner on measures of return for real estate investments. The 1970s were relatively early days for computer applications involving finance problems, and Findlay and Messner developed a methodology that they termed the Financial Management Rate of Return (FMRR). The contribution enabled estate investors to more accurately assess the returns on their investments and thus make better investment decisions. Early work in this area was published in "Real Estate Investment Analysis: IRR Versus FMRR", Real Estate Appraiser 41, July/August 1975. FMRR soon became, and remains, an industry standard. Chap Findlay's most recent book, Models for Investors in Real World Markets, was co-authored with Ed Williams and James R. Thompson, and was published in 2003 by Wiley-Interscience Series in Probability & Statistics.  The text has become a leading reference in the field.

In addition to his noteworthy academic career, Chap Findlay had an exceptional career outside of academics. He widely recognized as an outstanding expert witness and provided testimony in nearly 1,000 court cases. He also was co-inventor on a dozen patents. In 1985, Findlay left USC to form Findlay Phillips & Associates, now Phillips Fractor Gorman in Pasadena. During its first 10 years, Findlay Phillips & Associates operated from a suite in California Plaza. While there, Findlay became a co-founding and lifetime member of the City Club. He said it was the only way he could get a good hamburger for lunch without a wait. In his new role outside of academics, Findlay became a preeminent economic, finance, and valuation expert witness in some of the country's top legal cases. In addition, Chap served as a consultant on numerous special projects related to appropriate government regulation. As a consultant to the City of Los Angeles, Findlay undertook a Los Angeles Housing Market Study in which he analyzed the impact of Los Angeles's rent control ordinance. He was a consultant to the State Public Utilities Commission regarding the appropriate minimum amount of insurance to be held by commercial truckers. In addition, he was part of a team that analyzed the economic impact of landfills on nearby residential property values which became the primary research study in that area.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Findlay was one of a handful of experts involved in the defense in open market securities class action cases.  He served as a financial expert in the Orange County Bankruptcy case. He was also part of a team that analyzed the financial implications of how "market share liability" was used to allocate settlements in asbestos litigation. In addition, Chap was one of the first experts to testify in the area of alter ego and developed a variety of techniques to "pierce the corporate veil."

In 1998, Findlay was co-founder of Pasadena's "Center for Computationally Advanced Statistical Techniques" (c4cast.com, Inc.), which has developed numerous Internet-based investment and forecasting tools, some of which are marketed under the EconomicInvestor and "The Economy Matters" brands.  He served as chief financial officer and a director of c4cast.com until his death.

Despite the shift to practitioner, Chap was never able to completely walk away from his academic roots.  In particular, Findlay became an advisor to the Department of Finance, Real Estate & Insurance at California State University, Northridge. And in this role he filled for over 20 years, Chap served as a mentor for faculty, assisted with curriculum development, and facilitated faculty research.

Chap Findlay is survived by his wife Beatrice, a prominent painter with studios in New York and Los Angeles. The family requests that donations be made to these memorial projects.  Checks should be made payable to the CSUN Foundation with "Chap Findlay" in the memo field and should be sent to Dean's Office, College of Business, CSUN, 18111 Nordhoff St., Northridge, CA 91330. In addition, the College of Business at California State University, Northridge is creating the M. Chapman Findlay Scholar Fund, which will award a cash prize annually to an outstanding CSUN real estate/finance graduate. The school is also developing an annual Findlay Memorial Lecture, where a pre-eminent scholar will be invited to speak at CSUN on a topic related to Findlay's extensive research.

Information for this obituary was provided by Phillips Fractor & Gorman.