While the housing market is in the tank and is not likely to emerge anytime soon, real estate investment in college towns continues to promise good returns (The Wall Street Journal, September 2 4 , 2010). Marcela Treisman works for an investment firm in Michigan. Her assignment is to analyze the rental market in Ann Arbor, which is home to the University of Michigan. She gathers data on monthly rents for 2011 along with the square footage of 40 homes.

A portion of the data is shown below; the complete data, labeled Ann Arbor Rental, can be found on the text website.

Monthly Rent Square Footage 645 500 675 648 2400 2700 Source: w w w .z illo w .c o m .

a. Use Excel to calculate the mean and standard deviation for monthly rent.

b. Use Excel to calculate the mean and standard deviation for square footage.

c. Use Excel to construct 90% confidence intervals for the mean rent and the mean square footage of all homes in Ann Arbor, Michigan. P-69