This week, five Colorado State University business students will be competing to win back a title that was taken by the University of Colorado last year.

CSU is hosting the International Council of Shopping Centers Sherman Miller Real Estate Case Competition. This is the second year that a competition like this has been offered to Colorado colleges, said the program’s interim director, Richard Button.

In the ICSC competition, students will look at a real property case study and determine the best way to optimize the worth of the property by preforming a full-situation analysis, Button said. The teams will receive the case Monday and will have the whole week to develop their presentation. Friday, the teams will present to a panel of nine judges who are professionals in real estate.

Button said the CSU team has prepared for the competition extensively and has a strong shot at taking home the first-place title.

The other two schools participating in the ICSC competition are the University of Denver and the University of Colorado. In 2014, CU hosted the competition and took the first-place ranking, according to Button.

“I place a high value on these kinds of experiences for students,” Button said.

The students will also have an opportunity this year to visit the property they are analyzing. This is a privilege that the students in the competition last year did not have, Button said.

The CSU team consists of five business students. Team captain Sam White said the team meets on a minimum basis of once per week and has been preparing since the beginning of the semester for this competition.

“This is really exciting because we get to start furthering ourselves before we even graduate,” White said.

Each team will receive a cash prize for their place in the competition, but the real incentive is to have a professional example to help kickstart their career, White said.

“I think the biggest value of this competition is not necessarily the prize of winning, but it’s the face-time and the experience that you get to showcase to these judges and potential employers,” White said.

The other students participating with the CSU team are business students Denzel Myers, Jake Miller, Lance Eberhard and Zach Johnson.

Collegian Reporter Megan Braa can be reached at news@collegian.com or on Twitter @megan_braa.