Current Issue
Dec 1, 2007
Each year, CPN awards the commercial real estate industry's leading executives, those whose actions during the year exhibited creativity, foresight, innovation and strategic thought. Determined by a vote among the top executives across the industry, the Executives of the Year awards reflect the respect these leaders have earned from their peers.
Once again, CPN turned to the industry at large for nominations before narrowing down the selection and sending final ballots to the top two executives at each company or network across the industry. This year's results included our first triple winner, who also won Investor of the Year for the second consecutive year. That award was also a tie this year. In addition, we added recognition for Minority Leader of the Year to highlight the progress of minority members in the industry, as we already do with female leaders and rising leaders.
CPN congratulates this year's award winners, whose acquisitions, dispositions, mergers, development plans and new pursuits took place during a year that started out full throttle but ultimately proved challenging.
Executive of the Year
Investor of the Year
Innovator of the Year
Jonathan Gray
Jonathan Gray is a senior managing director & co-head of the real estate group for The Blackstone Group L.P., responsible for management of the group's investment activities and personnel in the United States. He has actively acquired both hotel-and office-focused public real estate companies since his 1992 debut at Blackstone, culminating in this year's closings on the purchases of Equity Office Properties Trust and Hilton Hotels Corp. The Equity Office deal closed for a record $39 billion, but Blackstone made even bigger real estate history when it flipped much of the portfolio for a total of at least $65 billion. The purchase of Hilton, which upon its announcement Gray said would be kept whole, was almost as large, at $26 billion. Previously, Gray had been involved in Blackstone's privatization of 10 other real estate companies, including Wyndham International, the Savoy Group, Extended Stay America, CarrAmerica Realty Corp. and—together with Brookfield Properties Corp.—Trizec Properties Inc.
Previously a member of Blackstone's corporate advisory services and private equity groups, Gray has a Bachelor of Science degree in economics from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of Pennsylvania, from which he graduated magna cum laude and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
Gray was named CPN's Investor of the Year last year.
Investor of the Year
Sam Zell
"Sam Zell" is arguably the best-known name in real estate, having attracted the industry's attention repeatedly over the years with opportunistic purchases, sales and other savvy business decisions. In February, Zell, as chairman, led the sale of Equity Office Properties Trust, the largest office REIT in the United States, to The Blackstone Group L.P. for $39 billion in what is said to be the largest private equity transaction in history.
His investments range from finance to energy to transportation, communications and real estate, and he chairs and maintains substantial interests in five New York Stock Exchange-listed companies, including Equity Residential Properties Trust, the largest apartment REIT in the United States; Equity Lifestyle Properties, an equity REIT that owns and operates manufactured-home communities in 26 states; Capital Trust, a specialized real estate finance company; and two non-real estate companies.
Zell is also the chairman of private entrepreneurial investment firm Equity Group Investments, the originator of three of the industry's largest REITs, as well as of privately held Equity International, which invests in real estate-related businesses outside the United States. Its deals have included public offerings for three international companies in which Zell maintains substantial interests: Gafisa, the leading homebuilder in Brazil; BR Malls, one of the largest shopping center owners and operators in Brazil; and Homex, the fastest-growing homebuilder in Mexico.
Zell's other activities include an April proposal to finance the sale of the Tribune Co. through an employee stock-ownership plan. He became a board member in May as part of the transaction and will become its chairman when the deal closes. Board memberships also include the JPMorgan National Advisory Board, the Eurohypo International Advisory Board, the President's Advisory Board at the University of Michigan and the Visitor's Committee at the University of Michigan Law School. In addition, he worked with the University of Michigan Business School to establish the Zell/Lurie Entrepreneurial Center and has worked to enhance the University of Michigan Business School's Polish Studies Program. The graduate of both the University of Michigan and the University of Michigan Law School has also been appointed a DeRoy Visiting Professor in Honors at the College of Literature, Science and the Arts at the university. He is also a longstanding supporter of the University of Pennsylvania Wharton Real Estate Center—and has endowed the Samuel Zell/Robert Lurie Real Estate Center at Wharton—as well as the Northwestern University Center for Risk Management.
Zell entered the real estate business as an undergraduate, managing apartment buildings throughout Southeast Michigan.
Developer of the Year
Bruce Ratner
Forest City Ratner Cos. chairman & CEO Bruce Ratner has led the company to become one of the most active urban real estate developers in the New York City metropolitan area.
The company has attracted significant attention—albeit also some controversy—with Atlantic Yards, a $4 billion mixed-use development spanning 22 acres in a predominantly industrial (though also residential) section of Brooklyn, N.Y. Designed by internationally acclaimed architect Frank Gehry, the project is anchored by the 850,000-square-foot, 18,000-seat Barclays Center, designed as the new home for the Nets basketball team, which Ratner and a group of investors purchased three years ago. The project also includes more than eight acres of public open space, 6,400 units of mixed-rate housing (more than 2,200 of them affordable housing), more than 336,000 square feet of commercial space, 247,000 square feet of retail space and a 165,000-square- foot hotel.
Forest City has a number of other major retail projects throughout the metropolitan area as well. In Lower Manhattan, it developed the headquarters for the New York Mercantile Exchange near the World Financial Center. In the Times Square area, it built the 42nd Street Retail and Entertainment Complex, a 335,000-square-foot complex featuring a 25-screen AMC Cineplex and a Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum, topped with a 25-story, 455-room Hilton Hotel that includes a sky-lobby restaurant. The firm also joined with The New York Times Co. to build its new Midtown headquarters, a 1.5 million-square-foot asset that includes 700,000 rentable square feet of Class A office space. In Battery Park City, the company has developed a 617,000-square-foot mixed-use complex that includes a 14-story Embassy Suites Hotel, retail stores and a 4,000-seat, 16-screen United Artists Theater.
Ratner graduated cum laude from Harvard College in 1967, earning a law degree from Columbia University School of Law in 1970. He then entered the government, joining the administration of New York City Mayor John Lindsay as director of a Model Cities program and later as the head of the consumer protection division of the Department of Consumer Affairs. After four years as a professor at New York University Law School, he became Commissioner of Consumer Affairs under Mayor Ed Koch, responsible for designing major initiatives in consumer-fraud protection that became models for national legislation.
During that tenure, Ratner became interested in major national retail outlets' tendency to underserve inner-city residents and New York City's own failure to utilize major business and transit hubs to offset corporations' flight to New Jersey and the surrounding suburbs, interests that remain key to Forest City Ratner today.
Ratner has also pursued a number of philanthropic endeavors, including serving as chairman of the Brooklyn Academy of Music from 1992 to 2001. He also created the MetroTech Downtown Fund, which encourages contributions to the arts from companies moving into Brooklyn, and in 1994 received the New York State Governor's Arts award. Two years later, the Metropolitan Museum of Art elected him as a trustee.
He serves on a number of other boards, including those of the Weill Cornell Medical College, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and the Museum of Jewish Heritage.
Brokerage Executive of the Year
Roger Staubach
Roger Staubach is executive chairman of the global real estate advisory firm The Staubach Co., which he founded 30 years ago after seeing a niche opportunity in representing users exclusively. Now a 1,500-person company serving more than 3,000 clients from over 65 North American offices, the company transacts business globally through an alliance with DTZ Staubach Tie Leung.
The firm has amassed relationships with such companies as Advanced Micro Devices, Blockbuster Inc., Burlington Northern Santa Fe, Carter & Burgess, Cisco Systems, CVS Corp., Office Max, Patterson Cos., PBS, PepsiCo, Science Applications International Corp., Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp., T-Mobile USA, Target Corp., Time Warner Cable, United Stationers and Wachovia Corp.
A 1965 graduate of the United States Naval Academy with a Bachelor of Science degree in engineering, Staubach served four years as a Navy officer. After the Navy, the 1963 Heisman Trophy winner joined the Dallas Cowboys football team, launching his real estate career with the Henry S. Miller Co. during the offseasons between 1970 and 1977.
Staubach sits on the boards of AMR Corp. and Cinemark Holdings Inc. and serves as chairman of the host committee for Super Bowl XLV, which will be held in North Texas in 2011. He is also involved with The Children's Cancer Fund, the United States Naval Academy Foundation and a variety of other civic, charitable and professional organizations.
He is also the recipient of numerous honors and awards, among them the 2006 Congressional Medal of Honor Patriot award, the NCAA Teddy Roosevelt award for being one of the 100 Most Influential NCAA Student-Athletes, the American Jewish Congress Torch of Conscience award, the United States Naval Academy Distinguished Graduate award and the Horatio Alger Award. He was also inducted as a lifelong member by the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans and named CPN Corporate Services Executive of the Year three times.
Financier of the Year
John Pelusi Jr.
Holliday Fenoglio Fowler L.P. executive managing director & managing member John Pelusi Jr. has more than 26 years of experience in commercial real estate, with over $15 billion worth of real estate transactions to his credit. They include investment sales, note sales, debt placement, equity, structured finance and loan servicing. As one of the 10 members of the firm's operating committee and managing member of the firm, Pelusi is responsible for the overall direction of its 18 offices throughout the nation. He is also the vice chairman & CEO of HFF Inc.
Pelusi's clients have included such well-known investors as Aetna Life Insurance Co., Bank of America Corp., Blackstone Real Estate Advisors, Federal Realty Investment Trust, ING Investment Management, JPMorgan Investment Management, Legg Mason Real Estate Services, Prudential Insurance Co., Simon Property Group Inc. and Starwood Capital Partners, among others.
With Master of Public Administration and Bachelors of Arts and Science degrees from the University of Pittsburgh, Pelusi joined Holliday Fenoglio in May 1998 from PNS Realty Advisors, where he was managing partner. He is currently on the boards of trustees for the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, as well as a member of the board for the Holy Family Foundation and Bidwell Manchester Craftsman's Guild. He is also a member of The Real Estate Roundtable, the International Council of Shopping Centers and the Mortgage Bankers Association.
Investment Banker of the Year
Roy March
Roy March is the CEO & senior partner in Eastdil Secured L.L.C., having joined predecessor Eastdil Realty in 1978. His experience runs the gamut from all types of financing to the sale, acquisition and management of all forms of real estate. He has transacted deals in the United States, Europe and the Far East.
March advised The Blackstone Group L.P. on its purchases of Equity Office Properties Trust, CarrAmerica Realty Corp. and Trizec Properties Inc., as well as its subsequent spinoff sales. His transactions have also included such landmark sales as those of The GM Building, Sears Tower, The Bank of America Building, Wyndham Hotels and Sardinia Resorts.
With a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of California at Davis, March is a member of the international advisory board for the Harvard University Real Estate Academic Initiative, the Wharton Advisory Board, the National Realty Committee executive committee for membership and the board of directors for the Nancy Davis Foundation for Multiple Sclerosis, as well as president of Friends of Malibu Urgent Care. He is also a member of the Urban Land Institute, the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, the International Council of Shopping Centers and the Pension Real Estate Association.
Eastdil Secured, the result of the January 2006 merger of Eastdil Realty and Secured Capital, completed more than $90 billion worth of transactions in 2006. The company specializes in raising capital across the range of product areas—including office, hotel, retail, industrial and multi-family—as well as the full spectrum of the capital markets—debt/equity, public/private, domestic/offshore and institutional/ non-institutional.
Female Leader of the Year
Debra Cafaro
Debra Cafaro is chairman, president & CEO of healthcare REIT Ventas Inc., which has a diversified portfolio of more than 500 independent- and assisted-living communities, hospitals, skilled-nursing facilities and medical office buildings in 43 U.S. states and two Canadian provinces.
Cafaro joined Ventas from Ambassador Apartments Inc., having served as president and a director for the multi-family REIT, which was acquired by American Investment and Management Co. in May 1998.
Earlier this year, Ventas acquired Sunrise Senior Living REIT and sold off 22 underperforming properties for $171.5 million to tenant Kindred Healthcare Inc., for a gain of about $120 million.
A graduate of the University of Notre Dame and the University of Chicago Law School, Cafaro previously served as a judicial clerk for Judge J. Dickson Phillips of the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, then practiced real estate, corporate and finance law. Cafaro also taught real estate transactions and finance as an adjunct professor for Northwestern University Law School.
She is a member of the board of directors of Weyerhaeuser Co. and treasurer of the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, as well as a member of the nominating committee for The Real Estate Roundtable. In addition, Cafaro chairs the visiting committee for the University of Chicago Law School and is a member of the owner's advisory board for Flight Options, The Chicago Network and the Illinois and Pennsylvania bars.
Lifetime Achievement
Milton Cooper
Milton Cooper is chairman & CEO of public shopping center REIT Kimco Realty Corp., which he co-founded in 1960 and took public in 1991. As of September 2007, the company had amassed a portfolio with equity interests in 1,959 properties totaling 183 million square feet in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, Mexico and Chile.
The company continues to expand internationally, develop actively and acquire avidly. Among its ventures, Kimco continues to expand its relationship with GE Real Estate in Mexico, with the total number of properties in the joint venture reaching 14 in September, with a total of 5 million square feet. Overall, it had more than 55 active development and redevelopment projects for its own portfolio, as well as 30 merchant development projects. It acquired 15 properties during the third quarter alone, and it was continuing to pursue innovative strategies to create shareholder value, including a number of commingled funds with expected launches in 2008.
Cooper is also a director for Getty Realty Corp. and Blue Ridge Real Estate/Big Boulder Corp. and a member of the executive committee of the board of governors for the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts. He is a former trustee for MassMutual Corporate Investors and MassMutual Participation Investors, a former chairman of the shopping center committee for the Real Estate Board of New York and a former trustee of the International Council of Shopping Centers. A graduate of The City College of New York, he earned a degree from Brooklyn Law School, serving as a partner in law firm Galpeer & Cooper before forming Kimco.
Last year, Cooper won CPN's Retail Property Executive of the Year award.
Rising Leader
John Gates
John Gates was named president & COO of The Staubach Co. effective July 1, 2007. His responsibilities include chairing the company's operating and executive committees and overseeing all North American operations. He is also involved in the development and execution of strategy for the overall business. In addition, Gates oversees day-to-day operations for Staubach's national industrial platform and its global corporate services business, while also serving as president of Staubach Corporate Services' Western region.
Previously, he spent six years as president of the Southwest corporate services division. He also oversaw both a large portion of the company's corporate services business and all its industrial business as executive vice president and was a Dallas-Fort Worth office leader. Under his leadership, the Southwest corporate services division increased business by 75 percent. During this time, he also led an effort to restructure much of the company's West Coast operations.
Before joining the management ranks, Gates built a career as a broker. During that time, he was considered a "top achiever" by the company, received repeated recognition by the Dallas Business Journal as a top 10 office broker in the Dallas area and won longtime client MCI WorldCom's Outstanding Vendor Service Award.
Gates has a Master of Business Administration degree with a finance concentration from the University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelor of Science degree in business and economics from Trinity University.
Minority Leader of the Year
Herman Bulls
Herman Bulls holds a variety of positions. As founder & CEO of Jones Lang LaSalle Public Institutions, he focuses on delivering integrated real estate solutions to government entities, nonprofit organizations, transportation facilities and higher-educational institutions. His more than 18 years at Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. have also included stints in development, investment management and business development/retention. He has built relationships with many of the company's leading clients, including the General Services Administration, the Department of the Army, the Department of State, the University of Pennsylvania, Duke University, George Washington University, Georgetown University, Georgia Tech and the Port of Oakland.
In 2000, Bulls temporarily left Jones Lang LaSalle to become executive vice president & COO of a $3 billion Fannie Mae Delegated Underwriting and Servicing lender. During that period, he was also a member of the board of Jones Lang LaSalle Americas. After improving marketing and operations and working with Fannie Mae to make loans for university student housing, he formed Bulls Advisory Group L.L.C., a firm that provides strategic advisory and implementation services to corporations, universities and government entities. Major clients include the University of Pennsylvania and the Lancaster County Convention Center Authority. He returned to Jones Lang LaSalle in January 2002 to oversee the public institutions business but also stayed active in the multi-family lending business, forming Bulls Capital Partners L.L.C., a Fannie Mae-approved DUS multi-family lender, in 2004. A joint venture between SunTrust Banks Inc. and Bulls Multifamily L.L.C., Bulls Capital offers products for multi-family owners that include small-loan solutions, affordable housing solutions, student housing, market-rate multi-family mortgages and credit facilities.
Bulls is also co-founder and was the inaugural president of African-American Real Estate Professionals, the more than 400-member professional association started in Washington, D.C. He has also been active in the formation and activities of the Real Estate Executive Council, an organization of the most senior African-American real estate executives across the nation.
But real estate was Bulls' second career. Prior to joining Jones Lang LaSalle, he was on active duty with the United States Army for almost 12 years, part of that time spent serving overseas in the Republic of Korea. Still a colonel in the Army Reserves, he was last on active duty working in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Financial Management at the Pentagon and as an assistant professor in the Department of Social Sciences at his alma mater, the United States Military Academy at West Point. His current reserve duty is as a professor of finance and management for West Point.
With a Master of Business Administration degree from Harvard Business School following his West Point degree in engineering, Bulls is a member of the Executive Leadership Council, an organization of senior African-American business executives from Fortune 500 companies, and served two years as chair of the Executive Leadership Foundation. He has also served on the boards of the Executive Leadership Council; the Foundation of Independent Higher Education, Leadership Washington; and Comfort Systems USA, for which he has served on the audit committee and chairs the compensation committee. He has also served on the advisory board for SunTrust Asset Management Advisors, a subsidiary of SunTrust Banks Inc.; the real estate advisory committee for the New York State Teachers' Retirement System, Chicago Title Insurance Co.'s Metropolitan D.C. advisory board, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Community and Friends Board and the West Point Board of Trustees. He is a member of the National Black MBA Association, The Real Estate Group of Washington D.C., the Urban Land Institute, Lambda Alpha International and the National Association of College and University Business Officers. He is also the immediate past chair of the Fannie Mae National Housing Advisory Council, a group of 50 senior finance, development and not-for-profit executives from around the nation who provide national perspective on housing market issues to the Fannie Mae chairman, CEO and executive management.
Office Property Executive of the Year
Michael Fascitelli
Michael Fascitelli is president of Vornado Realty Trust, which he joined in December 1996 from Goldman, Sachs & Co. During his tenure, he has helped build the REIT to become a major U.S. player, with 64 million square feet of commercial space, including 28 office properties totaling 16 million square feet in the New York City metropolitan area, located primarily in Midtown Manhattan; 83 office properties and one hotel totaling 17.6 million square feet in Washington, D.C., and Northern Virginia; 173 retail properties totaling 21.1 million square feet and in the United States and Puerto Rico; and 9.2 million square feet of Merchandise Mart properties in nine buildings, including the 3.4 million-square-foot Merchandise Mart in Chicago. The company also holds a 32.8 percent interest in Alexander's Inc., a 32.8 percent interest in Toys "R" Us, ownership of the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York City, a 47.6 percent interest in Americold Realty Trust, ownership of mezzanine loans for real estate-related companies and interests in a variety of other real estate.
Fascitelli, who has a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial engineering summa cum laude from the University of Rhode Island and a Master of Business Administration degree with highest distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration, worked for Bristol Myers Co., management-consulting firm McKinsey & Co. and Goldman Sachs' real estate department before joining Vornado. At Goldman Sachs, he became a partner in 1992, was head of the real estate investment banking business and served on the investment committee for the Whitehall Investment Funds.
Fascitelli's involvement in the real estate industry and his own community include service as a trustee & member of the Urban Land Institute, on the executive committee and as vice chairman of the Wharton Real Estate Center and on the board of the New York University Child Study Center, The Rockefeller University board of trustees and St. Bernard's board of trustees. He is also on the board of Dean's Advisors for Harvard Business School. He received the Good Scout award and the James E. West Fellow award in 1997 and he received the Silver Beaver Award in 2003 from the Greater New York Councils Boy Scouts of America. He also received CPN's 2006 Office Property Executive of the Year award.
Retail Property Executive of the Year
John Bucksbaum
John Bucksbaum is chairman, CEO & a member of the board of General Growth Properties Inc., the second-largest United States-based publicly traded REIT, with ownership interest and management responsibility for a portfolio of more than 210 regional shopping malls in 45 states, as well as ownership in planned community developments and commercial office buildings. The company's portfolio totals 200 million square feet of retail space and includes more than 24,000 retailers nationwide.
Bucksbaum received his bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Denver and joined family-founded General Growth in 1978. He was named CEO in 1999 and chairman in the summer of 2007.
Bucksbaum is a past chairman and member of the executive committee of the International Council of Shopping Centers, past chairman of the Samuel Zell/Robert Lurie Real Estate Center at The Wharton School, a trustee for the Urban Land Institute and the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts and a member of The Real Estate Roundtable and the University of California Real Estate Center. In addition, he serves on the boards of the University of Chicago Hospitals, U.S. Ski & Snowboard Team, USA Cycling Development Foundation and World T.E.A.M. Sports and is a member of the Young Presidents Organization and the advisory board of the Chicago chapter of the American Jewish Committee.
Hotel/Hospitality Property Executive of the Year
Christopher Nassetta
Christopher Nassetta became the new president & CEO of Hilton Hotels Corp. following The Blackstone Group L.P.'s recent purchase of the formerly public hotel giant, with a start date at the end of November. President & CEO of Host Hotels & Resorts Inc. since 2000, Nassetta joined that company in 1995. During his tenure, the the company more than doubled in size, while he significantly enhanced stockholder value and diversified the company's brands, building Host Hotels to become the largest lodging REIT and one of the largest owners of luxury and upper-upscale hotels.
He is charged with expanding Hilton Hotels' international presence, building on the portfolio gained through last year's merger with Hilton International and developing the company's luxury hotel collection, which is already benefiting from the Blackstone buy. Blackstone has said it will fold a significant number of its luxury hotels and resorts into Hilton.
A graduate of the University of Virginia McIntire School of Commerce with a degree in finance—who also studied international finance at the London School of Economics—Nassetta preceded his time working for Host Hotels at Bailey Capital Corp. real estate investment and advisory firm, which he co-founded in 1991. Before that, he spent seven years as chief development officer and in various other positions with The Oliver Carr Co.
Nassetta is a director for CoStar Group Inc., second vice chair and a member of the board of governors for the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, chairman of The Real Estate Roundtable and a member of the McIntire School of Commerce advisory board.
Industrial Property Executive of the Year
Jeffrey Schwartz
Jeffrey Schwartz added chairman responsibilities to his CEO position at ProLogis in May, succeeding K. Dane Brooksher, who Schwartz had succeeded as CEO in January 2005. In his current positions, Schwartz heads an industrial giant, with over $34.4 billion worth of assets under management, including more than 2,669 distribution facilities in 105 markets throughout North America, Europe and Asia. He also heads the public REIT's executive committee.
Schwartz has worked for ProLogis since 1994, when it acquired his Florida industrial development firm, The Krauss/Schwartz Co., the largest such firm in the state. At that time, he became managing director for ProLogis responsible for its U.S. development pipeline and its expansion into Mexico. Three years later, he became vice chairman of the company, taking it into Europe and establishing it as Europe's largest provider of warehouse facilities. In 2000, he became CEO of Vizional Technologies Inc., a ProLogis affiliate focused on supply-chain management and logistics services. Two years later, he became president of international operations as well as president & COO for Asia, responsible for building the company's portfolio in Japan and China.
Since becoming CEO, Schwartz has led the company's continuing expansion, including such major deals as its $5.3 billion merger with U.S. developer Catellus, a subsequent merger with European developer Parkridge Holdings and, more recently, a joint venture with SZITIC CP in China and entrance into the Middle East with plans to build a distribution facility in Dubai.
Schwartz received a Bachelor of Science degree with honors from Emory University and a Master of Business Administration degree from Harvard Business School.
Last year, he was awarded CPN's Developer of the Year and Industrial Property Executive of the Year awards.
Multi-Family Property Executive of the Year
J. Ronald Terwilliger
J. Ronald Terwilliger has served as chairman & CEO of Trammell Crow Residential since 1986, driving the company in its growth as a leading multi-family developer. The firm now operates 23 offices throughout the United States.
An honor graduate of the United States Naval Academy, Terwilliger served for five years in the Navy, then received a Master of Business Administration degree with high distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Business, where he was elected a Baker Scholar.
His focus on housing has expanded to affordable and workforce housing. A past Urban Land Institute chairman of the who continues to serve on the governance committee, he recently made a $5 million gift to establish the ULI Terwilliger Center for Workforce Housing. He also made a $5 million gift to the Enterprise Foundation to create the Enterprise Terwilliger Fund, which aims to build 2,000 affordable homes annually. And in late October, he was elected chairman of Habitat for Humanity International's 28-member board of directors. That followed seven years of service on the board, most recently as vice chairman and chairman of the resource development and communications committee.
Terwilliger is also chairman emeritus of the Wharton Real Estate Center, past chairman of the Atlanta Neighborhood Development Partnership, a director for the Naval Academy Foundation, subcommittee chairman of the Naval Academy Athletic Committee, immediate past chairman of the National Association of Homebuilders Multifamily Leadership Board and a member of the executive committee for Enterprise Community Partners' board of trustees.
Net Lease Property Executive of the Year
Barclay Jones III
Barclay Jones III became executive vice president of investments for iStar Financial Inc. in March 2000. As such, he focuses on the corporate-loan and tenant-lease investment activity for the major commercial real estate finance company.
Jones joined iStar Financial from a position as a principal for ACRE Partners L.L.C., a privately held firm providing public and private corporations with highly structured, value-added financing solutions for their corporate real estate facilities.
A graduate in finance and economics from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, he served in a variety of capacities, including vice chairman and chief acquisitions officer, for W. P. Carey & Co. from 1982 to 1998. During that period, he was responsible for originating more than $2 billion in sale-leaseback financings and over $1 billion in mortgage placements. During his tenure at W. P. Carey, the firm grew from fewer than 10 employees to more than 70 and from $100 million in assets to over $2.5 billion.
Jones also was voted CPN's Net Lease Property Executive of the Year last year.
Each year, CPN awards the commercial real estate industry's leading executives, those whose actions during the year exhibited creativity, foresight, innovation and strategic thought. Determined by a vote among the top executives across the industry, the Executives of the Year awards reflect the respect these leaders have earned from their peers.
Once again, CPN turned to the industry at large for nominations before narrowing down the selection and sending final ballots to the top two executives at each company or network across the industry. This year's results included our first triple winner, who also won Investor of the Year for the second consecutive year. That award was also a tie this year. In addition, we added recognition for Minority Leader of the Year to highlight the progress of minority members in the industry, as we already do with female leaders and rising leaders.
CPN congratulates this year's award winners, whose acquisitions, dispositions, mergers, development plans and new pursuits took place during a year that started out full throttle but ultimately proved challenging.
Executive of the Year
Investor of the Year
Innovator of the Year
Jonathan Gray
Jonathan Gray is a senior managing director & co-head of the real estate group for The Blackstone Group L.P., responsible for management of the group's investment activities and personnel in the United States. He has actively acquired both hotel-and office-focused public real estate companies since his 1992 debut at Blackstone, culminating in this year's closings on the purchases of Equity Office Properties Trust and Hilton Hotels Corp. The Equity Office deal closed for a record $39 billion, but Blackstone made even bigger real estate history when it flipped much of the portfolio for a total of at least $65 billion. The purchase of Hilton, which upon its announcement Gray said would be kept whole, was almost as large, at $26 billion. Previously, Gray had been involved in Blackstone's privatization of 10 other real estate companies, including Wyndham International, the Savoy Group, Extended Stay America, CarrAmerica Realty Corp. and—together with Brookfield Properties Corp.—Trizec Properties Inc.
Previously a member of Blackstone's corporate advisory services and private equity groups, Gray has a Bachelor of Science degree in economics from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of Pennsylvania, from which he graduated magna cum laude and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
Gray was named CPN's Investor of the Year last year.
Investor of the Year
Sam Zell
"Sam Zell" is arguably the best-known name in real estate, having attracted the industry's attention repeatedly over the years with opportunistic purchases, sales and other savvy business decisions. In February, Zell, as chairman, led the sale of Equity Office Properties Trust, the largest office REIT in the United States, to The Blackstone Group L.P. for $39 billion in what is said to be the largest private equity transaction in history.
His investments range from finance to energy to transportation, communications and real estate, and he chairs and maintains substantial interests in five New York Stock Exchange-listed companies, including Equity Residential Properties Trust, the largest apartment REIT in the United States; Equity Lifestyle Properties, an equity REIT that owns and operates manufactured-home communities in 26 states; Capital Trust, a specialized real estate finance company; and two non-real estate companies.
Zell is also the chairman of private entrepreneurial investment firm Equity Group Investments, the originator of three of the industry's largest REITs, as well as of privately held Equity International, which invests in real estate-related businesses outside the United States. Its deals have included public offerings for three international companies in which Zell maintains substantial interests: Gafisa, the leading homebuilder in Brazil; BR Malls, one of the largest shopping center owners and operators in Brazil; and Homex, the fastest-growing homebuilder in Mexico.
Zell's other activities include an April proposal to finance the sale of the Tribune Co. through an employee stock-ownership plan. He became a board member in May as part of the transaction and will become its chairman when the deal closes. Board memberships also include the JPMorgan National Advisory Board, the Eurohypo International Advisory Board, the President's Advisory Board at the University of Michigan and the Visitor's Committee at the University of Michigan Law School. In addition, he worked with the University of Michigan Business School to establish the Zell/Lurie Entrepreneurial Center and has worked to enhance the University of Michigan Business School's Polish Studies Program. The graduate of both the University of Michigan and the University of Michigan Law School has also been appointed a DeRoy Visiting Professor in Honors at the College of Literature, Science and the Arts at the university. He is also a longstanding supporter of the University of Pennsylvania Wharton Real Estate Center—and has endowed the Samuel Zell/Robert Lurie Real Estate Center at Wharton—as well as the Northwestern University Center for Risk Management.
Zell entered the real estate business as an undergraduate, managing apartment buildings throughout Southeast Michigan.
Developer of the Year
Bruce Ratner
Forest City Ratner Cos. chairman & CEO Bruce Ratner has led the company to become one of the most active urban real estate developers in the New York City metropolitan area.
The company has attracted significant attention—albeit also some controversy—with Atlantic Yards, a $4 billion mixed-use development spanning 22 acres in a predominantly industrial (though also residential) section of Brooklyn, N.Y. Designed by internationally acclaimed architect Frank Gehry, the project is anchored by the 850,000-square-foot, 18,000-seat Barclays Center, designed as the new home for the Nets basketball team, which Ratner and a group of investors purchased three years ago. The project also includes more than eight acres of public open space, 6,400 units of mixed-rate housing (more than 2,200 of them affordable housing), more than 336,000 square feet of commercial space, 247,000 square feet of retail space and a 165,000-square- foot hotel.
Forest City has a number of other major retail projects throughout the metropolitan area as well. In Lower Manhattan, it developed the headquarters for the New York Mercantile Exchange near the World Financial Center. In the Times Square area, it built the 42nd Street Retail and Entertainment Complex, a 335,000-square-foot complex featuring a 25-screen AMC Cineplex and a Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum, topped with a 25-story, 455-room Hilton Hotel that includes a sky-lobby restaurant. The firm also joined with The New York Times Co. to build its new Midtown headquarters, a 1.5 million-square-foot asset that includes 700,000 rentable square feet of Class A office space. In Battery Park City, the company has developed a 617,000-square-foot mixed-use complex that includes a 14-story Embassy Suites Hotel, retail stores and a 4,000-seat, 16-screen United Artists Theater.
Ratner graduated cum laude from Harvard College in 1967, earning a law degree from Columbia University School of Law in 1970. He then entered the government, joining the administration of New York City Mayor John Lindsay as director of a Model Cities program and later as the head of the consumer protection division of the Department of Consumer Affairs. After four years as a professor at New York University Law School, he became Commissioner of Consumer Affairs under Mayor Ed Koch, responsible for designing major initiatives in consumer-fraud protection that became models for national legislation.
During that tenure, Ratner became interested in major national retail outlets' tendency to underserve inner-city residents and New York City's own failure to utilize major business and transit hubs to offset corporations' flight to New Jersey and the surrounding suburbs, interests that remain key to Forest City Ratner today.
Ratner has also pursued a number of philanthropic endeavors, including serving as chairman of the Brooklyn Academy of Music from 1992 to 2001. He also created the MetroTech Downtown Fund, which encourages contributions to the arts from companies moving into Brooklyn, and in 1994 received the New York State Governor's Arts award. Two years later, the Metropolitan Museum of Art elected him as a trustee.
He serves on a number of other boards, including those of the Weill Cornell Medical College, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and the Museum of Jewish Heritage.
Brokerage Executive of the Year
Roger Staubach
Roger Staubach is executive chairman of the global real estate advisory firm The Staubach Co., which he founded 30 years ago after seeing a niche opportunity in representing users exclusively. Now a 1,500-person company serving more than 3,000 clients from over 65 North American offices, the company transacts business globally through an alliance with DTZ Staubach Tie Leung.
The firm has amassed relationships with such companies as Advanced Micro Devices, Blockbuster Inc., Burlington Northern Santa Fe, Carter & Burgess, Cisco Systems, CVS Corp., Office Max, Patterson Cos., PBS, PepsiCo, Science Applications International Corp., Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp., T-Mobile USA, Target Corp., Time Warner Cable, United Stationers and Wachovia Corp.
A 1965 graduate of the United States Naval Academy with a Bachelor of Science degree in engineering, Staubach served four years as a Navy officer. After the Navy, the 1963 Heisman Trophy winner joined the Dallas Cowboys football team, launching his real estate career with the Henry S. Miller Co. during the offseasons between 1970 and 1977.
Staubach sits on the boards of AMR Corp. and Cinemark Holdings Inc. and serves as chairman of the host committee for Super Bowl XLV, which will be held in North Texas in 2011. He is also involved with The Children's Cancer Fund, the United States Naval Academy Foundation and a variety of other civic, charitable and professional organizations.
He is also the recipient of numerous honors and awards, among them the 2006 Congressional Medal of Honor Patriot award, the NCAA Teddy Roosevelt award for being one of the 100 Most Influential NCAA Student-Athletes, the American Jewish Congress Torch of Conscience award, the United States Naval Academy Distinguished Graduate award and the Horatio Alger Award. He was also inducted as a lifelong member by the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans and named CPN Corporate Services Executive of the Year three times.
Financier of the Year
John Pelusi Jr.
Holliday Fenoglio Fowler L.P. executive managing director & managing member John Pelusi Jr. has more than 26 years of experience in commercial real estate, with over $15 billion worth of real estate transactions to his credit. They include investment sales, note sales, debt placement, equity, structured finance and loan servicing. As one of the 10 members of the firm's operating committee and managing member of the firm, Pelusi is responsible for the overall direction of its 18 offices throughout the nation. He is also the vice chairman & CEO of HFF Inc.
Pelusi's clients have included such well-known investors as Aetna Life Insurance Co., Bank of America Corp., Blackstone Real Estate Advisors, Federal Realty Investment Trust, ING Investment Management, JPMorgan Investment Management, Legg Mason Real Estate Services, Prudential Insurance Co., Simon Property Group Inc. and Starwood Capital Partners, among others.
With Master of Public Administration and Bachelors of Arts and Science degrees from the University of Pittsburgh, Pelusi joined Holliday Fenoglio in May 1998 from PNS Realty Advisors, where he was managing partner. He is currently on the boards of trustees for the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, as well as a member of the board for the Holy Family Foundation and Bidwell Manchester Craftsman's Guild. He is also a member of The Real Estate Roundtable, the International Council of Shopping Centers and the Mortgage Bankers Association.
Investment Banker of the Year
Roy March
Roy March is the CEO & senior partner in Eastdil Secured L.L.C., having joined predecessor Eastdil Realty in 1978. His experience runs the gamut from all types of financing to the sale, acquisition and management of all forms of real estate. He has transacted deals in the United States, Europe and the Far East.
March advised The Blackstone Group L.P. on its purchases of Equity Office Properties Trust, CarrAmerica Realty Corp. and Trizec Properties Inc., as well as its subsequent spinoff sales. His transactions have also included such landmark sales as those of The GM Building, Sears Tower, The Bank of America Building, Wyndham Hotels and Sardinia Resorts.
With a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of California at Davis, March is a member of the international advisory board for the Harvard University Real Estate Academic Initiative, the Wharton Advisory Board, the National Realty Committee executive committee for membership and the board of directors for the Nancy Davis Foundation for Multiple Sclerosis, as well as president of Friends of Malibu Urgent Care. He is also a member of the Urban Land Institute, the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, the International Council of Shopping Centers and the Pension Real Estate Association.
Eastdil Secured, the result of the January 2006 merger of Eastdil Realty and Secured Capital, completed more than $90 billion worth of transactions in 2006. The company specializes in raising capital across the range of product areas—including office, hotel, retail, industrial and multi-family—as well as the full spectrum of the capital markets—debt/equity, public/private, domestic/offshore and institutional/ non-institutional.
Female Leader of the Year
Debra Cafaro
Debra Cafaro is chairman, president & CEO of healthcare REIT Ventas Inc., which has a diversified portfolio of more than 500 independent- and assisted-living communities, hospitals, skilled-nursing facilities and medical office buildings in 43 U.S. states and two Canadian provinces.
Cafaro joined Ventas from Ambassador Apartments Inc., having served as president and a director for the multi-family REIT, which was acquired by American Investment and Management Co. in May 1998.
Earlier this year, Ventas acquired Sunrise Senior Living REIT and sold off 22 underperforming properties for $171.5 million to tenant Kindred Healthcare Inc., for a gain of about $120 million.
A graduate of the University of Notre Dame and the University of Chicago Law School, Cafaro previously served as a judicial clerk for Judge J. Dickson Phillips of the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, then practiced real estate, corporate and finance law. Cafaro also taught real estate transactions and finance as an adjunct professor for Northwestern University Law School.
She is a member of the board of directors of Weyerhaeuser Co. and treasurer of the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, as well as a member of the nominating committee for The Real Estate Roundtable. In addition, Cafaro chairs the visiting committee for the University of Chicago Law School and is a member of the owner's advisory board for Flight Options, The Chicago Network and the Illinois and Pennsylvania bars.
Lifetime Achievement
Milton Cooper
Milton Cooper is chairman & CEO of public shopping center REIT Kimco Realty Corp., which he co-founded in 1960 and took public in 1991. As of September 2007, the company had amassed a portfolio with equity interests in 1,959 properties totaling 183 million square feet in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, Mexico and Chile.
The company continues to expand internationally, develop actively and acquire avidly. Among its ventures, Kimco continues to expand its relationship with GE Real Estate in Mexico, with the total number of properties in the joint venture reaching 14 in September, with a total of 5 million square feet. Overall, it had more than 55 active development and redevelopment projects for its own portfolio, as well as 30 merchant development projects. It acquired 15 properties during the third quarter alone, and it was continuing to pursue innovative strategies to create shareholder value, including a number of commingled funds with expected launches in 2008.
Cooper is also a director for Getty Realty Corp. and Blue Ridge Real Estate/Big Boulder Corp. and a member of the executive committee of the board of governors for the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts. He is a former trustee for MassMutual Corporate Investors and MassMutual Participation Investors, a former chairman of the shopping center committee for the Real Estate Board of New York and a former trustee of the International Council of Shopping Centers. A graduate of The City College of New York, he earned a degree from Brooklyn Law School, serving as a partner in law firm Galpeer & Cooper before forming Kimco.
Last year, Cooper won CPN's Retail Property Executive of the Year award.
Rising Leader
John Gates
John Gates was named president & COO of The Staubach Co. effective July 1, 2007. His responsibilities include chairing the company's operating and executive committees and overseeing all North American operations. He is also involved in the development and execution of strategy for the overall business. In addition, Gates oversees day-to-day operations for Staubach's national industrial platform and its global corporate services business, while also serving as president of Staubach Corporate Services' Western region.
Previously, he spent six years as president of the Southwest corporate services division. He also oversaw both a large portion of the company's corporate services business and all its industrial business as executive vice president and was a Dallas-Fort Worth office leader. Under his leadership, the Southwest corporate services division increased business by 75 percent. During this time, he also led an effort to restructure much of the company's West Coast operations.
Before joining the management ranks, Gates built a career as a broker. During that time, he was considered a "top achiever" by the company, received repeated recognition by the Dallas Business Journal as a top 10 office broker in the Dallas area and won longtime client MCI WorldCom's Outstanding Vendor Service Award.
Gates has a Master of Business Administration degree with a finance concentration from the University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelor of Science degree in business and economics from Trinity University.
Minority Leader of the Year
Herman Bulls
Herman Bulls holds a variety of positions. As founder & CEO of Jones Lang LaSalle Public Institutions, he focuses on delivering integrated real estate solutions to government entities, nonprofit organizations, transportation facilities and higher-educational institutions. His more than 18 years at Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. have also included stints in development, investment management and business development/retention. He has built relationships with many of the company's leading clients, including the General Services Administration, the Department of the Army, the Department of State, the University of Pennsylvania, Duke University, George Washington University, Georgetown University, Georgia Tech and the Port of Oakland.
In 2000, Bulls temporarily left Jones Lang LaSalle to become executive vice president & COO of a $3 billion Fannie Mae Delegated Underwriting and Servicing lender. During that period, he was also a member of the board of Jones Lang LaSalle Americas. After improving marketing and operations and working with Fannie Mae to make loans for university student housing, he formed Bulls Advisory Group L.L.C., a firm that provides strategic advisory and implementation services to corporations, universities and government entities. Major clients include the University of Pennsylvania and the Lancaster County Convention Center Authority. He returned to Jones Lang LaSalle in January 2002 to oversee the public institutions business but also stayed active in the multi-family lending business, forming Bulls Capital Partners L.L.C., a Fannie Mae-approved DUS multi-family lender, in 2004. A joint venture between SunTrust Banks Inc. and Bulls Multifamily L.L.C., Bulls Capital offers products for multi-family owners that include small-loan solutions, affordable housing solutions, student housing, market-rate multi-family mortgages and credit facilities.
Bulls is also co-founder and was the inaugural president of African-American Real Estate Professionals, the more than 400-member professional association started in Washington, D.C. He has also been active in the formation and activities of the Real Estate Executive Council, an organization of the most senior African-American real estate executives across the nation.
But real estate was Bulls' second career. Prior to joining Jones Lang LaSalle, he was on active duty with the United States Army for almost 12 years, part of that time spent serving overseas in the Republic of Korea. Still a colonel in the Army Reserves, he was last on active duty working in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Financial Management at the Pentagon and as an assistant professor in the Department of Social Sciences at his alma mater, the United States Military Academy at West Point. His current reserve duty is as a professor of finance and management for West Point.
With a Master of Business Administration degree from Harvard Business School following his West Point degree in engineering, Bulls is a member of the Executive Leadership Council, an organization of senior African-American business executives from Fortune 500 companies, and served two years as chair of the Executive Leadership Foundation. He has also served on the boards of the Executive Leadership Council; the Foundation of Independent Higher Education, Leadership Washington; and Comfort Systems USA, for which he has served on the audit committee and chairs the compensation committee. He has also served on the advisory board for SunTrust Asset Management Advisors, a subsidiary of SunTrust Banks Inc.; the real estate advisory committee for the New York State Teachers' Retirement System, Chicago Title Insurance Co.'s Metropolitan D.C. advisory board, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Community and Friends Board and the West Point Board of Trustees. He is a member of the National Black MBA Association, The Real Estate Group of Washington D.C., the Urban Land Institute, Lambda Alpha International and the National Association of College and University Business Officers. He is also the immediate past chair of the Fannie Mae National Housing Advisory Council, a group of 50 senior finance, development and not-for-profit executives from around the nation who provide national perspective on housing market issues to the Fannie Mae chairman, CEO and executive management.
Office Property Executive of the Year
Michael Fascitelli
Michael Fascitelli is president of Vornado Realty Trust, which he joined in December 1996 from Goldman, Sachs & Co. During his tenure, he has helped build the REIT to become a major U.S. player, with 64 million square feet of commercial space, including 28 office properties totaling 16 million square feet in the New York City metropolitan area, located primarily in Midtown Manhattan; 83 office properties and one hotel totaling 17.6 million square feet in Washington, D.C., and Northern Virginia; 173 retail properties totaling 21.1 million square feet and in the United States and Puerto Rico; and 9.2 million square feet of Merchandise Mart properties in nine buildings, including the 3.4 million-square-foot Merchandise Mart in Chicago. The company also holds a 32.8 percent interest in Alexander's Inc., a 32.8 percent interest in Toys "R" Us, ownership of the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York City, a 47.6 percent interest in Americold Realty Trust, ownership of mezzanine loans for real estate-related companies and interests in a variety of other real estate.
Fascitelli, who has a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial engineering summa cum laude from the University of Rhode Island and a Master of Business Administration degree with highest distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration, worked for Bristol Myers Co., management-consulting firm McKinsey & Co. and Goldman Sachs' real estate department before joining Vornado. At Goldman Sachs, he became a partner in 1992, was head of the real estate investment banking business and served on the investment committee for the Whitehall Investment Funds.
Fascitelli's involvement in the real estate industry and his own community include service as a trustee & member of the Urban Land Institute, on the executive committee and as vice chairman of the Wharton Real Estate Center and on the board of the New York University Child Study Center, The Rockefeller University board of trustees and St. Bernard's board of trustees. He is also on the board of Dean's Advisors for Harvard Business School. He received the Good Scout award and the James E. West Fellow award in 1997 and he received the Silver Beaver Award in 2003 from the Greater New York Councils Boy Scouts of America. He also received CPN's 2006 Office Property Executive of the Year award.
Retail Property Executive of the Year
John Bucksbaum
John Bucksbaum is chairman, CEO & a member of the board of General Growth Properties Inc., the second-largest United States-based publicly traded REIT, with ownership interest and management responsibility for a portfolio of more than 210 regional shopping malls in 45 states, as well as ownership in planned community developments and commercial office buildings. The company's portfolio totals 200 million square feet of retail space and includes more than 24,000 retailers nationwide.
Bucksbaum received his bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Denver and joined family-founded General Growth in 1978. He was named CEO in 1999 and chairman in the summer of 2007.
Bucksbaum is a past chairman and member of the executive committee of the International Council of Shopping Centers, past chairman of the Samuel Zell/Robert Lurie Real Estate Center at The Wharton School, a trustee for the Urban Land Institute and the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts and a member of The Real Estate Roundtable and the University of California Real Estate Center. In addition, he serves on the boards of the University of Chicago Hospitals, U.S. Ski & Snowboard Team, USA Cycling Development Foundation and World T.E.A.M. Sports and is a member of the Young Presidents Organization and the advisory board of the Chicago chapter of the American Jewish Committee.
Hotel/Hospitality Property Executive of the Year
Christopher Nassetta
Christopher Nassetta became the new president & CEO of Hilton Hotels Corp. following The Blackstone Group L.P.'s recent purchase of the formerly public hotel giant, with a start date at the end of November. President & CEO of Host Hotels & Resorts Inc. since 2000, Nassetta joined that company in 1995. During his tenure, the the company more than doubled in size, while he significantly enhanced stockholder value and diversified the company's brands, building Host Hotels to become the largest lodging REIT and one of the largest owners of luxury and upper-upscale hotels.
He is charged with expanding Hilton Hotels' international presence, building on the portfolio gained through last year's merger with Hilton International and developing the company's luxury hotel collection, which is already benefiting from the Blackstone buy. Blackstone has said it will fold a significant number of its luxury hotels and resorts into Hilton.
A graduate of the University of Virginia McIntire School of Commerce with a degree in finance—who also studied international finance at the London School of Economics—Nassetta preceded his time working for Host Hotels at Bailey Capital Corp. real estate investment and advisory firm, which he co-founded in 1991. Before that, he spent seven years as chief development officer and in various other positions with The Oliver Carr Co.
Nassetta is a director for CoStar Group Inc., second vice chair and a member of the board of governors for the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, chairman of The Real Estate Roundtable and a member of the McIntire School of Commerce advisory board.
Industrial Property Executive of the Year
Jeffrey Schwartz
Jeffrey Schwartz added chairman responsibilities to his CEO position at ProLogis in May, succeeding K. Dane Brooksher, who Schwartz had succeeded as CEO in January 2005. In his current positions, Schwartz heads an industrial giant, with over $34.4 billion worth of assets under management, including more than 2,669 distribution facilities in 105 markets throughout North America, Europe and Asia. He also heads the public REIT's executive committee.
Schwartz has worked for ProLogis since 1994, when it acquired his Florida industrial development firm, The Krauss/Schwartz Co., the largest such firm in the state. At that time, he became managing director for ProLogis responsible for its U.S. development pipeline and its expansion into Mexico. Three years later, he became vice chairman of the company, taking it into Europe and establishing it as Europe's largest provider of warehouse facilities. In 2000, he became CEO of Vizional Technologies Inc., a ProLogis affiliate focused on supply-chain management and logistics services. Two years later, he became president of international operations as well as president & COO for Asia, responsible for building the company's portfolio in Japan and China.
Since becoming CEO, Schwartz has led the company's continuing expansion, including such major deals as its $5.3 billion merger with U.S. developer Catellus, a subsequent merger with European developer Parkridge Holdings and, more recently, a joint venture with SZITIC CP in China and entrance into the Middle East with plans to build a distribution facility in Dubai.
Schwartz received a Bachelor of Science degree with honors from Emory University and a Master of Business Administration degree from Harvard Business School.
Last year, he was awarded CPN's Developer of the Year and Industrial Property Executive of the Year awards.
Multi-Family Property Executive of the Year
J. Ronald Terwilliger
J. Ronald Terwilliger has served as chairman & CEO of Trammell Crow Residential since 1986, driving the company in its growth as a leading multi-family developer. The firm now operates 23 offices throughout the United States.
An honor graduate of the United States Naval Academy, Terwilliger served for five years in the Navy, then received a Master of Business Administration degree with high distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Business, where he was elected a Baker Scholar.
His focus on housing has expanded to affordable and workforce housing. A past Urban Land Institute chairman of the who continues to serve on the governance committee, he recently made a $5 million gift to establish the ULI Terwilliger Center for Workforce Housing. He also made a $5 million gift to the Enterprise Foundation to create the Enterprise Terwilliger Fund, which aims to build 2,000 affordable homes annually. And in late October, he was elected chairman of Habitat for Humanity International's 28-member board of directors. That followed seven years of service on the board, most recently as vice chairman and chairman of the resource development and communications committee.
Terwilliger is also chairman emeritus of the Wharton Real Estate Center, past chairman of the Atlanta Neighborhood Development Partnership, a director for the Naval Academy Foundation, subcommittee chairman of the Naval Academy Athletic Committee, immediate past chairman of the National Association of Homebuilders Multifamily Leadership Board and a member of the executive committee for Enterprise Community Partners' board of trustees.
Net Lease Property Executive of the Year
Barclay Jones III
Barclay Jones III became executive vice president of investments for iStar Financial Inc. in March 2000. As such, he focuses on the corporate-loan and tenant-lease investment activity for the major commercial real estate finance company.
Jones joined iStar Financial from a position as a principal for ACRE Partners L.L.C., a privately held firm providing public and private corporations with highly structured, value-added financing solutions for their corporate real estate facilities.
A graduate in finance and economics from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, he served in a variety of capacities, including vice chairman and chief acquisitions officer, for W. P. Carey & Co. from 1982 to 1998. During that period, he was responsible for originating more than $2 billion in sale-leaseback financings and over $1 billion in mortgage placements. During his tenure at W. P. Carey, the firm grew from fewer than 10 employees to more than 70 and from $100 million in assets to over $2.5 billion.
Jones also was voted CPN's Net Lease Property Executive of the Year last year.
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Aug. 01, 2008
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