HardtRock
Backstage
Back in the days
In 2001, Deka Immobilien, one of Germany’s largest open ended funds, threw me into cold water by giving me a €570 million, 157,000 sqm office, retail, and logistics portfolio to manage.
This included developing the Frankfurt landmark office building 'Herriot’s' (€124 million / 43,000 sqm) whilst completing 42,000 sqm leases to tenants like IBM, Nike, FIAT, Nortel, and FIFA.
It was real, real estate in its most core, conservative and institutional form.
Then in 2005, it knew ti was time to...
...bring in some Rock into Real Estate
London Calling
During the Deka days, I completed a UK based Master, which also introduced me to the UK investment universe and I was fascinated by its international, capital-markets-driven approach.
Soon later, London based Alpha Real Capital invited me to start and lead their German income fund.
Thirty-one transactions later, I had built a reputation as a hands-on fund manager with a weakness for complex cross-border transactions.
More importantly, I learned, that beauty in real estate lays in the eyes of the beholder as over the years, I regularly delivered higher returns with unglamorous, unspectacular assets than with prominent, glassy high risers.
Crisis Mode
Post-Lehman, Goldman Sachs/Archon made me Director for the firm’s €1.5 billion Central Region portfolio - 650,000 sqm across multiple asset classes.
Operating under severe capital constraints, I focused on cash preservation, strategic exits, and ensuring the delivery of the business plan to wind down the operations in Germany.
Whilst occupancy improved from 67% to 74%, I oversaw 400 lease agreements and €640 million in disposals.
It was asset management under fire and after the burst of the dot.com bubble, the second lesson how to deliver results despite the market turning against the odds.
Deal Driven
Next was Valad in Berlin, a Blackstone portfolio company.
After Valad's successful sale, Blackstone asked me to run their real estate operations in Germany. I hired a great team, supported the acquisitions and repositionings of landmark buildings such as the Pollux and the Messeturm in Frankfurt, as well as the Treptowers in Berlin.
Moving on as Head of Germany for Oxford Properties in 2018, I oversaw the repositioning strategy of the Sony Center Berlin and its integration into the European portfolio.
Beyond The Transactions
My Fellowship at the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, various panel memberships at leading German research institutes or lecturing at Real Estate Institutes are rather a life long learning privilege and pleasure than a commitment.
At Oxford, I took part in the program about the implementation of AI driven decision-making tools as well as in the digital automatization of real estate processes at The MIT School of Architecture and Planning.
Being allowed to operate across both, board-level strategy and operational execution, to adapt to different international culture and organizational styles and to anticipate and respond to ever changing market dynamics is what fascinates me about the real estate business to this day.
Tbc...