Here is what your fellow Columbia Business School Real Estate Alumni have been doing recently. If you don’t see your news mentioned, please let us know.

Hodes Weill Appoints Ross Smotrich to Advisory Board
Hodes Weill & Associates (Hodes Weill), a global real estate advisory firm, is pleased to announce the appointment of Ross Smotrich as an Advisory Board Member. Mr. Smotrich most recently served as a Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Barclays, where he led the research team responsible for covering the real estate investment trust (REIT) and real estate securities industries. Prior to joining Barclays, Mr. Smotrich led the REIT research business at Bear Stearns, moving his team to Lehman Brothers in 2008, shortly before its acquisition by Barclays.

Howard Hughes Corp. Names New President
The Howard Hughes Corp. has appointed CFO David O’Reilly as president of the company. O’Reilly will continue to serve as chief financial officer, a position he has occupied since joining in 2016, thus expanding his leadership role. The move is part of the Dallas-based firm’s reorganization strategy that included naming a new CEO in October.

C&W Brokers $19.5M Loan for NJ Office Property
“We congratulate ML7 and Univest on the closing of this re-financing. This process commenced post-Covid and is a testament to the strength of this asset, as well as all the parties involved in this process, that we achieved such a seamless execution,” said Gideon Gil. “ML7’s strong sponsorship coupled with steady fundamentals in the Princeton office market led Univest Bank and Trust to put forth a compelling financing package that emphasized their understanding of the client’s long-term goals.”

CushWake Lines Up Acquisition Debt for Downtown BK Rentals
“USAA Real Estate had conviction about the caliber of this new property and the institutional sponsorship,” said Gil. “Their unwavering commitment during a difficult period in the capital markets ensured a timely execution for our client. USAA Real Estate provided a custom debt solution that was perfect for this acquisition.”

Who’s News: Helmsly Spear Bolsters Rank; Drew Warshaw Joins Enterprise

Enterprise Community Partners announced that Drew Warshaw will serve as the first Chief Operating Officer (COO) for Enterprise and its family of companies. As COO, Warshaw will oversee the implementation of Enterprise’s forthcoming five-year strategic plan. He joins Enterprise from Clearway Energy Group, among the three largest renewable energy companies in the United States. Before that, he helped launch the Renewables division of NRG Energy, Inc., a Fortune 250 company, a division which was later acquired and reorganized as Clearway.

Lenders of Different Stripes Weigh In on Financing Moving Targets in Today’s Market
“As transitional lenders, just given that the acquisition and investment sales markets drive a lot of our activity, there has been a slowdown there,” said Amherst Capital managing director and head of originations Abbe Franchot-Borok, who said most of the firm’s loan book is term financed in a CLO in which it is the servicer. “[In] the first six weeks of the pandemic, we and many of our competitors were playing defense and making sure we were focused on the existing portfolios.” But as May progressed, Franchot-Borok said she began looking at other opportunities in the market, adding that the firm’s two focuses right now are originating new deals to its existing equity partners who are finding “interesting opportunities” and following loan portfolios that have been put on the market, “primarily driven by liquidity issues by other debt funds and we’re underwriting some of those and… we’ll see more opportunities in that space going forward.”

NYC Hotels Battered by Pandemic Face Rift Over Safety Rules

“The majority of owners and operators are shocked and are clueless as to how they can reopen a closed hotel with the very costly and very cumbersome new union demands,” said Jonathan Falik, chief executive officer of JF Capital Advisors, which works with hotel owners. “It will force many of the existing hotels to remain closed, file for bankruptcy or convert to other uses.”

People on the Move
HVS Executive Search has promoted Rachel Levitt to SVP in North America. Levitt works with a diverse hospitality client base which includes hotel management, private equity, restaurant brands and hotel real estate companies. Prior to joining HVS, her experience included finance, business development, and project management roles with companies ranging from Fortune 500 to entrepreneurial ventures.

What Will Your Office Look Like After Coronavirus?
When there is a return to normalcy, the question becomes “What will the office — or lack thereof — mean for the American worker?” Experts believe that “flex” work will likely be the dominant model. “I predict more companies will have a flexible policy. Work from the office when you want and work from home when you want,” Jonathan Wasserstrum, CEO and Co-Founder of commercial real-estate company SquareFoot, tells InsideHook. “There is an increased desire for flexibility. I believe that flexible space as an offering is going to increase in the coming years.”

Robert Reffkin Recounts Instances of Racism
As a young man in New York, Robert Reffkin was stopped by police who left his white friends alone. He watched taxis pass him by “over a hundred times.” And when he started working, at Goldman Sachs and McKinsey, he often felt isolated as the only black man in a sea of white faces.

Compass CEO Encourages Agents to Spend Billions with Black Vendors
Robert Reffkin is inviting his company’s approximately 15,000 agents to guide 15 percent of their spend to Black-owned companies or vendors.

$1.3 Billion in Sales Give Welltower Options as Business Stabilizes
Once shelter-in-place orders are relaxed and communities begin to re-open, Welltower Chairman and CEO Tom DeRosa believes the REIT’s operators will be poised to tap into pent-up demand. He noted that 80% of an individual’s health and wellness is predicated by social determinants such as where the person lives, nutrition, social interaction, transportation and safety. Health care, clinical services, procedures, and pharmaceuticals account for the remaining 20%. “For many seniors who live alone and are isolated, maintaining these elements of daily living are challenging under the best of circumstances and have been exacerbated by Covid-19,” he said.

Welltower Selected as 2020 Green Lease Leader by the Department of Energy’s Better Buildings Alliance and the Institute for Market Transformation
“Welltower is proud to be named a 2020 Green Lease Leader as we constantly strive to improve the energy efficiency of our real estate," said Thomas J. DeRosa, Chairman and CEO. "To receive this recognition for the second consecutive year and to see our score rise to the Gold Level is confirmation that our efforts are effective in moving us towards year-over-year improved sustainability.”

Surge in Suburban Housing Interest Hasn’t Impacted Multifamily Rental Market
But several developers that have built multifamily properties in the suburbs over the last five years told Bisnow they are not seeing an abnormal amount of interest and they are not scoping out any new projects that they weren’t already before. “I think this notion that there is a tremendous amount of demand, I haven’t seen a tremendous demand on the rental side of it,” Cappelli Organization Executive Vice President Bruce Berg said.