Speaker Profiles
Sam Zell (Speaker)
Chairman and Chief Executive, Equity Group Investments
Sam Zell is chairman of Equity International. He founded the Company with Gary Garrabrant in 1999. Mr. Zell has been particularly active with Equity International’s publicly held portfolio companies in which he maintains substantial interests. Three of these are listed on the New York Stock Exchange: Gafisa (GFA), a leading homebuilder in Brazil, Xinyuan (XIN), a fast-growing regional homebuilder in China, and Homex (HXM), Mexico’s leading homebuilder. A fourth, BR Malls, Brazil’s largest retail property owner and operator,
is listed on the Bovespa (BZ:BRML3).
In December 2007, Mr. Zell became chairman and chief executive officer of Tribune Company, after financing the sale of the public
company to a private Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP).
Thomas J. McDonald, '08 (Speaker)
Chief Strategic Officer, Equity International
Thomas McDonald is chief strategic officer of Equity International. Mr. McDonald has been associated with the Company since its inception in 1999 and is primarily responsible for building and optimizing the Company’s partner relationships. He is a director of various portfolio companies, including Gafisa (NYSE:GFA, BZ:GFSA3), BR Malls (BZ:BRML3), Tenda (BZ:TEND3), and AGV Logística.
Prior to joining Equity International, Mr. McDonald was with Anixter International, a global provider of network infrastructure solutions and services. He joined Anixter in 1992 and served in several different capacities, most recently as vice president of global sales. From 1994 to 1997, Mr. McDonald resided in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he was responsible for business development with Anixter’s largest multinational customers throughout Latin America.
Prior to joining Anixter in 1992, Mr. McDonald was based in Mexico City with Quadrum S.A. de C.V., a Latin American finance company. Mr. McDonald is fluent in Spanish, and speaks Portuguese and French. He has lived and worked in Latin America for the majority of his professional career.
Mr. McDonald earned a BA in international relations and Spanish from the University of Notre Dame and received his MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
Kevin M. Murphy, PhD '86 (Speaker)
George J. Stigler Distinguished Service Professor of Economics, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Kevin M. Murphy is the first professor at a business school to be chosen as a MacArthur Fellow in the 25 years that the awards have been given. He was selected for "revealing economic forces shaping vital social phenomena such as wage inequality, unemployment, addiction, medical research, and economic growth." The foundation felt his work "challenges preconceived notions and attacks seemingly intractable economic questions, placing them on a sound empirical and theoretical footing." In addition to his position at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, Murphy works as a faculty research associate for the National Bureau of Economic Research. He primarily studies the empirical analysis of inequality, unemployment, and relative wages as well as the economics of growth and development and the economic value of improvements in health and longevity.
In 2007, Murphy and fellow Chicago Booth faculty member Robert Topel won the Kenneth J. Arrow Award for the best research paper in health economics for "The Value of Health and Longevity," published in the Journal of Political Economy. The award is given annually by the International Health Economics Association.
A fellow of the Econometric Society and an elected member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, Murphy was a John Bates Clark Medalist in 1997. He has received fellowships from the Earhart Foundation, the Sloan Foundation, and the Friedman Fund.
Murphy is also the author of two books and several academic articles. His writing also has been published in numerous mainstream publications including the Boston Globe, the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, and two Wall Street Journal articles coauthored by Nobel laureate Gary Becker.
He earned his Ph.D. in 1986 from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business after graduating from the University of California at Los Angeles with a bachelor's degree in economics in 1981. He joined the Chicago Booth faculty in 1984.
Dean Edward A. “Ted” Snyder, AM ’78, PhD ‘84 (Speaker)
Dean and George Pratt Shultz Professor of Economics, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
In his role as Dean, Mr. Snyder oversees the overall academic, financial, and administrative leadership of the school, including its academic programs in Chicago, London, and Singapore.
During his tenure beginning in July 2001, Mr. Snyder has focused on strengthening the school's values with the objective of ensuring that Chicago Booth continues to offer the most challenging academic programs of any business school in the world. His other main strategic imperative has been to strengthen the school's relationships with business and alumni around the world for the dual purposes of (a) increasing opportunities for Chicago Booth students and alumni, and (b) increasing the school's influence so that it can continue to help improve business practices, increase performance, and strengthen the world's market-oriented economies.
During Mr. Snyder's tenure, Chicago Booth has (a) moved into its new campus in Hyde Park as scheduled and on budget, (b) established its own campus in central London, (c) gained higher levels of recognition as offering the most rigorous MBA programs, (d) increased significantly the school's strengths in marketing and entrepreneurship, (e) instituted a program of peer-driven senior faculty reviews, (f) continued to meet its budget targets, (g) met its campaign goal of $300M, and (h) increased its endowment by over 150 percent. He is active in The Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Civic Consulting Alliance, and an advisory group to Mayor Richard Daley. He serves on the boards of Argonne National Laboratory and Career Education Corporation.
Heather S. Goldman, '99 (Panelist)
Partner, Brookfield Financial US, LLC
Heather Goldman is a Partner at Brookfield Financial US, LLC, responsible for new business origination and supporting corporate strategy. Prior to joining the Firm, Ms. Goldman was Senior Vice President at Starwood Capital Group Global responsible for Fundraising and Client Services. Prior to that, Ms. Goldman was Senior Client Partner and Global Sector Leader, Real Estate, at Korn/Ferry International. Previously, Ms. Goldman spent nearly five years as Chairman and CEO of CapitalThinking, a real estate software and risk management company. Ms. Goldman has an eight-year background in investment and corporate banking, including at Bank of Montreal where she was a Director in the Real Estate Capital Markets Group. Previously, Ms. Goldman had served more than three years as a US Peace Corps volunteer in Mali, West Africa.
Ms. Goldman earned her BA in International Relations from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and her MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Ms. Goldman serves as a Director for University Settlement, a social services nonprofit based in New York City, where she also chairs the Development Committee and previously served as Treasurer.
Christopher P. Haley (Panelist)
Principal & Co-Founder,, Palladian Realty Capital LLC
Mr. Haley is co-founder of Palladian Realty Capital LLC, a boutique investment- and advisory-firm focused on providing strategic counsel and transaction execution services to publicly- and privately-held real estate operating companies.
Mr. Haley was previously Managing Director in Wachovia Securities’ Equity Research division. Mr. Haley joined Wachovia (then named Wheat First Butcher Singer, privately-held) in early 1993 to lead its research and investment efforts in the real estate securities sector. Mr. Haley directed the group’s fundamental analysis and research of real estate capital markets, macro- and micro-economic issues impacting publicly-traded real estate securities - including real estate investment trusts (REITs) and operating companies (REOCs). During Mr. Haley’s career at Wachovia, the firm’s real estate research effort improved its third-party quality rankings from 21st to consistently in the top-five among full-service investment/commercial banks (e.g., quality of research, quality of service, access to management, trusted resource).
Additionally, over the course of his career at Wachovia, Mr. Haley has been involved in the issuance of ~$13 billion in debt, hybrid, and equity transactions for various public real estate companies, and pre-IPO and independent assessments of over 23 private property companies.
Joseph L. Pagliari, Jr., PhD., CFA, CPA (Moderator)
Clinical Professor of Real Estate, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Joseph L. Pagliari Jr. is both a certified public accountant and a chartered financial analyst, with a research focus on joint ventures, the strategic aspects of leverage, the pricing and return-generating process, option-pricing, portfolio management and public-/private-market arbitrage as they apply to commercial real estate investing. His article "The Pricing of Non-Core Real Estate Ventures" was published in The Journal of Portfolio Management; "Public versus Private Real Estate Equities: A More Refined, Long-term Comparison" written with Kevin Scherer and Richard Monopoli was published in Real Estate Economics; "Public v. Private Real Estate Equities: A Risk/Return Comparison" written with Kevin Scherer and Richard Monopoli appeared in The Journal of Portfolio Management; and "Twenty Years of the NCREIF Property Index" written with Frederich Lieblich, Mark Schaner, and James R. Webb, was published in Real Estate Economics.
Based on over 25 years of industry experience, Pagliari's research goal is to attempt to answer important real estate investment questions from a rigorous theoretical and empirical perspective. He also hopes to share that knowledge with students so they can learn to make thoughtful decisions about commercial real estate investing.
He co-authored several chapters in The Handbook of Real Estate Portfolio Management, of which he is also the editor. Pagliari also has co-written material published in Real Estate Investment Trusts, Pension Fund Investing and Megatrends in Retail Real Estate.
Pagliari serves on the editorial advisory boards of the Journal of Real Estate Research and Journal of Real Estate Portfolio Management.
Pagliari earned a bachelor's degree in finance from the University of Illinois-Urbana in 1979. He earned an MBA from DePaul University in 1982 and a Ph.D. in finance from the University of Illinois-Urbana in 2002. His interests include sports of most every kind - some of which he still plays.
Kent Born, '91 (Panelist)
Senior Managing Director, PPM America, Inc.
Kent Born is a Senior Managing Director of Real Estate Securities for PPM America. As such, he oversees all CMBS and REIT investments for the company. Mr. Born also is a voting member on the committee responsible for approving all commercial mortgage and real estate equity investments made by PPM. Prior to joining PPM in October of 1995, Mr. Born spent two and one-half years in the commercial mortgage group at Fitch Investors Service, L.P., rating all types of CMBS. Before that, he spent one and one-half years in real estate asset management with The Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York. Mr. Born’s other experience includes two and one-half years in commercial mortgage origination with Travelers Realty Investment Company, and one and one-half years in leasing
and property management with Equitec Properties Company.
David Helfand, '90 (Panelist)
Chief Executive Officer, Helix Funds
Prior to forming Helix Funds in 2003, Mr. Helfand worked at Equity Office Properties (NYSE:EOP) where he served as Executive Vice President and Chief Investment Officer. During his tenure at Equity Office, Mr. Helfand supervised more than $13 billion of investment activity, including EOP's mergers with Cornerstone Properties and Spieker Properties. Prior to joining Equity Office in 1998, Mr. Helfand served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Equity Lifestyle Properties, Inc. (NYSE: ELS). Until recently, Mr. Helfand has served as a Member of the Board of Directors of ELS. He has also served as a Managing Director of Equity International Properties, a private equity fund sponsored by Samuel Zell, focusing on international real estate investment. Mr. Helfand holds a master's degree from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and a bachelor's degree from Northwestern University.
Nathaniel M. Marrs, '04 (Moderator)
Partner, Kirkland & Ellis
Nathaniel M. Marrs is a partner in the Chicago office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. Mr. Marrs represents real estate and alternative asset (including infrastructure and energy) fund sponsors and other institutional owners and operators of real estate and alternative assets in a variety of corporate transactions, with a particular focus on fund formations and investments, joint venture arrangements and portfolio acquisitions and dispositions. Mr. Marrs received a B.A. from the University of Michigan, an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and a J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School.
Dan Fasulo (Panelist)
Managing Director, Real Capital Analytics
Mr. Fasulo is Managing Director and head of research for Real Capital Analytics (RCA), a global research firm that provides real time data concerning the capital markets and values for commercial property. He is an active contributor to RCA’s industry leading reports, the Capital Trends Monthly and Global Capital Trends. Mr. Fasulo is a noted source for information on the global real estate capital markets with credits in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times, Bloomberg, Reuters and Australian Financial Review among others.
Mr. Fasulo is responsible for tracking current property sales globally and assists in analyzing and interpreting the data to provide insight on the dynamic capital environment for real estate. He also acts as a consultant to RCA clients, providing support for transaction due diligence, investment location analysis and market research reporting. Personally, he has acquired, owns and manages investment property in the NYC area.
Rob Miceli (Panelist)
Partner, Kirkland & Ellis
Roberto Miceli is a partner in the Chicago office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. Mr. Miceli focuses on complex public and private company real estate transactions, including domestic and international acquisitions, dispositions and mergers. He has experience in structuring and negotiating real estate funds and private placements as well as significant exposure to secured and unsecured credit facilities. Mr. Miceli's experience also includes the representation of institutional and private equity real estate clients in the formation and negotiation of joint ventures. His representation ranges from single site domestic deals to multi-site, cross-border transactions.
Mr. Miceli received a B.B.A. from the University of Wisconsin, an LL.M. from New York University School of Law and a J.D. from the University of Minnesota Law School.
Randall Mundt (Panelist)
President and Chief Investment Officer, Principal Real Estate Investors
Randy is the president and chief investment officer of Principal Real Estate Investors, the dedicated real estate group of Principal Global Investors. He is responsible for the development and execution of client investment strategies across all real estate quadrants, including investment pricing, performance and policy. Randy leads new product and fund design, Principal's dedicated real estate research group and the firm's real estate equity portfolio management group. He joined the firm in 1983. He chairs Principal's Real Estate Investment Committee and Client Strategy committee. Randy is also a member of Principal's Economic Resource Group.
Randy received an MBA in finance from the University of Iowa and a bachelor's degree in business from Iowa State University. He serves as a board member and program chair of the Association of Foreign Investors in Real Estate (AFIRE) and is a member of the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries (NCREIF), the National Association of Real Estate Investment Managers (NAREIM), the Real Estate Roundtable and the Pension Real Estate Association (PREA).
Brian Newman, ’00 (Panelist)
Managing Principal, Ceres Real Estate Partners, LLC
Mr. Newman has extensive management experience successfully overseeing real estate professionals with multi-billion dollar investment mandates covering both high yield debt and opportunistic equity investments. Mr. Newman has been directly responsible for all aspects of investments covering every real estate asset class across five continents, as well as overseeing over $10 billion in real estate investments and participating in over $7.5 billion of private equity investments. Mr. Newman's personal investment focus has been on off-market investments in hospitality, healthcare and distressed situations where value is created by active business operations and strategic legal maneuvering. Mr. Newman was a Managing Director and Head of Real Estate at Madison Dearborn Partners, co-ran Merrill Lynch Global Principal Investments with responsibility for both equity and high-yield debt, was an Acquisitions Principal at Walton Street Capital covering all asset classes, and was an Attorney in the VC/LBO group at Kirkland & Ellis.
Mr. Newman has a M.B.A. from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, a J.D. Magna Cum Laude from Harvard Law School and a B.S. from the University of Illinois where he was the Lincoln Laureate of the Class of 1993. Mr. Newman is a member of the Real Estate Roundtable in Washington D.C., and a member of the Board of Children's Memorial Hospital.
E. Gerald O’Brien II, ’94 (Panelist)
Senior Partner, CarVal Investors
Jerry O’Brien is a senior partner for CarVal Investors with specific responsibilities for leading its global loan portfolio business. In addition, Mr. O’Brien serves on the Cargill Political Action Committee (PAC) Steering Committee. Prior to joining CVI in 1994, Mr. O’Brien was with W.Y. Campbell & Co., a Detroit-based investment banking subsidiary of Comerica Bank. Mr. O’Brien was previously with DG Investment Bank and Chemical Bank N.A in New York.
Mr. O’Brien received his MBA in analytic finance and marketing from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and his A.B. in honors economics magna cum laude from the University of Michigan.
Bernie S. Ocampo, ’05 (Speaker)
Senior Asset Manager and Co-Founder & Global Chair of the Chicago Booth Real Estate Alumni Group, TriMont Real Estate Advisors, Inc.
Currently, Bernie Ocampo is a Senior Asset Manager for TriMont Real Estate Advisors with investment management responsibilities in the U.S. West Coast and Hawaii. The investments are structured as equity joint ventures, loans (senior, mezzanine, corporate, syndicated and securitized), and as a combination of equity and debt.
Mr. Ocampo has over 19 years of commercial real estate experience in equity and debt investment management involving institutional, private and foreign investors. His multidisciplinary experience includes asset and portfolio management (equity, mortgage and REO), distressed loan workout and foreclosure, transaction management (acquisitions, dispositions and leasing), equity/debt underwriting and valuation, credit risk and financial analysis, lending, joint venture partnership governance, property management and operations, as well as construction monitoring (predevelopment, rehab and ground up development). Mr. Ocampo also has a diverse knowledge of property types, nationwide. Investments have included core, value-added and opportunistic strategies.
Prior to TriMont, Bernie was a VP/Portfolio Manager for a high growth California-based bank (now JP Morgan Chase) where he managed a $2.5B mortgage portfolio of performing and non-performing commercial assets. He was also previously employed with Prudential Real Estate Investors, GE Financial Assurance, Trammell Crow Company and Grubb & Ellis. Bernie is a member of Urban
Land Institute and National Multi Housing Council.
Bernie is a Co-Founder and Global Chair of the Chicago Booth Real Estate Alumni Group (REAG). The non-profit entity was formed in 2006.
Kenneth P. Riggs. Jr., ’94 (Panelist)
President and CEO, Real Estate Research Corporation
Kenneth Riggs has served as chief executive officer of Real Estate Research Corporation (RERC) since 1991. He is active in bringing sophisticated and solid research to the real estate industry. He serves as the publisher of the RERC Real Estate Report, a widely quoted real estate quarterly, and the RERC/CCIM Investment Trends Quarterly. He also produced Emerging Trends in Real Estate and the RERC Industry Outlook, and serves as co-publisher of Expectations & Market Realities in Real Estate, one of the nation's leading annual forecast reports.
In addition to his research activities, Mr. Riggs oversees the firm's valuation, consulting, independent fiduciary services, and manage ment information services. He has served as a featured speaker for the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR), the Pension Real Estate Association (PREA), the Association of Foreign Investors in Real Estate (AFIRE), the Institute of Real Estate Management (IREM), The Counselors of Real Estate, the CCIM Institute, the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries (NCREIF), and many other respected national organizations. He has had numerous articles published and has been quoted in many publications, including The Wall Street Journal, CNNmoney, Bloomberg News, Barron's, Mortgage Banking, Real Estate Forum, Real Estate Issues, and Real Estate Portfolio, among others.
Mr. Riggs earned his master's of business administration degree from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, concentrating on finance/statistics, and his bachelor's of business administration in real estate and finance from Kent State University. In 2006, he was named by NAR as one of Real Estate's 25 Most Influential Thought Leaders.
Nicholas H. Seidenberg (Panelist)
Managing Director, Eastdil Secured
Nicholas Seidenberg, Managing Director in the Washington, D.C. office for Eastdil Secured, focuses on debt placements, loan sales and structured joint venture transactions. In the past twenty-four months Mr. Seidenberg has been involved in over $3.5 billion of loan sales and debt placement and has provided advisory services on over $2 billion of structured finance loan portfolios. Prior to joining Eastdil in June 2007, Mr. Seidenberg was a Managing Director in the Real Estate Merchant Banking group at Wells Fargo which provides acquisition, bridge, mezzanine, preferred equity and participating debt financing for value-added real estate investments. Mr. Seidenberg managed the offices in Washington DC and Boston and was responsible for overseeing a portfolio in excess of $1.5 billion in loan commitments and investments. During his 10 year tenure at Wells Fargo, Mr. Seidenberg closed in excess of 125 transactions which represented in excess of $5 billion in commitments.
He holds a BS in Applied Economics from Cornell University and received an MBA from The Stern School of Business at New York University.
Michael Sher (Panelist)
Managing Director, RSM McGladrey
Michael Sher is a managing director in the National Real Estate Group of RSM McGladrey. During his 22 years practicing public accounting, Michael has had extensive experience overseeing large real estate due diligence engagements encompassing all property types. In addition, he is involved in accounting, auditing, taxation and consulting for all facets of the real estate industry involving complex real estate transactions.
His audit experience includes privately and publicly offered real estate syndications and mortgage bankers with troubled loan and real estate-owned portfolios. Michael has been instrumental in the growth of the Real Estate Practice and assisted in managing the affairs of the group.
Michael also served as the chief financial officer of Mesa Development LLC (a real estate developer) where he oversaw all financial management, cash, investment, accounting, tax compliance, projections, and administration matters for the firm and their developments. He established and maintained the organizations accounting principles, practices and initiatives. Additionally, Michael was responsible for the financial reporting packages that had to be submitted to lenders and investors.
Michael is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) and the Illinois CPA Society. Michael earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in accounting, auditing and taxation (achieving the Raymond Stein Award for the highest tax results) and a Higher Diploma in taxation from the University of the Witwatersrand – Johannesburg, South Africa.
J. Gregory Winchester (Panelist)
Managing Director/Shareholder, TriMont Real Estate Advisors, Inc.
TriMont Real Estate Advisors performs asset management and servicing on over $60 billion of invested capital for its various institutional lenders and investors. The firm specializes in the handling of large, complex transactions; development deals; and distressed assets.
Mr. Winchester focuses on new business development for the company and jointly oversees the asset management group at TriMont. Mr. Winchester joined TriMont Real Estate Advisors, Inc. in 1996 and has thirty years in the banking and commercial real estate lending/investment industry. He has been involved in the portfolio management of over $150 billion in loans and real estate investments during his career. Prior to joining TriMont, Mr. Winchester was the Executive Vice President of the Commercial Division of Lomas Management, Inc., and was an Assistant Vice President, with the First National Bank of Atlanta.
Mr. Winchester is a graduate of the University of North Carolina (BSBA) and is a member of CMSA, NAREIM, and ICSC.