Life Science Ground Up Development

Cornell Real Estate Case Competition Deck

Forthcoming investment pitch on 4010 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA (referred to as Zoe 3.0 in the case). A proposed ground-up development deal in the University City submarket, a hotbed for biotech, life science, and co-working space demand. In the case study, our group was forced to analyze the potential investment from the perspective of March 2020, deliberately limiting the cope of our research and giving us the chance to act from the perspective of an investment committee evaluating opportunities at the onset of the global pandemic. The result was a rigorous breakdown of our returns given different scenarios affecting our base rent and vacancy, sorting through the most viable given debt options, and ultimately settling on a hold period that yielded the type of opportunistic returns fitting for a development of this risk profile.

Brooklyn Value-Add Industrial to Multifamily Conversion

5018 4TH AVE. - OFFERING MEMORANDUM

In this group project for NYU Stern’s Real Estate Development & Entrepreneurship, we were tasked with identifying a value-add investment opportunity with a total project cost under $20M, fleshing out the risks and merits of the property, and ultimately putting together a comprehensive analysis of submarket trends and financial drivers of value. The result was a creative pitch to invest capital in a play that would leverage sub-market population growth, fixed housing supply, and a unique

zoning/entitlement opportunity with a building zoned for residential despite current industrial usage.

In developing our thesis, we considered existing interest in the area from institutional investors, crucially, the previously failed forays into the Sunset Park submarket by developers trying to convert large industrial parks for residential and retail usage. We saw this as a strong indicator of our position’s viability and also a unique opportunity for the building to thrive amidst competitors’ inabilities to develop in the face of a strict municipality.

Additionally, the building boasted additional floors of air rights that we viewed as untapped potential for growth in the rentable area. With low-interest rates helping facilitate developer-friendly construction loans, the necessary construction and subsequent refinance debt in our analysis achieve positive leverage and help solidify the asset’s potential as a strong value-add investment. Our team developed a strong understanding of demographic and economic trends in the area to assume steady rent growth and continued momentum built off the existing housing demand.

The Economics Review at NYU - Published Article

ARTICLE LINK

In the Fall of 2020, I had an article published in The Economics Review at NYU. The student-run, faculty-advised print and web publication exist to promote the spread of ideas and economic theory amongst the student body and beyond. I wrote a piece that aimed to situate commercial real estate amidst the broader economic downturn brought about by Covid-19. The article goes into greater depth about how various asset classes can expect to perform upon recovery and also compared the 2008 GFC to the Pandemic to try and glean any valuable insights about the structural integrity of the industry going into these respective recessions.