NAI Hiffman names Assoian head of Asset Management, looks to ramp up office business

December 2, 2011

Commercial brokerage firm NAI Hiffman, a local powerhouse in the property management business, has tapped Bob Assoian as managing director of its Asset Management Group in a move that targets office sector growth.

Assoian brings a 25-year career in asset management to the Oakbrook Terrace-based firm and will oversee the Asset Management Group, which currently operates a portfolio of 58 million square feet of third-party assets for investor clients. He will also be active in new business development.

“I’m excited to work with a firm that is locally owned, yet has the size and capacity that NAI Hiffman does,” says Assoian. “I’ve been impressed with the growth of the company and my job now is to make a great firm bigger and better.”

Assoian is joining NAI Hiffman from Grubb & Ellis Realty Investors, where he oversaw various investor clients such as Prudential, with responsibility for assets in Chicago, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Columbus, Denver, Miami, Portland, Detroit and Nashville.

However, it is Assoian’s experience on the institutional side, with firms like Travelers Insurance, and his exposure to office property management that has made him most appealing to Hiffman.

“Bob has spent many years as an institutional asset manager, which granted him an owners perspective and the ability to offer clients valued strategic asset management advice,” said David Petersen, NAI Hiffman’s CEO, in a statement. “His commitment to cultivating new relationships, as well as enhancing those we have with existing clients, fits perfectly with NAI’s dedication to client service.”

Assoian says that 80 percent of his background work has been with office product, both on the institutional and third party provider side. He plans to build on existing relationships to grow the office portion of Hiffman’s portfolio.

“We are growing all lines of our services, which include office, industrial and retail,” says Petersen. “We have had a tremendous increase in the office sector, to which Bob brings a unique perspective.”

He will be based out of the company’s Oakbrook Terrace headquarters, from which he will manage NAI’s six satellite management offices and the group’s 160 employees.

“I’ve had the job that my clients now have. I can take the best practices I’ve seen from those situations and bring them to a service company,” says Assoian. “It is refreshing that I’m not replacing anyone. NAI is actually adding people, making new hires. I’m looking forward to contributing to the continued success of the company.”

Posted by NAI Hiffman | Filed Under Asset Management

Management News

November 22, 2011

Seen in Real Estate BISNOW

NAI Hiffman’s asset management group has been awarded the property management for more than 1M SF of combined industrial, office and retail product in the Chicago suburbs and Decatur. The industrial assignments include the Speedway Logistics Center, recently purchased by Molto Capital, at 3451 S Chicago in Joliet as well as two assets acquired by TA Associates Realty at 4675 Turnberry in Hanover Park and 1640 Fullerton Court in Glendale Heights. Chicago-based WH&H Realty Advisors has also assigned its Harmswood Office Center at 5750 Old Orchard Rd in Skokie to NAI Hiffman’s asset management group.

***

NAI Hiffman’s special asset solutions has recently added the following to its roster of managed properties: Riley’s Point, a 15k SF shopping center located at 12371 Derby Road in Lemont; a 41k SFindustrial asset at 1440 Davey Rd in Woodridge; and a 200k SF retail asset, Northgate Shopping Center in Decatur.

Posted by NAI Hiffman | Filed Under Asset Management

NAIOP Award winners announced

November 19, 2010

NAI Hiffman took home two awards at the NAIOP Awards in Chicago last night.

The firm received the Property Management Firm of the Year and the Industrial Transaction of the Year for a deal between True Value Company and Mirvac Industrial Trust in Harvey, Ill. The deal, negotiated by John Cash and David Haigh, was for a 10-year lease renewal for the full 1,194,650-square-feet of space at 308 S. Division Street. e tenant with a transaction value of $26 million. The deal was valued at $26 million.

The other multiple winner on the night was Hines. The developer received Office Development of the Year for 300 N. LaSalle and Green Development of the Year for the same project.

The complete list of winners:

Office Development of the Year
300 N. LaSalle, Chicago, IL
Developer: Hines

Industrial Build-to-Suit of the Year
3M Regional Distribution Center, Park 88 – 1250 Macom Drive, DeKalb, IL
Developer: Venture One Real Estate, LLC / Clayco Realty Group

Industrial Speculative Development of the Year
Crossroads 5, 801 N. Schmidt Road, Romeoville, IL
Developer: Duke Realty Corporation

Industrial Redevelopment of the Year
Alsip Distribution Center #1, 5100 W. 123rd Street, Alsip, IL
Developer: ProLogis

Office Redevelopment of the Year
Woodfield Pointe Office Center, 231 N. Martingale Road, Schaumburg, IL
Developer: Keystone Property Group

Green Development of the Year
300 N. LaSalle, Chicago, IL
Developer: Hines

Broker Transaction of the Year – Downtown Office
United Airlines, Inc. at Willis Tower at 233 S. Wacker Drive, Chicago, IL
Tenant/Buyer Brokers: Molly Carroll, David Matthews, Hugh Murphy, Meredith O’Connor, Steve Stratton, Jones Lang LaSalle
Landlord/Seller Broker: Mike Kaz, U.S. Equities Realty

Broker Transaction of the Year – Suburban Office
Career Education Corporation at Woodfield Pointe Office Center at 231 N. Martingale Road, Schaumburg, IL
Tenant/Buyer Brokers: Chad Freese, Mark Pasquella, David Saad, James Whalen, CB Richard Ellis, Inc.
Landlord/Seller Broker: Jack Reardon, formerly with CB Richard Ellis, Inc.

Broker Transaction of the Year – Industrial
True Value Company Distribution Center at 308 S. Division Street, Harvard, IL
Landlord/Seller Brokers: John Cash, David Haigh, NAI Hiffman

Broker Transaction of the Year – Office Investment
180 N. LaSalle, Chicago, IL
Brokers: Jeffrey Bramson, Jaime Fink, Kenneth Glomb, Holliday Fenoglio Fowler

Broker Transaction of the Year – Industrial Investment
IDI/JP Morgan Industrial Portfolio, 150 E. Crossroad Parkway/553 Joliet Road, Bolingbrook, IL and 1550 Central Avenue, Roselle, IL
Brokers: Jeffrey Devine, Steven Disse, Jeffrey Kahan, Colliers International

Architectural Firm of the Year
IA Interior Architects

General Contractor of the Year
McShane Construction Company

Industrial Developer of the Year
CenterPoint Properties

Property Management Firm of the Year
NAI Hiffman Asset Management, LLC

From: REJournals.com

Posted by NAI Hiffman | Filed Under Asset Management, Awards and Honors, Industrial, Media Coverage

Dave Petersen: Property management success all about listening

October 12, 2010

By Dan Rafter

It’s overstating it to call property management the savior of commercial real estate brokerages. But in today’s challenging commercial environment, property management services have provided struggling brokerages with a reliable source of income. For many companies, property management has made the recession and its slow recovery at least a little more bearable.

Midwest Real Estate News recently spoke with Dave Petersen, chief executive officer of the asset management company of Chicago’s NAI Hiffman. He had some illuminating information to share about succeeding in the property management business today.

Midwest Real Estate News: How important is property management today?
Dave Petersen: Aside from the obvious fact that there are reoccurring fee revenues that come from the property management business to help contribute to the operating bottom line of any company, there are some other benefits to property management. When you are working in property management, you are creating other access to revenue streams. In the product that you lease and manage, other transactions occur. You are creating deal flow within that asset-managed portfolio. You are providing your leasing brokers an additional opportunity to call for business as they are out trying to fill space in buildings. You are creating construction-management revenues. By being in that business in today’s economy, or by being asked to engage with lenders or CMBS folks that have problem assets in place, you are in line for the dispositions of the assets that are under that management base.
Lastly by being in the property management business, whether on the brokerage side of the business or the representation-of-product side, you are at the table with tenants. Tenants today are gold in the eyes of investor clients. Nothing helps operating costs more so than being able to have a good tenant in place. Read more

Posted by NAI Hiffman | Filed Under Asset Management, Media Coverage

Recipe for failure: Doing the same thing that you’ve always done

September 28, 2010

By Dan Rafter

The working world today is one of change. You can’t succeed if you don’t adapt to changing technology or business models. Commercial real estate is no exception.

Dave Petersen, chief operating officer of the property management division of Chicago’s NAI Hiffman, mentioned this to me earlier this week. We were talking about the recession and its slow recovery, of course. We were talking, too, about how important it is to keep clients happy in these rough economic times.

Petersen pointed to the ever-increasing speed of business. If he gets an e-mail from a client, that client expects an answer in minutes. It doesn’t matter if Petersen has to do some intensive research to find that answer: Anything longer than 30 minutes? That’s too long.

Petersen wasn’t complaining. He was stating a fact.

“If you are sitting around and saying that this is the way we have always done it, you are doomed to fail in this business,” Petersen said. “It’s a constant changing of how we are doing things. Today, it’s all about speed and communication.”

Source: REJournals.com

Posted by NAI Hiffman | Filed Under Asset Management, Media Coverage

Property managers set to shine

August 25, 2010

Property management may have been considered the least glamorous portion of commercial real estate in years past, but as traditional brokerage remains slow, property managers have risen to star status in firms nationwide.

Keeping up with the industry’s hottest trends, The Real Estate Conferences Group has netted some big names for its September 23 Property Management Conferencein Des Plaines.

Leading off the conference, The State of the Market Panel will include David Petersen, CEO NAI Hiffman Asset Management Group; Sam Delisi, senior managing director at CB Richard Ellis; Christopher Schneider, SVP of operations and CIO of First Industrial Realty Trust, Inc.; and Patrick Philbin, general manager at Hines.

Michael Cornicelli, executive vice president of BOMA/Chicago, will present the association’s plan for a commercialsmart grid in Chicago, the first of its kind in the world.

Other panels will include topics such as Technology, Security, and Energy and Environment.

Please join us in Des Plaines for what is sure to be an informative and insightful day.

Source: REJournals.com

Posted by NAI Hiffman | Filed Under Asset Management