RESTON, VA-Calkain Cos. has closed on its acquisition of asset management firm Westpark Real Estate Advisors, a full-service consulting and advisory firm that provides underwriting, asset management and consulting services to commercial real estate owners.

Calkain has had a relationship with the firm for several years, and concluded it would be advantageous to bring its functionality in house, Jonathan Hipp, president and CEO of Calkain, tells GlobeSt.com. "We have worked with Rich [Murphy, former principal of Westpark Real Estate Advisors] for two years, referring a lot of clients over there. The more people we would refer, the more it made sense to us to create our own platform by merging with them,” he says. 

Murphy, who launched his career in public accounting at E&Y Kenneth Leventhal in Boston, is now the managing director for Calkain Asset Management. The practice will focus on the underwriting, asset management and life cycle of net lease investments in the office, industrial and retail sectors.  

Hipp expects the new platform will deliver additional business opportunities and clients--particularly from international companies. By the end of the year, Hipp says, he hopes to have closed between $30 million to $50 million in new business from international clients that will want to use Calkain Asset Management.

For example, the firm is currently speaking with an overseas group looking to raise funds from Latin American investors to target single-tenant net lease investments in the US. It wants to raise $100 million and leverage it to as much of $200 million, Hipp says. Negotiations are underway to hire Calkain on the brokerage and asset management side. "I am not sure if that is a business we could have attracted without this new platform," he says.