Why National Real Estate Development Wants to Build in DC Now

WASHINGTON, DC—Last week locally-based Daniel D. Killinger was named managing director and head of National Real Estate Development after almost two years with the company. He'll be overseeing a project portfolio consisting of two million square feet of mixed-use and residential space in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Philadelphia valued currently at more than $1 billion.

A subsidiary of National Real Estate Advisors, National Development offers a full spectrum of development related services—making Killinger an excellent resource for on-the-ground insight into what is the state of the development at this point in the real estate cycle. GlobeSt.com caught up with Killinger shortly after his appointment was announced to discuss this and issues. Following are excerpts from the interview.

GlobeSt.com: Before this position, you directed National's East Market project in Center City Philadelphia. Can you tell us about that and how that strategy translates onto the national stage?

Killinger: Sure. East Market is $500 million, phased redevelopment of a full block near Philadelphia's City Hall. It will have pedestrian-oriented retail, rental apartments, office, and hotel and digital signage. And in a nutshell, that was the play for the project: getting all those uses in one single project and making them work as a whole. We are working on a similar project in Downtown Los Angeles called The Bloc. It's a renovation of a 500-room Sheraton hotel with retail and office redevelopment phases.

Basically we are focusing on urban core; urban center projects that are transformative. They don't necessarily have to be mixed-use but we do think there is real value to adding mixed-use to a project.

GlobeSt.com: Tell me what other projects you are working on now.

Killinger: There are two projects in San Francisco underway. 100 Van Ness in San Francisco. It's a 485,000 square foot, 418-unit apartment development near City Hall. There is also a 429-unit apartment development, next to 100 Van Ness, that scheduled to begin construction very soon.

GlobeSt.com: What comes after that?

Killinger: Well, we'd love to have a larger presence in the DC area. Anywhere from DC to Boston is the general area we are targeting right now. National has a wonderful pipeline of opportunities. Also we have our own grass roots efforts underway to find interesting deals.

GlobeSt.com: Can you tell me more about the pipeline, especially for DC?

Killinger: We don't have anything on the books in DC. Our goal isn't to have 15 projects under construction at one time. We want to have a few in each phase so we can deliver these projects in different markets.

GlobeSt.com: What is the bottom line for development now? Has the "perfect" moment for building arrived? Did it already arrive and it is peaking now?

Killinger: Each market is a little different. Development in Boston is different than development in DC and so is the market cycle.

As for the "right time" we broke ground on all of our projects some time ago and we think we can continue to break ground but again, each market has its own dynamics. There is good runway in the markets we are in, and DC as well, but then a lot depends on product type as well.