BETHESDA, MD—Walker & Dunlop announced this week that it would take full ownership of its CMBS lending platform -- Walker & Dunlop Commercial Property Funding -- which it launched in 2013. W&D also announced that Bob Restrick will be joining Walker & Dunlop as CEO of WDCPF.
Restrick has 25 years of experience in the CMBS space. Most recently he was managing director at Annaly Capital Management.
The platform launched in 2013 as part of a joint venture with an affiliate of a fund managed by Fortress Investment Group. Tim Koltermann, a 25-year industry veteran in commercial loan originations, CMBS trading, loan pricing and CMBS securitization, was tapped to head it. According to his profile on LinkedIn, Koltermann is still the CEO of WDCPF.
WDCPF began originating in mid-2014, going on to close $337 million in CMBS loans through Sept. 30, 2015.
In the company's most recent earnings call, CEO Willy Walker told listeners that "although our conduit has not scaled as we had hoped, to date our CMBS partnership has established a strong brand in the marketplace for originating and securitizing excellent deals."
He told listeners that going forward in 2016 more opportunities would be available to the conduit with CMBS maturities forecast by the Mortgage Bankers Association to grow 82% to $133 billion.
Walker continued this theme in the announcement.
"The upcoming commercial mortgage maturities are dominated by CMBS loans that provide a significant opportunity for refinancings in the coming years, and with complete control over the operations of WDCPF, Walker & Dunlop can receive the full benefits of this robust CMBS market activity."
W&D does not expect its full ownership in WDCPF to have a material impact on its financial results.
W&D was unable to arrange an interview with GlobeSt.com in time for publication.
© Touchpoint Markets, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to asset-and-logo-licensing@alm.com. For more inforrmation visit Asset & Logo Licensing.
