"We're looking beyond Houston and Texas," explains James C.Mastandrea, who was named the HCP REIT's chairman and interim CEOafter thesplit from the management company in October 2006. "Thename change gives us an opportunity to gain more of a nationalreputation and the timing was right to do it." The name change iseffective immediately, with full re-branding expected to be inplace by the end of summer.

Mastandrea tells GlobeSt.com that the company is looking forvalue-add office, retail and warehouse properties in marketssimilar to Houston. The preferred size is 50,000 sf to 200,000 sf.He says Whitestone will look at all-cash purchases, leveragedopportunities and joint ventures.

Mastandrea says the value-add factor can mean upping a class Cbuilding to class B status, finishing an incomplete class Abuilding or developing a piece of property adjacent to an existingstructure. "We already have a fairly substantial pipeline andregional contacts in two marketplaces," he says. "We're close onsome of the properties we'd like to make offers on."