Meet Our Students
The following students are members of the MIT Center for Real Estate class of 2010. (See bottom of this page for a list of Student Hosts for the Class of 2010 Visitor's Program.)
STYLIANOS AVRAMIDIS
Xanthi, Greece
BSc, Civil Engineering, 2003, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece
MSc, Civil Engineering, 2004, Democritus University of Thrace, Greece
Certificate, Management, 2008, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece
After his undergraduate studies, Stelios worked as a partner in the family‐run real estate development company, which mainly deals with residential property development. In his joint capacity as an entrepreneur and engineer, Stelios was engaged in all company activities. He has been responsible for the project planning procedure of the company, participating in the development of architectural blueprints, conducting structural analysis and composing technical reports. As a quantity surveyor and construction manager he has prepared project budgets and monitored the entire progress of work in various building sites. Working from these posts, he has cooperated with individuals, big companies and non‐profit organizations.
Having completed his graduate studies, Stelios served his military service in the Greek Army as a Reserve Second Lieutenant, holding the positions of the expenses officer at an Engineering Company and of the assistant officer at the department of military works and construction projects of the IV Army Corps. He was also a platoon leader for a group of 27 individuals.
Moreover, Stelios offered consulting services on a part‐time basis to Emporiki Real Estate, one of the largest real estate management companies in Greece, whereby he worked as a real estate appraiser engaged in projects that covered all sorts of properties. He was also responsible for estimating the market value for proposed new construction projects on behalf of the company, approving the bills of quantities and monitoring the progress of the construction cost.
Stelios is a licensed professional engineer and was member of a regional committee of the Technical Chamber of Greece responsible for Urban Planning and Structured Environment for almost 2 years.
ONOUSA BOONTANORM
Bangkok, Thailand
BArch, 2000, Chulalongkorn University (Honors)
MBA, 2004, Sasin Graduate School of Business Administration, Chulalongkorn University (Distinction)
Onousa worked for four years as a Business Development Manager at Gaysorn Property, a high-end real estate development company in Thailand where she handled projects across several asset classes, including residential, hotel and hospitality, office, retail and mixed-use. She was responsible for strategic planning and acquisition, and served as development manager for several projects in which she managed and worked alongside cross-cultural teams of some of Asia’s most reputable designers, operators, and investors. The developments under her supervision include an ultra-luxury oceanfront resort and residential villa development in Phuket, a mixed-use retail, residential and serviced apartment building and a residential condominium in central Bangkok, totaling over USD 300 million in value.
Prior to Gaysorn and her graduate study in Business, Onousa began her professional career as an architect at Bunnag Architects, a design office specializing in tropical luxury resort and hospitality developments, where she participated in the design of several projects including The Oberoi Mauritius and Kirana Shiseido Spa Bali.
Onousa spent 3 years of her childhood in Singapore and speaks Mandarin Chinese. At MIT, she aims to deepen her understanding in real estate finance and global capital markets to prepare for a career in international RE investments.
BRIAN CASON
New York, NY
B.S. Business Administration, 2003, UC Berkeley
Brian has spent the past six years in Manhattan where he focused on various aspects of real estate investment from valuation to investment strategy and deal execution. His career has been highlighted by a balance of entrepreneurial ventures and institutional experience spanning nearly every asset type.
Most recently Brian has served as an acquisitions consultant for Goldenbridge Advisors, focusing on hospitality, office and multifamily distressed debt opportunities for their $500 million fund, and Wildwood Capital, focusing on distressed opportunities in the New York Tri-State area. Previously, Brian worked at White Acre Equities where he pursued opportunistic investments across a diverse range of asset types including student housing, office, hospitality and infrastructure. Prior to White Acre, Brian worked at DRA Advisors where he was involved with both single property transactions and REIT privatizations.
Brian is also involved with the planning committee for the ULI New York chapter of the Young Leaders Group. Brian grew up in Southern California. In his spare time, Brian enjoys golfing, surfing, and traveling abroad.
KEVIN FAGAN
San Diego, CA
BS, Arch. Engr., 2001, Univ. Texas, Austin
Kevin graduated in 2001 with a BS in Architectural Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin. Since then, he has been a Project Manager at Flores Lund Consultants, a diverse civil and structural engineering firm in San Diego. There Kevin earned licensure as a Professional Engineer and developed a wide range of skills in structural design and project management across a broad range of market sectors. The projects he managed included high end custom homes, 100,000+ square foot Type V wood residential structures, Class A steel and concrete commercial buildings, post-tensioned concrete high-rise hotels, seismic retrofits, and investigative services.
In 2006, Kevin switch professional focus from design to comprehensive development of structures. To prepare for this,, he obtained a certificate degree in real estate from the University of California San Diego, with a focus in investment and development. At the MIT MSRED program, he plans to continue his education and focus on development and project delivery methods, in order to successfully guide projects from concept to proud, profitable parts of their communities.
Kevin enjoys cycling, basketball and many other sports. He is a member of numerous industry societies including ASCE, SEAOC, ICSC, ULI and USGBC.
TONY FENG
Houston, TX
BS, Business, Finance & Entrepreneurship, 2003, Univ. of Southern California
Tony was born and raised in Taipei, Taiwan. After completing his undergraduate degree, Tony worked in several different real estate sectors: as a property supervisor and acquisition assistant in a boutique real estate investment and management company, a financial analyst with an executive suites operator, and as an assistant vice president with RERC, a national commercial real estate appraisal and consulting firm.
During his 3.5 years in the appraisal industry, Tony completed valuations of a wide range of commercial property types throughout the U.S., including properties with a combined total asset value exceeding $3.5 billion. He is recognized as a responsible, organized, detail-oriented and persistent individual with an ability to meet deadlines. Tony currently holds an active Texas State Certified General Real Estate Appraiser license.
While at MIT, Tony wishes to expand his real estate knowledge and develop a deeper understanding of all aspects related to real estate to prepare for a leadership role in the industry.
Tony looks forward to applying his knowledge and experience to the fields of commercial real estate investment, acquisition, asset management, and development. Tony is interested in analyzing investment opportunities in both national and international markets, and intends on taking advantage of his fluent Chinese by applying his learning to finding opportunities in the rapidly growing country of China.
ANDREW GALLINARO
Boston, MA
BS, Business Management, 2004, Babson College
Prior to attending MIT, Andrew worked in the Boston office of BlackRock Investment Management as an Associate in its Real Estate Group. While at BlackRock, he was responsible for the sourcing, underwriting, structuring and closing of single asset, portfolio and entity level joint venture and wholly owned opportunities. These transactions represented private equity financings on behalf of discretionary co-mingled real estate funds and institutional separate account clients. He also had asset management, workout and restructuring responsibilities. His experience included all primary real estate product groups and life cycles ranging from Development to Core.
Andrew began his real estate career at AEC, a private real estate operator and investor based in New York City. While there, he participated in multiple multi-family property acquisitions in Florida and New York which were financed with institutional joint venture equity.
Andrew is originally from Amherst, MA and enjoys playing golf and ice hockey and has completed two marathons. He is a member of ULI Young Leaders.
YOOHOON JEON
Seoul, Korea
SB, Business, 1992, Yonsei University
SM, Business/Finance, 1997, Yonsei University
Yoo Hoon started his career in the real estate finance division at Samsung Life Insurance. At a time when Korean real estate investment by foreign investors was in its preliminary stage, he was involved in underwriting senior ABS and construction project financing.
To advance his skills, Yoo Hoon joined Arthur Andersen’s Global Corporate Finance Group. In the real estate division within the GCF, he was also exposed to M&A and project financing advisory assignments for hotels and even golf courses. However, in order to become a competent professional of real estate development and finance, he realized that professional knowledge of the newly introduced REITS and Real Estate Fund in Korea was necessary.
This awareness led him to MyAsset Asset Management, where he continued his career as a real estate fund manager. As a fund manager in charge of all real estate investment activities, he was exposed to various obligations across a wide range of real estate projects—fundraising, investment, and the securitization of real estate development projects. His previous supervisor at Arthur Andersen, who is now a partner at Deloitte, asked Yoo Hoon once more to join him and use his knowledge to provide sound advice to his real estate clients; and hence, to this day, he has served as an advisor of real estate fund structuring and fundraising at Deloitte.
Apart from his real estate finance and investment career Yoo Hoon also played the role of developer, as one of two shareholders of a development company in Korea. Starting from the purchase of 660,000 square feet of land to the sales of the units valued at $200 million, he was deeply involved in every decision related to the project.
At MIT, he hopes to gain cutting-edge knowledge of the real estate market in the United States and worldwide, preparing him with the necessary tools to advise on various investment and development projects around the globe.
HYUNJAE KIM
Seoul, Korea
SB, Civil Engr., 2003, Seoul National Univ.
SM, Financial Mgmt., 2009, Seoul National Univ.
Hyunjae studied Civil Engineering (BS) at Seoul National University and has also been studying Financial Management (MS) in College of Business and Administration at the same school. He made further steps to fulfill his dream of being a real estate developer by joining Daewoo Engineering & Construction (E&C) in 2003, and has been with the company for the last seven years.
He managed construction progress and budgets at the Seoul Circular Highway PPP (Public Private Partnership) project site for the first 29 months, and for the past four years he had been involved in numerous domestic and overseas PPP infrastructure investment projects from the beginning to its realization. During that period Hyunjae devised business strategies and plans, built financial models and performed feasibility studies in numerous overseas and domestic private investment infrastructure projects such as Hydro power Station PJ in Pakistan and Container Port PJ in Vietnam at the Civil Development Project Team. This invaluable experience enabled him to transcend the engineer’s perspective of viewing highways and harbors as mere civil structures, and develop a business ability to analyze and evaluate their revenue structure.
Hyunjae’s goal in the MIT MSRED program is to study social and economic factors that influence a feasible model formation to link commercial and residential development with transport infrastructure development. For example, effective concurrent development of a railroad and its corridor or station impact area could improve project profitability by creating more cash-inflow early on.
Additionally, Hyunjae was recently married on May 2nd and they are enjoying their current time in Cambridge.
“Mike” HENGWA LAI
Macau
BS, Civil Engineering, 1999, Northeastern University
Mike grew up in Macau, a former Portuguese colony at the southern tip of China and came to the United States for college at the age of 18.
He started his career with Tetra Tech/Rizzo as a Site Engineer performing design and permitting for “big box” development. Major clients consisted of Lowe’s Home Improvement, Shaw’s Supermarket, and Wal-Mart. After a 5 year stint in consulting, Mike developed strong interest in retail real estate and subsequently joined Stop & Shop Supermarket. While at Stop & Shop, he was in charge of Site Planning which oversees concept development and design reviews. Working in tandem with Real Estate and Construction Department, he was also part of several key committees that are responsible for site selection, construction monitoring, and strategy development.
Mike is a licensed Professional Engineer (PE) in civil engineering. At MIT, he is interested in focusing on real estate finance and investment. Mike’s career goal is to found a REIT specialized in suburb development in China.
BRADY LARSEN
Salt Lake City, UT
University of Utah, 2002
B.A. Finance
B.A. Information Systems
B.A. Spanish
Prior to attending MIT, Brady spent two years working as Director of Real Estate Operations for Gastronomy Properties, in Salt Lake City, Utah. At Gastronomy Properties Brady gained experience as Asset Manager overseeing the operations of approximately 450,000 square feet of office space in the Central Business District of Salt Lake City. He was also intimately involved with the master planning of a 30-acre transit oriented multi-use redevelopment project, located on the periphery of the Central Business District of Salt Lake City.
After graduating from the University of Utah in 2002, Brady spent 5 years as a commercial mortgage banker with Q|10 Bonneville Mortgage Company. Brady first worked as an analyst with the responsibility to underwrite and process approximately $400 million dollars in long-term real estate financing for income producing properties of all types and sizes throughout the Intermountain West. He later spearheaded Bonneville Mortgage Company's expansion into the Idaho market by opening a satellite office in Boise, Idaho, where he resided for two years.
Brady is from Salt Lake City, Utah, and enjoys skiing, kayaking, mountain biking, and other active hobbies.
MAI LUO
San Francisco, CA
BA, Economics, 1997, Wuhan University
Whether sailing across the Pacific Ocean in a small sailboat, developing one of the first green buildings in China, or relocating to the US to start his own real estate investment firm, Mai is always courageous to seek innovations for positive change.
Mai has over three years of experience in international real estate investment industry as the Co-founder of WestLand Advisors, LLC, a real estate investment and consulting firm in the San Francisco bay area. It is his firm that pioneers to bring Chinese capital into the US real estate market. In addition, his firm offers US developers and investors with entry and exit strategies into the Chinese real estate market, such as feasibility studies and project acquisitions. Most recently, he has guided millions Chinese capital with residential and commercial investments in Northern California. Furthermore, he also advised a US real estate investment fund for the acquisition of a one million sq. ft. mixed-use project in China.
Before his entrepreneurship adventure, for nine years Mai worked in marketing, sales, and general management for Zhenye Group Ltd., a leading Chinese green building developer. As the director of marketing & sales, Mai developed the repositioning strategy of the once-floundering 7000-unit “Zhenye City” project leading to the creation of an award-wining project. One of the first green building projects in China, the project created a sales record in the city and later earned awards, including the important "National Building Energy-saving Model Project" award for an energy saving record of 55%. This project also helped him to realize that business interests and social responsibilities can be achieved through win-win innovation. Additionally, Mai enjoyed multi-disciplinary involvement and coordination including deal sourcing, acquisition, financial analysis, design, and construction through his general management role earlier.
Aside from his passion of real estate, Mai has actively volunteered in a wide range from community typhoon education in Shenzhen, China, to affordable housing in Oakland, CA. One of the first wind surfers in China, Mai served as the first-ever Asian board member in charge of training programs at the 700-member Cal Sailing Club in Berkeley, CA from 2008- 2009. He recently sailed back to San Francisco from Hawaii. Ending an eighteen-day non-stop trip, the boat No Ka Oi covered 4000 miles from June 8th to June 25th. Mai also enjoys public speaking, photographing, snowboarding, and playing tennis.
At MIT, he intends to deepen his understanding of real estate investment and global development to prepare for a leadership role in the industry.
PULKIT SHARMA
New Delhi (India), Dubai (UAE)
BE, Civil Engineering, Delhi College of Engineering, 2006, University of Delhi
SBSP- Chicago GSB (Booth), 2007, University of Chicago
LEED Accredited Professional (2009)
Prior to attending MIT, Pulkit completed his undergraduate degree from University of Delhi in Civil and Environmental Engineering. He then focused on business fundamentals by attending the Business Scholar program at the University of Chicago (Summer 2007). Pulkit recently completed and passed the LEED AP exam.
Most recently Pulkit worked with a UK based construction firm Laing O'Rourke in their multi-million dollar mega projects such as University Hospital, Atlantis , Old Town, etc. which were leisure, mixed-use, healthcare and residential in nature. He has worked on various aspects of the Built Environment such as Project Management, Quantity Surveying, Environment/CSR, Technology Integration and Business Systems in the fast paced UAE real estate market. Pulkit has traveled to South East Asia, throughout India, Middle East and the US. He enjoys travelling, chess, writing and keeping himself abreast with world events. He has held several leadership positions for various technical and cultural endeavors in high school and college. He is currently the Co-President of the MIT Sloan Real Estate club.
At MIT, Pulkit intends to develop an understanding of the finer aspects of real estate to prepare for a leadership role in the industry. He plans to apply his MIT education and diverse work experience to work as an international developer and amalgamate his interest in sustainable development and real estate asset investments.
KRISTIN SIMONSON
Cambridge, MA
BArch, 1998, Syracuse University
Kristin joins the CRE as a dual degree student in real estate and planning. With a long-standing interest in the built environment, she did her undergraduate studies in architecture and received a Bachelor of Architecture from Syracuse University. She has practiced architecture in Boston and Providence, leading design teams in projects ranging from affordable housing to historic preservation to commercial office development. She has also broadened her professional experience, spending a year in Portland, Oregon as an Americorps volunteer with Habitat for Humanity and working as a field engineer for a commercial contractor in Boston. This past summer she joined the efforts of Jonathan Rose Companies in New York as a Development Studio intern. Additionally, she has taught several courses at the Boston Architectural College, and has been honored to serve as a guest architectural critic at Northeastern, Wentworth and Syracuse. In 2007 she received her architectural license and is a member of the AIA, Boston Society of Architects and the APA.
In her first year at MIT, Kristin participated in a planning studio in Shenzhen, China, led the design component for the winning team of the Boston Home Loan Bank Affordable Housing Development Competition and travelled to northern Italy as part of an interdisciplinary urban planning team. She is looking forward to examining patterns of suburban development in her thesis work, combining past experience with new planning and real estate thinking and research. In her free time, she likes to read, run, draw and ride her motorcycle.
STEVEN C. WATKINS, JR.
Eagle River, AK
BSc Systems Engineering, 1999, United States Military Academy, West Point
Prior to MIT, Steve spent nearly four years in Iraq as a co-Founder and Director of Versar International Assistance Program (VIAP, Inc.), a subsidiary of Versar, Inc. VIAP provides engineer services to government and private clients. Steve helped bootstrap it from three to 470(+) fulltime employees operating in Iraq, Afghanistan, the UAE, the Southern Sudan, and the Philippines. By year three, VIAP netted over $50M profit – more than all other of Versar’s revenue streams combined.
Prior to Iraq, Steve spent six years as a US Army officer and Airborne Ranger serving throughout the Pacific Rim and North Africa. Steve volunteered for, and became a decorated veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan.
Steve is the founder of Bay Breeze, Inc., a real estate development company in Pretoria, South Africa as well as Madelon Swayne, Inc., an investment firm in Manila, Philippines. He also works as a consultant for three Iraqi engineering firms.
Steve earned PMI’s Project Management Professional (PMP) Certification, he holds a Top Secret security clearance and is studying for the Professional Engineer (PE) exam. In college, Steve acted, directed and played football. He enjoys ballroom dance, travel and snowboarding.
Student Hosts for the Class of 2010 Visitor's Program
- Hyunjae Kim
- Brady Larsen
- Mai Luo
- Pulkit Sharma
