San Francisco-based real estate investment firm Drawbridge Realty is moving up several key executives to oversee its nationwide portfolio of commercial properties as forces like the AI boom continue to drive a national office market recovery.
The company, an offshoot of global investment firm KKR, promoted veteran Mike Embree to chief portfolio officer. Embree will continue in his new position to oversee the company’s almost 7 million square feet of properties worth over $2 billion, mainly leased to tech firms and other large corporate users in “innovation markets across the United States,” the firm said in a press release.
The company, which focuses on acquiring, developing and managing commercial properties across the U.S., also said it has promoted two other executives: Nicole Kaneshiro, now a senior vice president, and Mike Hartford, now a vice president based in Denver.
Drawbridge's portfolio consists of more than 50 single-tenant office, R&D, life science and industrial buildings in 13 markets from Seattle to Atlanta, according to its website.
A combination of depressed demand, stagnant leasing and the ongoing effects of flexible work has helped push the national office vacancy rate to a record high of more than 14%, according to CoStar data. Tenants collectively handed back upward of 65 million square feet last year, boosting the total to more than 210 million square feet of move-outs since the start of 2020.
However, demand among artificial intelligence companies stole the show when it came to the national office market’s recovery last year, as the industry’s blockbuster deals helped reshape post-pandemic leasing dynamics.
Technology companies involved in the creation of AI-fueled products — from language models to chips powering data centers — are setting the stage for further growth and moving the needle on the nation’s record-high vacancy rate in recent years.
For the first time since 2019, the nation’s office tenants are committing to more space than they're giving up. A 40-year real estate industry veteran, Embree has spent the last 24 years with Drawbridge. In the last four years, Embree oversaw some 3 million square feet of new leases with tenants such as Anduril Industries, Aspida Financial Services, Discover Card, Myriad Genetics, Northrop Grumman, Uber and Victra, according to Drawbridge.
Before Embree joined Drawbridge in 2002, he managed properties on behalf of TriNet Corporate Realty Trust as well as Embree Real Estate Co. Inc., an office and retail development and management company. He graduated from San Diego State University.
“Mike’s extensive industry expertise, steady and collaborative leadership, and comprehensive understanding of our portfolio have been instrumental to Drawbridge’s ongoing success,” Drawbridge Chief Executive Officer Charlie McEachron said in a statement.
Nicole Kaneshiro has over 15 years of real estate finance and accounting experience, with knowledge of operational accounting, fund-level finance and forecasting, and investor reporting from her experience working as controller and in similar roles at Silicon Valley real estate firms. She is a CPA and graduated from the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Denver-based Vice President Mike Hartford joined Drawbridge Realty in 2022 and has been serving as an assistant vice president. He previously worked in acquisitions and asset management for Meeting Street Partners and for Carmel Partners on the acquisitions team. He holds an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and a BA in economics from Washington and Lee University.
Net absorption, the change in space measured by move ins minus move outs, climbed in the final months of last year across the United States, meaning the office market was able to land its first year of positive leasing since 2019, according to data in a recent report from Newmark. It comes as CoStar research found that office vacancy may have peaked.