Cerberus reorganizes RE team

Cerberus Capital Management has reshuffled its real estate platform to help facilitate its cross-border investment activity within the asset class, as well as cross-asset class collaboration.

As part of the reorganization, Lee Millstein, currently Cerberus’s head of European and Asian distressed/real estate, has ascended to the newly created role of global head of real estate. In another promotion, Ronald Rawald, head of European real estate advisory, will become the firm’s first head of international real estate and oversee all markets outside of North America. Millstein will continue to be based in New York and Rawald will relocate from London to New York as part of the role change.

Meanwhile, Daniel Dejanovic will move from Cerberus’s London office to its new office in Amsterdam and act as its new head of European real estate. Ronald Kravit and Thomas Wagner, co-heads of North American real estate, will continue to lead their New York-based team. Wagner, previously chief operating officer of Cerberus’s real estate business, was named co-head in January 2015.

“This realignment facilitates our ability to continue our excellent track record of investing in a diverse range of global assets and commitment to remain nimble and efficient stewards of our investors’ capital,” said Mark Neporent, chief operating officer and general counsel at Cerberus.

The reorganization follows the January final close of Cerberus’s $1.8 billion fourth global opportunistic fund, Cerberus Institutional Real Estate Partners IV. The firm now has assets under management and commitments in excess of $8 billion available for real estate-related investments.

Real estate is one of four main investment areas at Cerberus, along with distressed securities and assets, private equity and mid-market lending. Within real estate, the firm invests in distressed bank loans collateralized by property; US, Asian and European non-performing loan portfolios; distressed securities; gap financing for asset recapitalizations, rescue financing and joint ventures with firms in need of capital; distressed real estate foreclosed on by lenders; and real estate asset held by banks and corporations that need capital.