Donna Shafer/John Coe
Bio
Donna, a founding member of Cityline Partners, is responsible for Cityline’s strategic planning, and for oversight of the company’s day to day execution of its business plan. Prior to Cityline, Donna was affiliated with West*Group for several years, first as the CEO of Park*Crest, and then as Executive Vice President for West*Group. Prior to her tenure at West*Group, she was General Counsel and Vice President of Real Estate for Opus East, and a partner with the law firm of Hazel & Thomas, now known as Reed Smith.
Donna serves on the Board and Executive Committee for George Mason University Foundation, and chairs the Foundation’s Real Estate Committee. She is also on the Board of New Hope Housing and a member of the Urban Land Institute Executive Committee, and the Urban Land Institute Trends Committee. Donna earned her Bachelor of Arts from the University of Virginia, and her Juris Doctor from the University of Virginia School of Law.
Show Notes
- Current Role- DLJ Real Estate Partners formed Cityline Partners and she was made a Managing Director and has led the effort (6:30)
- While with West*Group before Cityline Partners the vision for Tysons’ land they owned was created (7:15)
- Origins
- Born in Denver, CO and was an Air Force “brat” as her Dad was an Air Force officer (8:30)
- Traveled constantly as a child
- Comfortable traveling and developing self confidence (9:15)
- Lived in Virginia until her senior yr. in HS where she graduated in South Dakota (10:00)
- College at UVA and she applied only there (11:30)
- Was told when accepted that 1 of 3 would not graduate (12:00)
- She was “lucky” (12:30)
- UVA Law School (13:30)
- Parents encouraged her (14:15)
- Parents met in NC and Dad went into Air Force for a career (15:00)
- She just decided to go law instead of business (16:00)
- Liked moot court and property law (17:45)
- Internship at Hazel Beckhorn and Haynes (18:45)
- Hired at Hazel Thomas (merged firm) (now Reed Smith) (20:00)
- Transactional legal work (22:15)
- Specialties- financing, P&S agreements, JVs (22:45)
- 13 years there (24:00)
- Opus East became a client (24:30)
- Closing a deal and they made a special appointment with her at her office to recruit her (25:00)
- Joined Opus East (26:30)
- Worked initially four days a week and it was the most comfortable time in flexibility (26:45)
- Few women had the responsibility of GC in real estate companies (27:50)
- Growth trajectory- Merchant builder in office & retail
- Opus Companies– Rauenhorst family (31:00)
- Build to sell and not permanently finance projects (31:40)
- Transitioned from real estate law to be a business executive (32:00)
- She valued getting the deal done- managing risk (32:45)
- Real estate lawyer should be knowledgable in real estate economics (33:45)
- While there she reached out to Gerry Halpin at West*Group about a site they had for a large mixed use project to JV with them. He approached her to join them. (37:00)
- Joined West*Group to develop Park*Crest...
