CPE Podcasts

Welcome back to Sustainability Street, our podcast on the intersection of commercial real estate and the world we live in.

My guest for this episode is Savills Vice Chair Katrina Kostic Samen, who heads the company's Workplace Studio. She and I discuss "Heat and Humanity: Protecting People and Building a Resilient Future," a white paper that she co-wrote with Jose Ramirez, co-lead of Savills Human Capital Solutions group.

The white paper examines the impacts of the global warming crisis on workplaces, particularly office buildings, and on occupant behavior. And it highlights examples of buildings whose owners are facing the crisis head-on with adaption strategies. 

"It's not just a comfort issue," Samen said. "It's a critical business risk if our people are not performing, and if they're making mistakes. And so that's really, ultimately, what I want to make sure that we bring back to the table."

Samen has a global view of workplace design trends, and her insights are unique and thought-provoking. Here are the key topics our conversation covered:

• (1:24) Workplace design guru
• (3:16) The post-COVID workplace
• (4:26) Why air conditioning is a band-aid
• (7:34) The mental impacts of heat
• (9:40) Aligning with sustainability goals
• (12:44) What can employers, owners do
• (18:28) What the U.S. can learn from the world
• (25:10) Samen's call to action

Over the past five years, it’s been a real rocket ship ride in the U.S. for Mapletree Investments. That’s the apt description of Rich Prokup, who leads US operations for the Singapore-based firm and is the guest on this episode.

Under Prokup’s leadership, Mapletree has become one of the industrial sector’s fastest-growing, most prolific investors and developers. In just a few short years, the company has created a U.S. footprint that now encompasses five offices, 150 team members and half a billion dollars of product in development.

In this conversation, Prokup tells why the company is focusing on development in 2026, and what will be driving leasing demand. He outlines the biggest challenges that owners and their clients will face.

Prokup is also an accomplished musician, and that seems to reveal what appeals to him most about his profession. As he puts it: “Real estate is a very creative business. You’re not spending time focusing on how to save a half a penny on 10 million widgets.” Take a listen.

After several years of hybrid experimentation, the office market is still in reset mode. Vacancy remains elevated, sublease space is reshaping availabilities, whereas tenants are rethinking every square foot. There’s a clear divide emerging between buildings that deliver a commute-worthy experience and those that don’t, with flex options, spec suites and hospitality-style amenities increasingly setting the tone.

In this episode of Step Into My Office, CPE’s Olivia Bunescu talked with Friedman Properties’ Vice President of Leasing and Acquisitions Brian Chernett about the current market fundamentals and how those are unfolding, specifically across the company’s portfolio. Drawing on Friedman’s concentrated mixed-use footprint in Chicago, Chernett explained how a tightly defined portfolio can weather market volatility and why curated experiences have become central to their strategy.

He also touched on how tenants are using office space today: from small and mid-sized users driving leasing velocity to companies testing flexible layouts before committing to a space long-term. The reality of today’s office is a “tale of two markets,” dividing amenity-rich trophy and Class A assets from older commodity buildings that struggle to keep up.

Here’s what they discussed about:

• Vacancy, sublease space and momentum (01:17)
• A “tale of two” office markets emerges (02:42)
• How RTO policies are reshaping demand (04:32)
• Which tenants are expanding—and which are waiting (06:23)
• How workplace design and decision-making are evolving (07:09)
• Inside Friedman Properties’ River North ecosystem strategy (11:37)
• Historic buildings, modern systems and tenant experience (16:06)
• Acquisition red flags and “highest and best use” (17:39)
• Two flavors of flex and what tenants really want (19:27)
• Office sector outlook and why 2026 could be pivotal (24:05)

Welcome back to Sustainability Street, our podcast on the intersection of commercial real estate and the world we live in.

My guest for this episode is Liz Beardsley, senior policy counsel for the U.S. Green Building Council. I spoke to Beardsley shortly after her return from COP30, the United Nations Climate Change Conference held last month in Belém, Brazil.

Each year, nearly 200 countries participate in COP, or Conference of the Parties, to negotiate international treaties, assess progress on previous treaties, especially the Paris agreement, and develop strategies for reducing emissions and strengthening resilience. The U.S. did not send a negotiating delegate this year, and there was no U.S. pavilion. But subnational representatives and the private sector made a strong showing, according to Beardsley.

Resilience was a key focus at the conference along with emissions reduction, Beardsley said. While there has been a significant downcurve in emissions globally, the world is already at 1.2 or 1.3 degrees Celsius, and current Nationally Determined Contributions are not enough to maintain global warming to the Paris agreement's 1.5 degree Celsius target.

"We understand that we need to do more faster," Beardsley said. "That was the focus. It was really on scaling and doing more, not doing less."

Here are some of the topics our conversation covered:

• (1:34) What is COP?
• (6:15) The U.S. presence at COP
• (12:38) Buildings on the global stage
• (18:49) Near-zero buildings defined
• (21:54) The emphasis on resilience
• (27:19) Why fossil fuels are hard to eliminate
• (28:46) Big takeaways

As the daughter of a Washington, D.C.–based real estate private equity executive, Hilary Provinse grew up around the industry, but her early career on a ‘90s Wall Street trading floor shaped her resilience and sharpened her leadership instincts. Today, as executive vice president and head of mortgage banking at Berkadia, she manages a 400-person capital markets team spanning mortgage banking and investment sales.

Provinse is a 2018 CREW Network Distinguished Leader and Berkadia is a CREW Network Gold Level Partner. Commercial Property Executive Senior Editor Laura Valean invited her on the CREW Up podcast for a candid conversation about leadership, career evolution and women’s progress in commercial real estate. Navigating today’s reset in financing values, she reflects on the importance of understanding people’s strengths, building diverse teams and meeting clients where they are.

In this FTI Experts’ Hub podcast, we look back at one of the most pivotal moments in recent commercial real estate history—the early months of the pandemic—through the lens of two specialists from FTI Consulting’s Real Estate Solutions and Real Estate Advisory practices: Jahn Brodwin and Benjamin Steele.

Back in April 2020, as uncertainty gripped the industry, 40-year veteran Brodwin wrote a thought piece titled "The Office Market After COVID-19: Will It Be a Zero-Sum Game?" In it, he explored the opposing forces he believed would shape office demand in the years ahead, and he shared those same ideas in an early episode of FTI Experts’ Hub.

Nearly six years later, his predictions offer a compelling starting point for understanding just how differently the office sector has evolved. In this podcast with CPE Senior Editor Laura Valean, Brodwin examines the assumptions behind his 2020 outlook and reflects on which dynamics unfolded as he anticipated and which surprised him. Joining him is Benjamin Steele, part of the next generation of CRE advisors at FTI Consulting. Steele adds a fresh, data-driven perspective on the sector’s trajectory and challenges some of the 2020 assumptions with today’s realities.

On January 1, 2026, Jim Taylor will officially retire asCEO of Brixmor Property Group. In this conversation, recorded before his retirement was announced this fall, Taylor reflects on his long and eclectic journey in the industry. Over the past couple of decades, he’s traveled what he jokinglydescribes as “a checkered path” that ultimately led to the C-suite at Brixmor.

Before becoming a real estate executive, he was anaccountant, earned a law degree and worked as an investment banker. Taylor’s service to the industry also includes leadership roles in several industryorganizations.  He’s been a member of Nareit’sexecutive board and he was the 2024 chairman of ICSC.

During his decade as Brixmor’s CEO, Jim Taylor has overseenan extensive program of reinvestment in the REIT’s 63-property, 354 million-square feet portfolio of open-air centers. As of the third quarter this year, Brixmor’s pipeline of property upgrades encompassed 375 million dollars’worth of enhancements across 35 properties.

In this conversation, Taylor discusses the factors that aredriving growth for open-air centers, how the capital markets view the asset category, Brixmor’s strategy of reinvestment and more. Take a listen.

Episode highlights:

·    (1:47) A “checkered path” to the REIT C-suite

·    (4:44) The No. 1 factor in company success

·    (6:01) Topline trends in open-air centers

·    (7:27) Inside Brixmor’s investment strategy

·    (9:43) Adding value: works in progress

·    (11:37) Disciplined capital allocation

·    (13:00) Creating critical portfolio mass

·    (14:44) An “unprecedented breadth” of tenantdemand

·    (16:18) Why it’s competitive out there foracquisitions

·   (18:37) Lenders open the gates

·   (19:29) Growth trajectory: 2026 and beyond

Industrial real estate is balancing short-term headwinds with long-term opportunity. While new supply and slower leasing are shaping near-term performance, e-commerce, manufacturing expansion and data center growth continue to drive structural demand.

In this inaugural episode of Inside Industrial, Link Logistics' CFO Matthew Ostrower discusses how the company is positioning for these shifts and using data to stay ahead of market change.

Ostrower oversees corporate finance and also leads strategy and innovation at Link. The company, established by Blackstone in 2019, is the largest U.S.-only owner-operator of last-mile industrial real estate, with a nationwide portfolio of modern warehouses and distribution facilities and customer programs such as the Energy Solutions platform.

“Location really matters—spatial economics is everything,” Ostrower said, noting that decisions increasingly hinge on where long-term demand is most durable. He also outlines how insights from Link’s portfolio guide capital allocation and why he expects momentum to build again over the next couple of years.

Take a listen as Commercial Property Executive’s Diana Firtea explores these themes with Ostrower in the first episode of Inside Industrial.

Welcome back to Sustainability Street, our podcast on the intersection of commercial real estate and the world we live in.

Last week, I attended the Greenbuild conference in Los Angeles where I got to sit down with Rhiannon Jacobsen, managing director of market transformation & development for the U.S. Green Building Council, which hosts the global sustainability event.

If you don't know, Greenbuild is an annual conference that draws thousands of executives from around the globe to talk about making buildings and communities more sustainable. Building resilience was a big focus for this year's program, but so was decarbonization, energy efficiency, the circular economy, wellbeing in buildings, the increasing role of data and so much more.

Jacobsen and I talked about the overall theme of the conference "Better Buildings, Better Futures," about the new LEED v5 and about how U.S. sustainability is faring now that the federal government has rolled back support.

 "We see incredible work happening at the city, at the state, at the county level," she told me. "We're going to continue to encourage that, and, of course, we're going to be available to speak with and support federal initiatives."

You can find other highlights from our conversation here:

• (1:10) The buzz at Greenbuild
• (1:52) "Better Buildings, Better Futures"
• (2:26) Green innovation
• (3:46) Getting to know LEED v5
• (6:27) States and cities lead the way
• (8:26) Big takeaways

A year of mixed sentiment across global commercial real estate, with sharp contrasts between regions—this is the main takeaway from the latest Global Commercial Property Monitor released by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors in London. While investor confidence is firming in markets such as the U.S., India and the UAE, markets such as China, France and Germany face sluggish demand and subdued outlooks. “Uncertainty around trade, interest rates, geopolitics continue to cloud the outlook as they have done most of the year,” said Head of Market Analytics Tarrant Parsons, in the final podcast episode of RICS Monitor in 2025.

Press play for the full podcast, hosted by CPE Senior Editor Laura Valean!