Meredith Donovan
Meredith Donovan, 26
Senior associate in equity, debt and structured finance at Cushman & Wakefield
For a time, Meredith Donovan seemed destined for a law career, following in the footsteps of her parents. A few internships later, however, she realized she wasn’t quite ready to commit to law school. She started networking, and two magic words, “real estate,” started popping up, as did some buzz about Cushman & Wakefield’s professional real estate program — a 12-month program with six rotations.
By the end of the program she knew the equity, debt and structured finance (EDSF) team was exactly where she wanted to land.
Case in point: In July 2021, she worked on the $905 million CMBS refinance for Stellar Management’s One SoHo Square — an office and retail asset — with Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and BMO Capital Markets in the lending syndicate.
“Other than it being the largest financing of my career, this one stood out because there was a smaller team within the EDSF team working on it — [senior directors] Alex Lapidus and Alex Hernandez and myself — so I was given more responsibility, and it was also one of the first CMBS deals that I worked on,” she said. “I love working on the EDSF team, because I’m continuously learning something new, and this deal stands out as a big turning point and learning experience for me.”
Then, in August this year, Donovan helped procure the $276 million loan for City Point, the retail and entertainment hub in Downtown Brooklyn. Sealing a retail financing in the post-pandemic world is no mean feat.
“We did so many analyses to show lenders how well it was doing,” Donovan recalled. “It is a fantastic asset, but the fact it’s retail scared some lenders away, so we were constantly updating our analyses, and it showed me how [data] can support a deal unlike anything else. No matter how great the graphics look in an offering memorandum or how good the sponsorship is, really getting into the numbers and showing how well an asset is performing is key.”
Donovan joined C&W roughly eight months before COVID hit — something she’s thankful for today.
“Having a team that is so ingrained in the market has been invaluable,” she said. “It’s really helpful to listen to colleagues who have lived through other cycles talk about how this [market period] compares. I learn from them every single day and genuinely enjoy spending time with them, which — in my opinion — is so crucial to being successful in this industry.”—C.C.
