Former Blackstone CRE Exec Could Hit $1B With First Fund At New Firm
A first-time property fund from a former Blackstone executive could be on track to raise as much as $1B by the end of the second quarter.
Town Lane, from Blackstone’s former Head of Real Estate Acquisitions in the Americas Tyler Henritze, has already closed $750M in commitments during Q1 2024, The Wall Street Journal reported.
That number alone puts Town Lane on track to reach $1B by the end of June, which analysts told the WSJ would be one of the largest sums ever for a first-time property fund.
The firm is concentrating on warehouses, hotels and multifamily buildings in Sun Belt cities, per the WSJ. Commitments currently being finalized by the firm reportedly come from investors including family offices, foundations and Ivy League endowments.
While first-time property funds have historically struggled to raise capital, Henritze negotiated the right to market his track record at Blackstone, where he was known for high-profile deals, Bloomberg previously reported.
Henritze spent nearly two decades at Blackstone. He was promoted to partner in 2013, a year after advocating for Blackstone to buy budget lodging chain Motel 6.
He then went on to play roles in deals that built Blackstone up to the position it occupies today, including its $26B Hilton Worldwide acquisition. The Hilton later went public, netting $14B for Blackstone in the most profitable sale ever by the firm.
Henritze was later key to Blackstone’s first casino acquisition, the Cosmopolitan on the Las Vegas Strip. Blackstone’s real estate fund bought the casino for $1.7B, with the Cosmopolitan becoming another of the firm’s largest asset sales in 2021 when it sold for $5.65B. He also co-led the $10B acquisition of QTS Realty Trust, which gave Blackstone exposure to 7M SF of data centers and a platform to invest billions more.
Henritze left Blackstone in June last year to co-found Town Lane with his sister, Parker Morse, who serves as chief operating officer after leaving her post as a principal at Sycamore Partners. Town Lane has also reportedly poached employees from firms including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Blackstone.
He's not the only former Blackstone real estate executive using this moment of volatility to strike out on his own. Chad Pike, who was co-head of real estate investment alongside Jon Gray during the Global Financial Crisis, late last year launched a new real estate investment management firm.
