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Zach Prager moved to Durham, North Carolina, 10 years ago. Since then, the founder and managing principal of real estate development and investment company Ternstone Holdings has grown his network of developers and organizations invested in the city’s future.
As Ternstone Holdings operates solely in the Durham market, Prager said a large part of his work entails conversing with companies, business owners and the community at large to determine what types of CRE developments can benefit the city and its residents.
He said success in this market hinges on building for people’s needs and wants, which involves learning about the market and its history and connecting with the community and its stakeholders.
“It’s easy to sit in your office and look at a building design or analyze demographic data, but that isn’t enough,” he said. “It’s hard to come up with the right strategy if you’re not engaged with the community and you don’t know how people live their lives.”
In a conversation with Bisnow, Prager dove deeper into Durham’s vibrant CRE scene and Ternstone Holdings’ approach to building in the city.
Bisnow: Why do you consider Durham to be such a dynamic market for CRE investment?
Prager: We love the fundamentals of Durham, its history and the diverse community of people from all walks of life. It is one of the most educated areas in the country, with three major universities within 30 minutes of downtown: UNC Chapel Hill, NC State and Duke University.
It’s also an incredibly walkable city. We have land in key locations in downtown Durham such as the Brightleaf neighborhood, which is very close to Duke’s East Campus and the downtown core and has an excellent food and beverage scene. If you live downtown, you can go to a restaurant, then to an art gallery, a show at the Durham Performing Arts Center, a Durham Bulls game or to Central Park for the farmers market. The area also has vibrant nightlife and outdoor recreation.
For one residential project we worked on, The Novus, we looked at where people were coming from and what they’re used to seeing in their market. We built an urban high-rise in an incredible location — right off Main Street in downtown Durham — and an amenity package that the underlying economy and people coming here were looking for. We want people to engage with both the city and our properties.
Bisnow: Can you tell me more about your approach to the market?
Prager: Our process involves gaining a strong understanding of the market and especially the locations we’re building in. In real estate, if there’s a market that’s attractive to companies, the population is growing and you have land in a walkable urban core, that’s a great place to start. From there, it’s about understanding what people want, identifying what’s missing and then deciding what we can build on a specific site to participate in the city’s growth.
It's so important for us to get out there and have conversations to understand what we should be building and who we’re building for. When we partner with out-of-town developers and investors, our local knowledge and relationships are the main competitive advantages we bring to the table. We also try to establish creative partnerships with different organizations in the downtown area, such as The Carolina Theatre, with whom we recently established a partnership for one of our projects.
Bisnow: What types of properties are you most interested in bringing to the area?
Prager: It depends on both the site and the opportunity. We have a hotel in our portfolio and have looked at doing a hotel on another site that is well-located right in the downtown core, near the Durham Convention Center. We’ve looked at doing multifamily, condominiums and retail on the site as well.
While some developers understandably are looking to grow their business and work in different markets, our strategy has been to solely do work in Durham. We organize our portfolio in a way that we can try to focus on one project at a time and figure out what assets make the most sense for the area. I’m open to different product types and uses based on what the area needs and what will be most successful.
Bisnow: What are you looking forward to most about Ternstone Holdings’ future in Durham?
Prager: I’m most excited about what's happening in Durham and being a part of its growth. The Urban Land Institute and Pricewaterhouse Coopers’ Emerging Trends in Real Estate report for 2027 listed Raleigh-Durham as No. 4 in its list of top markets to watch. After seeing what’s happening here firsthand over the last decade, I couldn’t agree more.
We have a handful of prime sites at the moment, and we’re working through what the right development is on each site. Mostly that involves finding the right partners to work with and bringing together products to really align with what we're seeing in Durham and what we think the area would welcome with open arms.
This article was produced in collaboration between Ternstone Holdings and Studio B. Bisnow news staff was not involved in the production of this content.
Studio B is Bisnow’s in-house content and design studio. To learn more about how Studio B can help your team, reach out to studio@bisnow.com.
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