Breakfast Forum: The Houston Commercial Real Estate Markets – What’s Ahead for 2019

Jimmy Hinton – Managing Director, HFF

Mr. Hinton serves as Managing Director of HFF, responsible for the firm’s research efforts. Mr. Hinton works with the executive management team to assist in investor relations and to inform both HFF staff and firm clients with in-depth analysis of economic, property and capital market trends. He is also responsible for providing extensive market reports, client presentations and deal-specific analysis for debt placement and investment sales assignments. Mr. Hinton’s responsibilities include substantial interaction with pension funds, life insurance companies, regional and CMBS lenders, REITs, foreign investors and private equity funds.

Prior to his role as Managing Director, Mr. Hinton worked at Cadence Bank, N.A. (fka Community Bancorp, LLC), a bank holding company formed in 2009 to invest $1 billion of equity in distressed financial institutions. Mr. Hinton’s responsibilities included mergers and acquisitions, investor and regulatory relations, corporate governance and real estate loan portfolio management.

Prior to Cadence Bank, Mr. Hinton served as an Associate Director, Research and Real Estate Analyst at HFF, underwriting, valuing and facilitating debt and structured finance transactions, as well as equity placements.

During his tenure at HFF, Mr. Hinton has supported the execution of more than 150 commercial real estate transactions totaling more than $4.5 billion in 20 states. Mr. Hinton has experience in fixed- and adjustable-rate debt, mezzanine debt, construction loans and joint venture executions on behalf of clients engaged in the acquisition, development and recapitalization of property types including multi-housing, industrial, office, retail, medical office and storage properties. Mr. Hinton first joined HFF in February 2005 after working in the private wealth management industry for two years.

Trey Odom – President and CEO, Avera Companies

H.T. “Trey” Odom is president and CEO of Houston-based Avera Companies, a major player in the commercial real estate industry, with industrial development, construction and investment projects in the Houston area, throughout Texas and across the country.

Odom founded Avera in 2002. His brother, Lance, joined in 2011 and their father, Hubert Odom, an attorney, came on board to handle some of the firm’s legal matters.

Avera’s team of professionals provides a range of development services for corporate clients. “We buy the land, we finance the project, we develop it, we entitle it, we built it,” Odom says. “Our specialty is industrial, and we know it.”

Abbey Roberson, Vice President of Planning, Texas Medical Center

Abbey Roberson joined the Texas Medical Center in February 2016 as the Vice President of Planning, focusing primarily on design and development plans for TMC3 and identifying opportunities for enhancing the TMC campus.

Prior to joining the TMC team, Roberson spent 12 years at HOK in Atlanta, Washington, D.C., and Houston, where she led a planning and landscape architecture team. With a specialty in urban design, master planning and urban infill developments, her experience includes serving clients on a broad range of projects, from district plans and mixed use developments to campuses and communities in cities across the country and around the world.

She is an active member of the Houston District Council of the Urban Land Institute and volunteers extensively with the Junior League of Houston, Inc. Roberson earned a Master of City and Regional Planning from Georgia Institute of Technology and a Bachelor of Environmental Design from Texas A&M University.