My Journey to Investments

From project development to real estate finance

I started my career as a project management consultant representing residential and commercial developers in Stockholm. With a Civil Engineering degree from Chalmers University of Technology, the role was a natural fit. A position in finance was never anything I considered due to the nature of my studies. Over time, I transitioned towards conducting TEDDs (technical and environmental due diligence) for both corporate M&As and pure real estate transactions, eventually becoming an assignment manager for those types of projects.

Working in a transaction focused environment opened a new world to me, and my interest in investments grew. The blend of interpersonal skills, unambiguous calculations, and the thrill of closing deals all factored in. I decided to move on, working purely with transactions as an advisor on both the sell-side and buy-side. This was immensely educational, but the urge for more complex financial analysis persisted. Not to mention that the years spent crunching calculus, structural design, and mathematical statistics at university have all shaped me into a numbers person. Naturally, when an opportunity to join Velo Capital arose, I didn’t hesitate.

Urban Partners Credit- Financing the Green Transition

Today, I am a part of the Real Estate Credit team. My day-to-day work mainly consists of underwriting and reviewing the deal opportunities we encounter. This includes, but is not limited to, cashflow modeling, market analysis, and business plan evaluations.

Real Estate Credit focuses on financing the green transition. We advise funds that provide tailored financing solutions to the best-in-class borrowers and projects. This includes mezzanine and whole loans for standing and transitional assets, as well as ground-up developments across a range of real estate segments in Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland.

We are a tight-knit team with various backgrounds that complement each other well. In practice, this means I could be educating my fellow colleagues on construction contractual law, the Swedish residential rent setting system, or the norms for load-bearing capacity of the floor in logistics assets. On the flip side, it could be my colleagues teaching me about CRREM analysis (Carbon Risk Real Estate Monitor, a sort of sustainability measurement tool), structuring of various security packages in legal documentation, or the best Bloomberg shortcuts.

True success is born from the collective strength of a multidisciplinary team

Working at a real estate private credit platform with a strong sustainability sentiment, there are several perspectives that bring added value to the team and thus also the funds. The most obvious being an understanding of the financial product, but also the underlying asset. That means we need to understand items such as the supply/demand dynamics for the property's usage and location, credibility of the business plan, potential exit strategies, and does the asset meet our sustainability demands.

At Urban Partners, we understand that true success is born from the collective strength of our multidisciplinary team. By harnessing a wealth of knowledge in finance, real estate, engineering and sustainability, we create a collaborative environment that enables us to analyze opportunities comprehensively. We make sure to leverage our in-house knowledge, making the sum larger than our individual values.

If the value we place on continuous learning and multidisciplinary skills resonates with you, I encourage you to explore the available job opportunities and consider joining Urban Partners.