ASK Partners appoints pair of senior managing partners
Real estate finance platform ASK Partners has appointed experienced real estate principals Greg Cohen and Mark Foster as managing partners.
The pair will join co-founders Daniel Austin and Doug King in the senior leadership team, with Austin continuing as CEO. As part of their appointments, both will ultimately become equity partners in ASK.
Since its launch in 2016, ASK has deployed over £2bn across over 160 real estate transactions and, in 2022, sold a 50% stake in the business to OakNorth Bank. Supported by OakNorth, the enlarged partnership will look to build on this track record to drive further growth in the lending business, broaden ASK’s investor base, and selectively pursue equity opportunities with experienced operating partners.
Cohen brings over 20 years’ experience in real estate development and investment. He is a partner at Sterlet Properties, formerly Newmark Property Consultants, where he has been involved in the acquisition and development of more than 1.5 million sq ft across all use classes and in transactions with a combined sales value in excess of £500m. His experience includes joint ventures with Argo, Investec, and RBE Investments, as well as transactions with major institutions including Derwent, Aviva, and British Land.
Foster brings experience in private capital and real estate investment across both debt and equity. He leads Melrose Capital, the family investment and trading business he established in 2018, and over the best part of a decade he has been active in deploying capital across a broad range of asset classes. Notable recent transactions include approximately 2,000 student beds across London and Manchester, life science projects in Cambridge, and over 500,000 sq ft of industrial space.
Cohen and Foster will both continue their respective activities through Sterlet and Melrose Capital alongside their roles at ASK.
Daniel Austin, CEO and co-founder of ASK Partners, said: “Over the past decade we have built ASK into an established real estate lending platform, deploying more than £2 billion across over 160 transactions and developing a strong network of borrowers, investors and capital partners.
“Greg and Marc joining the leadership team is an important step in the next stage of ASK’s growth. They bring complementary experience across development, investment, origination and private capital, as well as longstanding relationships across the real estate market. That strengthens our existing lending business, expands our investor network and gives us the capability to pursue selected equity opportunities where we believe we can create additional value for our investors and partners.
“Importantly, this is about building on what ASK already does well. We will continue to be highly selective and underwriting-led, but with a broader senior team, greater origination capability and more ways to deploy capital into attractive real estate opportunities.”
Greg Cohen, managing partner at ASK Partners, added: “I have spent my career investing and developing as an equity principal, which means looking at real estate through a slightly different lens – not simply how an investment is financed, but how value can be created through hands-on asset management.
“ASK has built an exceptional debt platform and I see a significant opportunity to combine that financing expertise with principal-side investment and development experience. Having known and worked with the ASK team for a number of years, this feels like a natural progression and I’m excited about what we can build together at a time when the real estate market offers real opportunism for those who have experience in extracting value.”
Marc Foster, managing partner at ASK Partners, said: “Having deployed capital as a family office across various levels of the capital structure over many years, the natural next step was to build a debt and equity-led business at scale. The opportunity to do that with ASK was incredibly compelling – bringing together our collective expertise, investor relationships and experience with an established infrastructure, deal flow and track record.
“My belief has always been that the starting point should be the quality of the underlying real estate and the opportunity itself, and that the best outcomes are achieved by working closely and collaboratively with partners, investors and borrowers throughout. That philosophy is strongly aligned with ASK’s approach and bringing additional equity capability into the business means we can now apply it across a much broader range of situations. Combined with Greg’s extensive development and investment experience and our collective network across private capital, institutional investors and operating partners, we have everything we need to build something genuinely significant.”
To coincide with the expansion of its senior team, ASK has relocated its London office to 107–113 Great Portland Street.