Company Profile
Steelbridge Capital, LLC is a privately held, value-focused, real estate investment company and its principals have generated lifetime gross IRR’s in excess of 20% for investors.
Steelbridge Capital acquires commercial real estate through debt, equity, and private or public markets.
Steelbridge Capital seeks assets where values have been temporarily discounted due to supply or demand imbalances in real estate capital, space, or information markets or where values can be significantly enhanced through redevelopment and repositioning of the asset with aligned management teams.
As value investors, we follow three important principles:- We focus on cycles to minimize capital competition and create efficient, after-tax value in real estate through hold periods that play heavily into local and national cycles
- We are research-driven and concentrate on information advantages, which enable us to play into inefficiencies between markets
- We focus exclusively on buying properties and in submarkets with unique, sustainable competitive advantages as identified by our proprietary models
Although Steelbridge Capital has deep roots and expertise in Florida, its proprietary models and investment history give it expertise in a number of other markets that fit its criteria, including Austin, San Diego, Los Angeles, Seattle, San Francisco, Washington D.C, Boston and Chicago. Steelbridge Capital also continues to closely monitor developments in Cuba.
Gavin Campbell; Firm Founder and Managing Principal
Steelbridge Capital, LLC was founded in 2006 by Gavin Campbell after a fourteen-year career at LaSalle Investment Management where he served as a Managing Director in its acquisitions and portfolio management groups. Mr. Campbell invested over $1 billion for the firm’s clients in a broad range of property types in both core, value-add and opportunistic investment programs, and consistently outperformed NCREIF benchmarks by 200-400 basis points.
During the mid 1990's and during his LaSalle tenure, Mr. Campbell also created and served as the President of the Florida Office Property Company, a private real estate investment trust that bought distressed office and retail properties in Florida and sold to strong returns in 2005-2008. Mr. Campbell oversaw all aspects of the Fund including acquisition and disposition of properties, raising capital, and portfolio management..
Mr. Campbell is also active in civic affairs, having served as former President of the Leadership Greater Chicago and the Latino Chicago Theater and as Deputy Director of the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago. He is a Fellow of the National Tropical Botanical Garden and was part of the acquisitions team in the 2003 acquisition of the Mies Van Der Rohe designed Farnsworth House in Plano, Illinois at auction, and its subsequent opening as an international museum (www.farnsworthhouse.org). Mr. Campbell received a BA Magna Cum Laude from Yale College in 1982 and holds an MBA in Finance from the University of Chicago.
Jay Caplin; Managing Principal
Mr. Caplin has been a leader in all aspects of commercial real estate for the past 24 years. Prior to joining Steelbridge Capital as Managing Principal, Mr. Caplin served as Executive Director, Capital Markets Group for Cushman & Wakefield, the world's largest privately held commercial real estate firm. During his tenure, Mr. Caplin was responsible for founding the Financial Services Group for Cushman & Wakefield in South Florida. Mr. Caplin led the expansion and direction of the company's impressive growth with a specialization in the disposition of real estate equities throughout the Florida region for major institutional clients including life insurance companies, REITs, pension fund advisors, developers and investors. Mr. Caplin has represented a diverse list of owners in the disposition and refinancing of over $7.0 billion worth of office, industrial, multi-family, retail and hotel properties.
A partial list of Mr. Caplin's prestigious client base includes MetLife, Prudential Real Estate Investors, LaSalle Investment Advisors, Westwind Capital Management, CB Richard Ellis Investors, DRA Advisors, Hines Interests, CMD Realty Investors, J.P. Morgan Investment Management, Prudential Realty Group, Principal Real Estate Investors, Sunbelt Investment Holdings, Morgan Stanley Real Estate, AEW Capital Management, Apollo Real Estate Advisors,, TIAA-CREF, Invesco Realty Advisors, UBS Realty Investors, John Hancock Mutual Life, Triple Net Properties, Blackstone Real Estate Advisors, TA Associates, and Colonnade Properties.
Additionally, Mr. Caplin served as a senior appraiser for a regionally based real estate advisory and appraisal firm.
A 2nd generation Floridian, Mr. Caplin graduated from Florida State University (FSU) with a Bachelor's Degree in both Finance and Real Estate. He is a member of National Association of Office and Industrial Parks and serves on the Executive Advisory Board for the FSU Real Estate Program, which was is formed to assist in advancing the Program's visibility and national standing; serve in an advisory capacity to the Program's faculty in the evaluation of the Program and its initiatives; assist in developing strategies to enhance the Program's resources; and assist with regard to career counseling, mentoring and placement of the Program's students. Mr. Caplin is most proudly a devoted father of two.
We aren't all over the map!
Steelbridge Capital is unique in the commercial real estate investment space because we focus only on submarkets that have these three key attributes:
- strong natural and political barriers to entry, such as oceans, lakes, environmentally-protected areas or mountains, capitol city height restrictions, historic district
- strong baby boom demand fundamentals; and
- an abundance of affluent housing.
Submarkets and markets such as these—and the properties that are built there-- have unique competitive advantages due to resulting strong limits on new supply and strong demand for existing real real estate, resulting in less risk and higher risk adjusted returns.
Florida has more of these kinds of markets than any state in the United States, which is why we are Florida focused and Florida based. As a result, we have a combined 40 years of investment history in Florida, with a proprietary data base of submarkets and specific properties with unique competitive advantages and an operating platform designed to maximize Florida investing.
Florida is also an area of specific interest now for many of our clients given both the current extent of real estate dislocation in Florida and Florida’s still bright long term prospects.