Diane Fox, a veteran of more than 25 years in hotel acquisitions and asset management, has joined CBRE as senior vice president of the company’s Midwest Hotels Advisory practice.
Based in Chicago, Fox will work with John Konrath, managing director for CBRE Valuations and Advisory Service’s Midwest Division, and Olivier Gompel, Midwest practice leader of CBRE Hotels Advisory, to expand CBRE’s Hotels Advisory practice in the Midwest.
Services include representing hotel owners, municipalities, lenders and investors in areas such as project feasibility, operator searches, development advisory, acquisition due diligence, highest and best use analyses, asset management, stress tests, TOT studies, repositioning studies, impact studies, financial benchmarking, value impairment analysis and other matters related to optimizing the value of hotel real estate.
With access to CBRE Hotels Research’s tools and reports, and close connectivity to the Hotels Investment Sales, Debt & Structured Finance, Loan Sales, Tax Advisory, Project management and other business lines within the broader CBRE Hotels platform, the company possesses unique capabilities in the hotel advisory arena.
During the past 12 years, Fox has worked in several high-profile asset management roles, overseeing Hotel Asset Management for Clarion Partners and Waterton before pivoting to third-party asset management services with HotelAVE and CHM Warnick. During these respective tenures, she oversaw hotel portfolios representing approximately 180 hotels with an aggregate value in excess of $4.5 billion. In her capacity as an asset manager, she oversaw extensive property renovation and repositioning programs, in-depth operational assessments, strategic planning, refinancings and dispositions.
Prior to her focus on asset management, Fox held development roles as vice president of development with Hilton Hotels Corp. from 2006 to 2008, covering the South Central region based out of Orlando. She also held the position of vice president, portfolio management with CNL Hospitality from 2004 to 2006. From 2002 to 2003, she served as vice president, acquisitions and development with Marcus Hotels and Resorts in Milwaukee.
Earlier in her career, she worked several years in the Lodging and Leisure Group at Lend Lease Real Estate Investments, progressing from analyst to vice president. She has also worked with the Economic Development Institute at the Georgia Institute of Technology with a focus on economic impact analyses of tourism development projects.
She earned her M.A. in Public Administration and a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration from Cleveland State University.
