Mark Velarde, Managing Director & Chief Operating Officer

Mark Velarde is a Founding Partner of A&M CapRE, and he sits on the firm's Investment Committee and Management Committee.  As an A&M veteran, with prior real estate private equity experience, Mr. Velarde’s background reflects a unique combination of corporate restructuring / turnaround management / performance improvement and real estate separate account and fund investment / asset management experience. 

Mr. Velarde has over $4.5 billion in total real estate experience including: acquisitions, asset management, development completion, leasing, corporate real estate, dispositions and advisory work spanning office, retail, industrial, hospitality, and mixed-use asset classes, as well as master-planned communities.  Prior to joining A&M in 1992, Mr. Velarde's 10-year career in institutional real estate involved work on behalf of a variety of corporate and public U.S. pension funds, foreign institutions and high net worth individuals.  Highlights of his real estate experience to date include:

• 1983 to 1988:  SVP Acquisitions, Karsten Institutional Realty Advisory (a subsidiary of First Interstate Bancorp);
• 1988 to 1992:  EVP & Co-Founder, Trinity Pacific Real Estate Advisors, Inc.;
• 2001 to 2003:  Co-Head of Real Estate Committee at Wherehouse Entertainment, Inc. (675-store chain at peak); and
• 2011 to present:  Oversight of Alvarez & Marsal’s Corporate Real Estate Department (40+ offices worldwide).

In addition, Mr. Velarde has a total of 18 years of experience in corporate restructuring, turnaround management and performance improvement with A&M, including work on 21 separate private or public-reporting middle market companies.  During this period, Mr. Velarde’s experience involved both debtor and creditor clients, both in and out-of-court, across a wide variety of industry sectors.  Mr. Velarde filled interim senior management positions at 13 of those 21 companies, including:

• CEO in a Chapter 11 reorganization of a hospital chain;
• CEO of a plastics manufacturing company;
• Executive Vice Chairman of an international packaging and plastics company;
• CFO and CAO in an out-of-court restructuring of a manufacturing firm;
• CFO and COO in a Chapter 11 reorganization global telecom company;
• CFO, CAO and Director of a 675-store specialty retailer; and
• CRO for a 77-store specialty retailer during its Chapter 11 case.

Mr. Velarde earned both a bachelor's degree and a master's degree in business administration, with concentrations in real estate and finance, from UCLA.  He is a member of the Urban Land Institute, the American Bankruptcy Institute (ABI), the Turnaround Management Association (TMA), and the Association of Insolvency and Restructuring Advisors (AIRA).  Mr. Velarde is a candidate for the Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor (CIRA) designation from the AIRA.