Paul Coates, head of real estate finance at UK bank RBS, is leaving after 16 years to join CBRE.
Coates will take up a newly-created role next year running CBRE’s EMEA debt and structured finance team, which advises clients on sourcing and structuring loans.
CBRE said he will spearhead the continued expansion of the 30-strong team across the region and develop the pipeline of debt advisory mandates.
A spokesman for RBS said that Coates will stay on until sometime in the new year while a successor is appointed.
At CBRE, Coates will report to Richard Dakin, managing director of CBRE Capital Advisors; Steve Williamson will continue to focus primarily on the debt advisory team’s UK clients and will also take on a new role as chairman of the debt group, while Marco Rampin will continue his focus on continental European activities.
Coates has led real estate finance for 10 years, through the difficult period after the global financial crash when the bank shrank its property lending, to a more stable period in the last few years when it has written £7bn - £8 bn of new UK property loans and refinancings each year.
RBS said Coates had ‘played an important part in establishing our real estate finance business as the leading franchise in the sector.’
It added that there are no other changes to the RBS REF senior leadership team. The bank is part way through a separation of its activities to meet new UK ring-fencing regulations which come into force on 1 January 2019.
Most real estate finance sits in the RBS commercial bank which is being rebranded as NatWest in England and Wales. Structured loans are issued via NatWest Markets which sits outside the ring-fenced bank.
CBRE advised on €6 bn of debt transactions in 50 deals between January 2016 and June 2017. It hired in a number of European countries with Martina Muehlhofer joining in Italy, Abdallah Ould-Brahim in France and Igor Borrego in Portugal, augmenting Capital Advisors activities in the Netherlands, Spain Germany and CEE.
Dakin said: ‘Paul has the experience to help us deliver the strategic growth that is required for us to continue to deliver exceptional outcomes for clients.’
