US-based CGI+ Real Estate Investment Strategies has appointed Salim Abboud as the head of Capital Markets (Middle East) to manage and grow the firm’s existing investor base of high-net-worth individuals and family offices in the Middle East.

 

A Los Angeles-based multifamily investment and development firm, CGI+ has more than $1.6 billion in assets under management. Its portfolio of multifamily and mixed-use assets represents 3,000 apartment units located primarily in Los Angeles, New York, Atlanta and Florida.

 

With more than two decades of real estate sales and marketing experience in both the US and the Middle East, Abboud joins CGI+ after having led the sales and marketing teams for the region’s top real estate master developers including Abu-Dhabi-based Eagle Hills and Dubai-based Majid Al Futtaim Properties and Emaar, said the company in a statement.  

 

Over the course of his career, he has worked on more than $10 billion worth of real estate projects including multi-billion-dollar master planned developments in the Middle East, transacting with international investors and end users, it added.

 

Lauding the appointment, Founder and CEO Gidi Cohen said: "While we have been traveling to the Middle East for years to meet with our investors, Abboud now gives us a permanent presence there, which was the natural next step at this time in our evolution."

 

CGI+ Plus is already a year ahead of its aggressive business plan to increase assets under management from $1 billion to $5 billion within the next five years, he noted.

 

On his new role, Abboud said: "Many of the region’s high-net-worth individuals tend to diversify their investments, and a significant part of that strategy is in US real estate, which is viewed as a safer environment offering favorable returns."

 

"My goal is to leverage the success CGI+ has had with major investors in order to capture a greater share of Middle East capital with an appetite for US real estate," he added.

 

The firm also has announced that Jon Shapiro has joined the firm as Director of Business Development and Investor Relations, in the firm’s Los Angeles headquarters.

 

Previously, Shapiro was Managing Director with West Hollywood, CA-based private investment management firm Skylark Capital Management where he was the primary point-of-contact with the firm’s equity partners.-TradeArabia News Service