Bisnow Exclusive: Bill Witte Opens Up
Related California is historically mum on its development plans, but we got CEO Bill Witte to open up about some of S.F.'s biggest. He told us new details this week of two signature projects in what he calls the two most active high-density residential development areas of S.F. Related's Transbay Block 8 site—which, at 550 feet tall will be the largest and tallest residential tower in the Transbay area—is already entitled and now subject to design review, he says. Construction is expected to launch in 2016.
Related's other S.F. biggie is the Goodwill site in Midmarket, which we were the first to report on in May. The prime site at South Van Ness and Mission, which sits in a growing residential and tech office hub, is an interesting deal, he says, because Related is fee developing it on behalf of the city. The site will include a 460k SF office building to house several city departments, 550 or so multifamily residential units, and 20k to 30k SF of retail. Because of city involvement, there's a head start on the entitlement process with the planning department, he adds, and construction will kick off in a couple years. He also hopes to get a good-sized site in Potrero Hill entitled in the next few years.
He says his company has developed a portfolio that is pushing towards $2B of largely urban, high-density product. A great team helped build that pipeline, and now he's made two hires to execute on it as the company splits into two divisions (one for market rate, another for affordable housing). Greg Vilkin, above, a big fish who's got a lengthy resume in high density urban development (most recently at MacFarlane), was named prez of the newly formed Related California Urban Residential and will be based in S.F. And longtime Related California exec Frank Cardone was named prez of Related California Affordable, which has 3,000 units in the pipeline (he'll stay on as COO of Related California too and work in Irvine).
