Kevin McHugh

Senior Director, Construction
Greystar

Kevin McHugh is a Senior Director and leads the UK construction team. He works across the full development lifecycle with Greystar’s investment, development and operations teams and supply chain partners to deliver safe, high quality and cost-efficient projects at pace.

Kevin champions Modern Methods of Construction to improve certainty of programme, quality and sustainability across Greystar’s UK portfolio. Since joining in 2018, he has helped to advance a consistent, scalable approach to project delivery that supports Greystar’s ambition to create purpose-designed and thoughtfully amenitised homes at scale.

Prior to joining Greystar, Kevin was a Cost Manager with IKEA’s Global Property Management Group, supporting project delivery teams across 30 countries. Earlier in his career he worked at Davis Langdon, delivering across commercial, education, industrial, retail and residential asset classes.

Kevin is a Member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and holds a first-class BSc in Quantity Surveying from Kingston University. He serves on the Steering Group of the British Property Federation and the Construction Clients’ Leadership Group’s Collaborative Clients Forum, which supports the Construction Leadership Council, and is a regular conference speaker and industry commentator on Modern Methods of Construction.

Joe Thornton

Founder & CEO
Cast Consultancy

Joe is a Founder of Cast and Chief Executive Officer. He has over 20 years-experience delivering cost and project management services across a range of sectors before specialising in residential where he now leads delivery across a range of client portfolios. Joe’s focus on innovation has contributed to the development of a range of unique MMC strategies and solutions for our clients across a variety of projects including the development of our Construction Integration and MMC Advisory propositions. Joe works with clients, manufacturers, technology companies and materials supplier organisations to develop bespoke strategic and technical solutions. His experience enables him to develop the optimum solution for projects ranging from the innovative procurement of largely traditional construction through to the complete re-engineering of processes to accommodate innovate MMC solutions. As the industry continues to evolve, he is working with a range of technology businesses to explore the digitalisation of the construction industry and how software can augment the continuing evolution of our core professional services. Joe’s focus on innovation has led to the development of several industry leading solutions such as the PMV Estimator, an automated 2D take off solution, a modular system configuration software platform and the evolution of a number of MMC Category 1 MMC system designs and business models.

Todd Marler

Senior Director Operations
Greystar

Joanna Drew

Director of Place
London Borough of Enfield

Joanne is Executive Director of Housing and Regeneration at LB Enfield and co-chair of the London Housing Directors Network.  She has worked in housing across the UK for central, regional, and local government, for housing associations and a national social justice charity driving transformation and the delivery of better outcomes for people, places, and the planet. At Enfield she leads a large-scale housing business and regeneration agenda. Enfield is also co-lead Borough for the London Council’s pan London Climate Change programme for warmer and greener homes through housing retrofit.

Richard Williams

CEO
The Ringley Group

Richard is Group CEO of The Ringley Group; he is an ex MD of Property Management and Board member at both CBRE & Avison Young. Richard is market facing, responsible for strategic partnerships and growth, as well as establishing Ringley's position in the commercial asset and property management arena. Richard's experience spans over 30 years across all UK real estate asset classes, including mixed use development, commercial, surveying, and valuation.

Nik Dyer

Development Director
Halcyon Development Partners

Nik is Development Director at Halcyon Development Partners, a specialist leader in the expanding Co-Living sector. With 15 years’ experience across all living sectors within the UK and Ireland, he has spent the last 7 years at the centre of the Co-Living movement at The Collective and subsequently Halcyon. Nik’s expertise spans the whole development lifecycle, having delivered the FOLK Co-Living portfolio for DTZ Investors from acquisition, planning, and construction through to operation, widely considered the benchmark for Co-Living best-practice in London, and one of the key influences for the GLAs London Plan Shared Living SPG on Purpose Built Large Scale Shared Living. More recently, he leads the development process for their expanding next generation 1,700 unit London portfolio which includes the first Co-Living plot within the Related Argent Brent Cross Town Masterplan.

Anna Hwang

Chief Investment Officer
Placefirst

As Chief Investment Officer at Placefirst, Anna is part of the senior leadership team with over 20 years’ experience in the property sector.  Anna has played an instrumental role in developing and executing Placefirst’s real estate strategy and previously held the role of Director of Operational Capital Markets at Savills. Anna supports on increasing the size of Placefirst’s residential portfolio,  developing and executing the investment strategy, and overseeing the management of the investment portfolio. Prior to that Anna was an investment partner at Addington Capital who is a UK real estate investment & asset management company based in London with transactions to date of over £1bn.

Shivani Goolab

Head of Private Client Real Estate
Investec

Niki Kyriacou

Sector Lead - BTR
NHBC

Niki is Sector Lead at NHBC focusing on client management of activity, with a focus on the BTR market. 

Niki was previously at leading property trade publication Property Week, specialising in partnerships, campaign strategy and cross-platform solutions and has over 20 years’ experience. She has a strong focus on the residential property sector, having driven the development of prestigious, large-scale events like RESI and the RESI Awards. 

Other career highlights during that time included launching and delivering high-profile initiatives like RESI Trailblazers - championing rising stars; and Joint Victories - celebrating the best of public-private partnerships.

Lindsay Garratt

Partner
Winckworth Sherwood

Lindsay is a specialist planning and regeneration lawyer with almost 20 years’ experience advising the residential development sector (private sale, PRS and affordable providers) on the promotion of complex planning applications for residential led/mixed use sites particularly in London and the South East. She advises on the full range of planning and highways law, S106, CIL and policy matters – and has commented extensively on the “First Homes” affordable housing tenure. Lindsay is a key advisor to several FTSE 100 companies, including Barratt Developments PLC.

Damien Sharkey

Managing Director
HUB

Damien Sharkey is HUB’s Managing Director. Damien is keenly involved in all aspects of the HUB business, leading the development process of its current £2.7bn pipeline from acquisition and funding through design, consultation, planning, procurement, and delivery to completion. An architect by background, Damien completed his post-graduate diploma in architecture at the University of Westminster before beginning his career at Robin Partington Architects, now known as Apt. Having moved into development, Damien remains passionate about design and ensures maximum value through thoughtful design, technical accuracy, and efficient delivery for all of HUB’s portfolio. His agile thinking and proclivity for problem solving allow him to develop the HUB direction, structure deals and lead a fantastic team.

Stephanie Smith

Head of Residential
Muse

Jennifer Murray

Director - Products, Equity and Partnerships
Homes England

Jennifer began her investment management career at Schroders where she was fund manager for directly invested real estate funds and multi manager property portfolios on behalf of pension fund and charity clients for over 15 years.  

Prior to joining Homes England, where she leads the equity and partnerships team within the Government’s housing delivery agency for England, Jennifer was a fund manager for Tesco Pension Investments.  While managing the scheme’s international real estate portfolio she developed a professional interest in the residential sector as an institutional investment class.

Jennifer is a member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the Investment Property Forum.  She represents Homes England on Association of Real Estate Funds (AREF), Investment Property Forum (IPF) and Urban Land Institute residential committees.

Sandra Jones

Managing Director
PriceHubble

Sowgol Zarinchang

Managing Director
Way of Life

Sowgol is the Managing Director of Way of Life, a top 3 National Built-to-Rent (BTR) platform providing bespoke residential lettings and management to a portfolio of over 1,600 homes across the UK. Sowgol ensures that Way of Life provides efficient building management and professional customer services through a multi-skilled team of people.

Before joining Way of Life, Sowgol was the Director of Serviced Apartments at JLL where she oversaw operational activities and advised both residential and serviced apartment operators. She was previously the Director of Private Rent (Folio London) and Student Lets at the Notting Hill Housing Trust where she was leading three multi-disciplinary teams with over 2,000 properties and an operational budget of £25 million.

Sowgol is also a member of Long Harbour’s ESG Committee and Chairman of the Diversity & Inclusion Committee for the board.

Emma Rosser

Director, Living Research and Strategy, EMEA
JLL

Emma leads insights for JLL's EMEA living research team, providing thought leadership on build-to-rent, student accommodation, coliving and later living. She is a former business analyst and journalist. She was residential editor at Estates Gazette, where she reported on investment and development and established the BTR data offering and a series of print supplements.

Lesley Roberts

BTR Operations Director
Related Argent

Alastair Mullens

Managing Director
Vertus

Alastair joined Canary Wharf Group in 2018, to establish the Canary Wharf Group’s (CWG) Build-to-Rent platform, Vertus. He is currently overseeing the delivery of three seed assets totalling 1,137 units, all based on the Canary Wharf Estate. The first new residential tenants moved in in February 2020. He is now working closely with CWG’s development team to design and envision the future phases of private rental product for the Estate.

Over the last twelve years Alastair has gained a broad experience of the UK residential property market; initially in Residential Management before moving into Residential Development and then centring on the emerging Build-to-Rent market. He spent 9 years with Hamptons International & Countrywide Group based in London and Hong Kong. In 2015 he returned from Asia to focus on Build-to-Rent lease-up delivery for various clients across London. His final role at Countrywide was as National Director of Corporate PRS & Build to Rent, during this time he oversaw the delivery of the group’s operational management platform. This included the delivery of two Build-to-Rent assets in the north-west totalling 488 units for the Vista fund, The Cargo Building in Liverpool and Pomona Wharf in Manchester.

Catherine Raynsford

MD of Stock Acquisitions
L&G Affordable Homes

Cath Webster

Chief Executive Officer
Thriving Investments

Cath leads Thriving Investments, a niche investment management company which is solely focussed on the UK Living Sector and seeks to generate strong returns for its investors through creating thriving communities.  Cath’s focus is to increase funds under management alongside the delivery of social value, augmenting the existing fund management platform across high-quality affordable housing, private-rented residential and urban regeneration strategies. She joined in January 2023 from property development and investment specialist Quintain where she was Executive Director for Strategy and Investment.

Outside of her exec role, she is a Trustee for the Creative Land Trust and Reading Real Estate Foundation at Henley Business School.

James Saunders

Chief Executive Officer
Quintain

James Saunders was appointed Chief Executive Officer of Quintain in October 2019.

James was previously Chief Operating Officer of Quintain and has been a main board director since 2017. As Chief Operating Officer, James led the place-making and estate management at Wembley Park, commercial partnerships, group marketing, IT and health and safety.

During his time at Quintain, James has led the repositioning of Wembley Park from an event destination to an exciting new neighbourhood for London. He has created the strategic direction for marketing, communications and place making that has led to dramatic reconsideration of the area, increase in footfall, improvements in press coverage and word-of -mouth, plus new partnerships including with Boxpark, Troubadour Theatres and Second Floor Studios.

As Chief Operating Officer, James also oversaw the Wembley Park estate operations team with responsibility for management of The SSE Arena, Wembley, London Designer Outlet, car parking, health and safety, service charge and retail development.

He has managed key stakeholder and commercial partner relationships with GLA, London Borough of Brent, Wembley Stadium, the FA, AEG and Realm, plus other local stakeholders. He was responsible for the renegotiation of agreements with adjacent landowners that unlocked the Wembley Park site from a development and operational perspective.

Prior to joining Quintain, James was the Chief Marketing Officer at The Cloud Networks, a consultant to Vodafone Europe and Brand Director at Coca-Cola Great Britain. He holds a Sloan Masters from London Business School, a Law Degree from Cambridge University and is a barrister-at-law.

Russell Pedley

Director & Co-Founder
Assael Architecture

Russell is Director and Co-Founder of Assael Architecture. With over 30 years as an architect and 15 years in urban design, he has a strong passion for creating a sense of place with historical and cultural connections in all of his work.

Russell spent many years spearheading Assael’s skills in the design of professionally-managed Build to Rent communities in the private rented sector. Following years of research, including many study trips to the US, and producing design guides for the UK, Assael is now one of the leading architects in the sector, paving the way with key projects such as Union Wharf in Greenwich for Essential Living, Blackhorse Mills in Walthamstow for Legal & General, and Pontoon Dock in Newham for Linkcity. Russell also co-authored both editions of the Urban Land Institute’s Build to Rent: A Best Practice Guide, which was sponsored by the British Government, and he is now Chair of the ULI’s UK Residential Council and advises on MHCLG’s Build to Rent Joint Committee.

Simon Scott

Lead Director - Living Capital Markets
JLL Europe

Simon has over 20 years’ experience in the field of residential investment and development, and was actively involved in the development of the student investment market in an advisory capacity, and led in a number of innovative funding structures working with both Housing Associations and Universities in making institutionally acceptable investment assets in the residential sector. Simon is now overseeing the residential investment team and will be focused on matching investor appetite for residential investment, whether off plan bespoke developments or existing portfolios of income producing or reversionary assets.

James Pargeter

Senior Advisor
GAA

James is a recognised advocate for the purpose-built operational Rented Living sector (incl. Build to Rent (BTR) and Single-Family Rent (SFR)) within the wider residential sector, with over 25 years’ varied delivery experience as a Project Manager and Advisor. He aims to help address the UK’s housing crisis through policy and practice, recognising that a full tenure spectrum is key to resolving this challenge. Through successive roles at Deloitte, Greystar and GAA, alongside sector roles including at BPF, the ARL and UKSFA, he has a track record of making positive differences to project outcomes.

James is a tireless campaigner for a much-needed cultural change around renting, including better appreciation of the benefits of purpose-built rental housing, Modern Methods of Construction (MMC), and intermediate affordable homes. He was included in EG's 'BTR's 50 Most Influential’ list.

Colette McCormack

Partner
Winckworth Sherwood

Colette leads the national Winckworth Sherwood Planning team and has over 25 years’ experience specialising in complex housing led mixed use developments.  She is ranked band 1 and a leading individual in planning in the legal directories ( bites by clients and peers).She provides strategic planning advice and is known for her ability to lead on and deliver complex projects.  She is solutions driven and collaborative in her approach to unlocking obstacles to development.  She understands the development cycle but also the regulatory and public law paradigm that public bodies and housing associations work within.  Her work advising developers, local planning authorities, Government departments and housing associations gives her a unique insight and in depth knowledge of housing delivery including BtR .  Colette advises on some of the largest and complex developments across the country including the iconic Battersea Power Station for Wandsworth Council, Liverpool Waters and Wirral Waters for Peel Holdings and Barking Riverside Limited acting for the joint venture between L&Q and the GLA (all of which deliver BtR) and BtR operators such as Moda Living .

Rebecca Taylor

Managing Director Multi-Family
Long Harbour

Rebecca is the Managing Director of Long Harbour’s BtR / Multifamily business. Since joining Long Harbour in 2015, Rebecca has deployed over £750mn of equity and leads on the LHMF JV which is a £1.5bn partnership with PSP and Cadillac Fairview.

Rebecca has over 15 years’ experience in development and investment having worked in projects in Australia, UK, Ireland and UAE. Prior to joining Long Harbour, Rebecca spent eight years at Laing O’Rourke working in their property and investment team. Here she worked on their offsite housing solution and a number of PFI/PPP deals.

She is the Vice-Chair of the BPF BTR Committee, is on the steering group for the UKAA Best Practice Guide and a member of the ULI UK Residential Council.

Olivia Harris

Chief Executive
Dolphin Living

Olivia Harris was appointed as Chief Executive of Dolphin Living in April 2017. Previously, Olivia was Finance Director at Dolphin, providing financial and commercial oversight on a wide range of property and related projects, including debt and fund raising. Olivia is a Chartered Accountant and has worked for more than 15 years in the property industry.