MRED Around the World student Evan Hyde chimes in from the team’s last stop of the trip–Paris. He writes:
The team spent a final day exploring Paris, France. Remnants of “Delhi belly” and persistent jet lag made for a weary group, but we kept it together for two final meetings in the city of baguettes and fromage.
First up on Thursday was a meeting with Louis Radiguet of Unibail Rodamco, Europe’s largest publicly traded REIT.
A beautiful model of a pending development project at the Unibail Rodamco office in Paris.
Unibail Rodamco specializes in shopping centers and engages in acquisitions, value-add, and ground-up development in several European countries. Radiguet impressed with his knowledge of real estate and the portfolio under his supervision; at 29 years old, Radiguet oversees over 1 billion euros in assets.
After meeting Radiguet at his office, the group toured the Les Halles project in central Paris. The redevelopment project is worth well over 1 billion euros and an entire underground shopping center is remaining operational during the extensive construction on the roof.
The roof of the Les Halles project in Paris.
The final engagement for the group was lunch with French architect Phillippe de Potestad. De Potestad has, coincidentally, family ties to Salt Lake City, and it was enjoyable to hear stories of his long and colorful career. Of note, De Potestad was one of the original architects to work on the iconic Louvre redevelopment project in the late 1980s.
After lunch the group did a brief wrap up and voila! The inaugural Real Estate Around the World trip is over! Some of the group will linger through the weekend in Paris while others will travel to one or two final exotic locations (Iceland, Croatia,etc.), or directly back to Salt Lake City. We’ll all be back in class starting at various points next week. Make sure to ask us about the trip! Everyone is eager to share new perspectives and insights that will enrich the MRED experience for all.