Director of Real Estate

Company Description

We take care of our employees, and they take care of our customers!

Become a member of a global community! The international logistics industry is an integral piece of the global trade puzzle; we make the world go round. Global supply chain management is what we do, and at the heart of Expeditors you will find professionalism, leadership, and a friendly environment, all of which foster an innovative, customer service-based approach to logistics. Expeditors is a global logistics company headquartered in Seattle, Washington. As a Fortune 500 company, we employ over 19,000 trained professionals in a worldwide network of over 350+ locations across six continents. Expeditors satisfies the increasingly sophisticated needs of international trade through customized solutions and seamless, integrated information systems.

Our Mission

We recruit, train, and retain the very best logistics and technical experts the world over. We love to promote from within - more than 50 percent of our employees have been at Expeditors for five years or more. Our high retention rate is influenced by a unique compensation program for positions that are more than just jobs - they're chances to grow, do what you love and build a career with us!

Job Description

The Director of Real Estate is responsible for developing, coordinating and executing our global real estate strategy including owned and leased office and warehouse facilities. Real estate represents our second greatest expense and is critical to our people, operations and future growth; we need to have the right facilities, at the right location, at the right time, and at a reasonable and market competitive cost. To accomplish this, the Director of Real Estate must ensure we are identifying real estate needs proactively, validating them and making informed, timely decisions.

KEY DELIVERABLES

• In conjunction with the President of our Geographies, set facility strategy and create a process to help identify facility needs and opportunities for each of our regions taking account of the current and projected freight volumes, headcount, and warehouse needs of our network of Districts worldwide.
• Develop, communicate and ensure compliance with real estate procedures and standards for both office and warehouse space, including lease/buy, space standards (including private office sizes, overall sq ft per employee, and similar measures), length of leases.
• Clarify District and Regional needs, critical timetables, macro factors and advise on their strategic analysis of locations, impact on freight, revenues and employees. This includes freight handling facilities, gateway operations, ground services networks, distributions services and cross-dock services.
• Manage enterprise portfolio of leased facilities ensuring timely docketing and consideration of options well in advance of lease renewals.
• Manage all enterprise owned facilities, including their property managers, real estate taxes, insurance and maintenance and establishing internal rental rates based on the market rent rates for similar facilities in the same location.
• Manage, develop and lead small internal team focused on facilities footprint.
• Manage nominated brokers to ensure facility needs and costs are clearly communicated. Institute formal KPIs with nominated brokers that will be tracked and trended at set intervals.
• Negotiate and manage relationships with landlords, brokers, and other real estate professionals.
• Facilitate cross-functional teams (Finance, Legal, Industrial Engineers, Design & Construction) to ensure alignment on each project, ensure corporate and district objectives and timelines are clearly communicated and appropriately supported.
• Conduct field education on our (Enterprise and District) buying/leasing/build-to-suit positions.
• Assist the District offices when working with Legal on facility contracts.

REPORTING STRUCTURE

Reports to SVP – Enterprise Services

Direct Reports:

• Manager Real Estate Operations
• Manager Real Estate Planning, Americas
• Manager Real Estate Planning, Europe

Qualifications

• Real estate expertise (industrial and office)
• Ability to analyze key macro and micro trends impacting both the real estate market and the strategic needs of the enterprise
• Ability to analyze freight network, routing and volume data.
• Ability to prepare budgets and analyze actual vs budget variances.
• Understanding of logistics industry
• Proven ability to prepare and review management and accounting reports
• Familiarity with domestic and international tax considerations of real estate transactions
• Excellent communicator using quantitative data with qualitative validation
• Excellent nego