Chief Executive Officer & Trustee, Jbg Smith Pptys
Search every verified W. Kelly interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Matt Kelly, CEO of JBG Smith, has discussed the company's strategy of shifting its portfolio from office to multifamily assets, noting that the company was about 80% office when it was created in 2017 and is now over 50% multifamily. He stated that most of the company's future growth will be "disproportionately multifamily versus office." Kelly has also commented on the broader office market, saying there is "too much office space and not enough demand to fill it" and that some obsolete office buildings will need to be converted to other uses, such as multifamily or hospitality. He described National Landing, where JBG Smith is building Amazon's second headquarters, as benefiting from defense-sector demand tailwinds but not being immune to national office market pressures. Kelly has spoken about the company's use of technology, including real-time building monitoring systems for energy efficiency, active indoor air quality monitoring, and piloting new technologies like carbon capture. He also noted that JBG Smith has integrated 5G connectivity and fiber in its submarkets to provide private cellular networking to commercial tenants. Reflecting on the broader industry, Kelly said he believes the next few years will be "pretty exciting" as the industry enters a "new normal phase" after the challenges of the pandemic, inflationary pressures, and global conflict. He has also emphasized the role of REITs in democratizing real estate ownership and making it accessible to retail investors)Skip
“I was like this has just got to be such a good way to make money; I had watched my mom buy and sell the house and the farm and it just makes sense.”
“I watched my mom buy and sell her first house, move to the farm, buy and sell that one and move to the second farm — seeing that made me realize people do this with personal homes.”
“The first book that I read was Rich Dad Poor Dad — highly recommend it — and then I just kept studying more about it.”
“At the age of 26 my mom was watching me study and she says, 'at some point you're just going to have to do it.'”
“REITs really do democratize real estate ownership. Real estate is otherwise an illiquid asset class that requires an enormous amount of capital and so it's not accessible to the retail investor. Yes, REITs are a majority owned by large institutions but a lot of those institutions represent ultimately private individual...”
“We have a national structural housing shortage of about 4 million housing units that by the end of the decade some studies suggest it's going to become as big as 10 million housing units. So clearly we need to do more to incentivize housing production and REITs again can be at the forefront of educating lawmakers and p...”
“National Landing benefits greatly from demand tailwinds in the defense sector due to global insecurity, but it is not immune to pressures affecting the office market nationally. We have too much office space and not enough demand to fill it, so some office space will need to go away and be converted to other uses like...”
“When the company was created in 2017 we were about 80% office and today if you include our assets that are in lease up and under construction we are over 50% multifamily and less than half office. Most of our growth going forward will be disproportionately multifamily versus office.”
“The fundamentals in the multifamily market in Washington Metro Area have been pretty strong with rental rate growths market-wide plus or minus 3%, better than what we see nationally which is negative. We expect continued rent growth opportunities due to a supply shortage and low pipeline of new construction.”
“We do a lot of tech related things when it comes to sustainability. We use real-time building monitoring systems that optimize energy efficiency and have active indoor air quality monitoring. We are piloting new technologies like Nano tint to reduce solar heat gain and carbon capture technology to move the needle on su...”
“We've integrated 5G connectivity and fiber in our submarkets to provide private cellular networking to our commercial tenants. This has been a huge draw and allowed us to attract tenants that otherwise wouldn't have prioritized our submarket.”
“The past few years have been challenging with pandemic, inflationary pressures, interest rates, global conflict, and now a presidential election. I think the next few years are going to be pretty exciting in our industry as we finally shake off the lingering effects of the pandemic and enter into a new normal phase.”
“I think one of the things that Nareit does a great job of, but needs to continue to do, is to make it clear how REITs really do democratize real estate. Making real estate accessible to retail investors is very important. Also, being at the forefront of environmental sustainability trends is very important in fighting...”
“JBG Smith is the largest operator focused on the Washington metro area. We're a mixed-use operator overseeing over 11 million square feet of commercial space and almost 6,000 multi-family units, concentrating in neighborhoods where we can drive value through place-making and amenities, notably National Landing where we...”
“Our strategy has been to concentrate and do mixed-use development in neighborhoods where we can accumulate synergy before bringing online the value, by having a rich amenity base and a balance between daytime and evening populations to drive higher occupancy and rental rate growth over time.”
From Studying to Action: How Captain Kelly Started Investing in Real Estate at 26! Kelly used to study real estate ...
Matt Kelly, CEO of JBG SMITH (NYSE: JBGS) and Nareit's 2024 chair, was a guest on the 400 th episode of Nareit's REIT Report ...
JBG Smith Chief Executive Officer Matt Kelly joins William J. Ferguson and Peter Linneman to share his thoughts on JBG Smith's ...
While Matt Kelly may suspect that his high school principal would have called him a clueless kid, the CEO of JBG Smith is far from ...
Sign in to search the full transcript archive, filter by topic, and access every quote from W. Kelly.
The summary and quote tags on this profile are produced with AI assistance from verified, first-person interview transcripts, then checked by our team to confirm the speaker's identity and the accuracy of every quote. See how we verify →