After spending her entire career in New York, Katie Kurtz is back on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River at the helm of Denholtz.

Kurtz joined the more than 70-year-old Red Bank business last year. Previously, she served as co-chief investment officer and chief financial officer for Silverstein Properties. When she joined the Denholtz team, former chief executive officer Steven Denholtz assumed the role of chairman and then-president Stephen Cassidy became managing partner.

“It has been my honor to lead Denholtz Properties through our evolution over the past four decades,” Denholtz commented at the time. “As we look to the future, we are confident that Katie’s extensive experience and leadership will guide us in building upon our legacy while seizing new opportunities for sustained growth.”

“As we enter what we believe is the next commercial real estate growth cycle, Katie’s institutional expertise will be crucial in advancing our business model and accelerating our growth trajectory,” Cassidy added.

To that end, Denholtz made another change to start the new year. The company launched a new website, name and business model, emerging as a private investment management firm. The rebrand represents the transition in a literal sense, cutting Denholtz Properties to the more-streamlined Denholtz.

Speaking with NJBIZ, Kurtz said the revamp sets up the company for the future, while staying true to its foundations and focusing on maturing. With a goal of launching its first formal fund in 2025, she said Denholtz is at work on the structure of what that will look like.

At Silverstein, Kurtz’s responsibilities spanned the company’s more than $10 billion commercial, residential and retail portfolio, as well as the development platform and the lending business. In addition to owner-operator firms, her past work experience also includes time at real estate investment trust AR Global. At the REIT, she said her work involved meeting with investors, raising capital and acquiring properties nationwide.

Reflecting on the move from Silverstein, Kurtz said she sees parallels between her former employer and the company she leads now. Silverstein, she points out, “had a lot of multifamily, and they had multifamily in urban areas as well as kind of what I’d call more stick-built real estate in other areas, which kinds of fits very well into what we do here at Denholtz.”

She characterized both organizations as “owner-operator, vertically integrated, buy cash-flowing properties, but also can do ground-up construction, love the community … kind of the dirt real estate people that are all about putting shovels in the ground and bettering the community around them and having an impact, giving back, charitable; all that is very much what I was used to.”

Those attributes are also part of Kurtz’s own ethos, and part of what drew her to Denholtz. “We complement each other really well,” she said.

Kurtz referenced a shared love among company leadership for having a positive impact through real estate and the built environment.

Additionally, “I believe the two of them are very good investors,” she said of Cassidy and now-Chairman Denholtz. “I think that’s what it starts with.”

“There’s all different things you can invest in, but you have to – at the core of it – be really good investors, because while you’re trying to have an impact on the world … you’re taking in people’s money and you’re accountable to them as a fiduciary to generate a return and protect that money,” Kurtz said. “You’re taking in people’s retirement money, their kids’ college funds. That’s a huge responsibility and we’re the main fiduciaries of that. So that starts by being a good investor.”

She also cited Denholtz’s platform. “We’re a little over $2 billion in assets under management,” she said, describing it as “a really amazing size portfolio,” and calling particular attention to its multitenant industrial and residential components.

Scaling up

“We historically were kind of a property company and not an institutional investment manager or asset manager. The difference really being … as institutional investment manager can pool capital.”

That helps build scale. “You can do more when that capital is all together like that,” Kurtz said.

“I think we are really good at what we do, the type of real estate we do, and we can really kind of spread that. So that’s kind of the goal or idea with our growth strategy for going forward,” she said.

“You need to be able to scale. If you’re thinking long-term, you want to think in terms of scalability. That’s both in the size of the portfolio as well as the geographical footprint of the portfolio.”

“How do we maybe start to buy more properties in the Mid-Atlantic? … [W]e have a regional office in Orlando, Fla.; how do we kind of grow our Florida footprint? What does that look like? What do we do in-house? Who do we partner with? How does all that work?” she said.

But Denholtz is also open to growing in areas where the firm is not already active.

“I think we’re going to stay focused on our knitting when it comes to the type of real estate we invest in and buy, which is that kind of multi-tenant industrial, maybe a little bit of office-flex and then multifamily residential.” But Kurtz said Denholtz is more agnostic about where it will invest – so long as the market makes sense. That could mean entering new states — or growing in those where the company already has a presence.

In early 2024, Denholtz acquired a two-building, more than 213,000-square-foot industrial property in San Marcos, Texas. A 13-acre site, Clovis Crossing is about 30 miles each from Austin and San Antonio featuring brand-new structures in a fast-growing industrial market. Before the year was done, Denholtz also signed its first lease there with OTC Industrial Technologies.

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In industrial, Clovis Crossing is just one piece of Denholtz’s national expansion efforts. The company also added the 18-building, 723,734-square-foot flex/industrial Lehigh Valley Portfolio, spread across Allentown and Bethlehem, in 2024. Additionally, Denholtz has also entered the Savannah, Ga., market in recent years and grown its industrial presence in North Carolina.

In the multifamily sector, Denholtz has out-of-state properties in Murfreesboro, Tenn., and North Carolina. In the latter, Denholtz and project partner Lansing Melbourne Group completed their Stadium Lofts project in August. The boutique mixed-use community offers a location with views of Atrium Health Ballpark in downtown Kannapolis. The home of the Kannapolis Cannon Ballers, a low minor league affiliate of the Chicago White Sox.

Outside New Jersey, the company’s office properties are concentrated in Florida – where Denholtz also has a satellite office.

Talent show

Denholtz is also looking to grow its ranks. “I’m a big believer in organizational structure,” Kurtz explained. “Because I think that it is impossible to have a great farm without great people.”

She referenced the Peter Drucker adage “culture eats strategy for breakfast.”

“We’re really looking to … bring in some fresh talent to the firm. And I think that talent’s all here in New Jersey and in Monmouth County,” Kurtz said.

“The world takes all kinds. But then you have those people like me that have been trained at those big shops and they really maybe have a little bit of an entrepreneurial spirit,” along with the experience to back it up, she said.

Maybe they’re tired of commuting, maybe they have young children. Or maybe, “They’d like to build something that they feel like they’ve had a massive impact in building.

“Then they come and meet the two Steves and they’re completely sold and they drink the Kool-Aid and they’re ready to come on board,” she said, recounting her own experience.

Monmouth County boasts a population of more than 642,000, according to U.S. Census Bureau data, with total employment in the region topping 247,000, per 2022 workforce figures. The fifth-most populous county in the state, Monmouth’s median household income ranks among the top 50 counties in the United States, according to census data.

We’re really looking to … bring in some fresh talent to the firm. And I think that talent’s all here in New Jersey and in Monmouth County.
– Katie Kurtz, Denholtz CEO

In its look back at economic growth for the second quarter of 2024, the most recent information available, Monmouth County officials said its forecast for economic growth remains strong. Data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York reinforces that claim.

Despite sharp drops during the pandemic, the New York Fed reports employment in the Middlesex-Monmouth region fully reversed its losses as of mid-2022. Meanwhile, “Income and educational attainment are higher than for the nation, and slightly higher than for New Jersey as a whole” in the region, according to the February 2025 report.

Over the past year, Denholtz has already made several new hires to help support its growth beyond adding Kurtz. At the beginning of February, the team expanded with a new executive vice president and head of capital markets.

Jennifer McCool comes from Kushner, where she led day-to-day strategy and execution of the New York firm’s investment management platform. At Denholtz, she’ll work closely with Kurtz to grow and scale the firm’s strategy.

“The Denholtz executive team has built a robust platform to capitalize on commercial real estate investment opportunities across the national market in 2025 and beyond,” McCool commented on her hiring. “I am excited to contribute my legal and institutional expertise, industry relationships and entrepreneurial mindset to help drive the company’s growth and success.”

Her experience also includes serving as COO at WatermanCLARK, as well as executive vice president and chief legal officer at Related Cos. During her tenure there, she played a key role in launching the firm’s private fund management business, Denholtz said.

“Jennifer’s career reflects a strong dedication to institutional excellence and a dynamic entrepreneurial mindset that resonates deeply with our values at Denholtz,” Kurtz commented in an announcement about the new addition. “We are confident that her leadership and strategic vision will strengthen our team and drive us forward as we pursue our ambitious growth objectives.”

Denholtz added two new leaders in October. Based in North Carolina, Paul Paschal serves as director of acquisitions for the MidAtlantic and Southeast. Kyle Kostakis, meanwhile, joined the Red Bank office from Toll Brothers, coming on board as development manager.

“Our experienced team and commitment to operational excellence enable us to consistently capitalize on untapped opportunities to grow our portfolio in competitive markets … Their expertise and entrepreneurial spirit will strengthen our capabilities as we continue to expand our footprint over the coming years,” Kurtz commented with the hiring of Paschal and Kostakis.

That line of thinking still holds.

Moving forward, Kurtz told NJBIZ the company “is looking to grow to make sure that we’re thinking about things in the long-term organizationally.”

“Once you own the real estate, how are you going to vertically integrate it and run it?” she said, putting focus on creating efficiencies in managing assets.

“How do you manage your property managers; how are you running your teams onsite; how are you serving the residents that live in your multi-tenant high rises to make sure that they’re happy, that they’re recommending your community to their friends?” she said. “There’s just so many ways to continuously get better.

“It’s like a cycle of continuous improvement and making sure that we have the right talent there that’s always kind of challenging the status quo and pushing us forward and improving us.”

Denholtz is known for developing distinctive projects across sectors, and Kurtz said that won’t change. “I believe that we can be good at both,” she said, taking into account the company’s investment pivot. “It just takes being thoughtful about your teams that run both.”

Denholtz started work in Bound Brook with Redwood Real Estate Group in 2023, expanding a concept also found in the firm’s native Red Bank. The Rail at Bound Brook will stand six stories at 100 Hamilton St. The transit-oriented Class A multifamily community will bring 143 units to the Somerset County downtown, which is working toward a renaissance of its own.

In November, shovels hit the dirt in Bridgewater on a 73,429-square-foot industrial redevelopment. The project is located within Denholtz Properties’ Bridgewater Business Park, a 16-building, 380,000-square-foot multi-tenant flex/industrial complex with direct access to Routes 22 and 28, as well as proximity to Interstate 287.

‘New norm’

Commenting on the nexus of the people, the portfolio and the moment, Kurtz said, “It kind of feels like ready to springboard. The foundation is all here, the investor base is here; the talent … So, everything felt poised for me to come in and help take the company to the next level.”

Looking ahead, Denholtz is ready to be optimistic, like others in the CRE space.

“I think we have a new norm of rates. So, I think the real estate community is just going to have to adjust to that new norm. Our cap rates are going to have to adjust and purchase prices and sale prices. I think that all has to start to happen. And I also think we’re getting there.”

That said, Kurtz added she senses a lot of pent-up energy in the sector after an extended waiting game.

“People are ready to transact, they’re ready to get moving, get business stirring, do a deal, do a merger, build a property. And so, I think that’s going to start to stir people to move to lending,” she said.

Looking ahead, Kurtz said Denholtz will be one of the players making moves.

“We’re going to be out raising capital. We want to be doing deals. Denholtz is ready to go,” she said.

Editor’s note: This story was updated at 10:45 a.m. ET Feb. 24, 2025, to update other recent new hires that have joined the Denholtz team.