Mason Valk

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Mason Valk

Accounting Manager

As an Accounting Manager at PENLER, Mason manages accounting operations, financial reporting, and treasury processes.

Mason previously worked with accounting teams for several multifamily developers, managers, and investment firms including Wood Partners, Greystar, and South City Partners. With several years of experience at Wood Partners, Mason played a key role in expanding the company’s third-party business model prior to the transition to Greystar and was honored as the 2023 Star Performer of the Year. His experience includes day-to-day accounting management, monthly draw preparation, financial reporting, acquisitions, dispositions, and cash management.

Mason received his Bachelor of Business Administration in Accounting from the Coles College of Business at Kennesaw State University in 2016. He currently resides in Marietta with his wife Colby.

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Wyatt Smith

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Wyatt Smith

Associate, Asset Management

At PENLER, Wyatt supports asset management efforts across the firm’s portfolio. He is responsible for executing business plans and driving value creation through strategic oversight of operations, renovations, and capital markets activity. His role also includes maintaining equity and debt relationships and supporting transaction execution.

Prior to joining PENLER, Wyatt served as an Analyst at RMR Residential, a private capital multifamily investment platform focused on Sunbelt markets. There, he managed a portfolio of more than 2,000 units and led disposition and financing transactions totaling over $750 million. He also played a key role in standardizing internal processes and optimizing property-level operations in collaboration with in-house management teams.

Wyatt earned his B.S. in Business Administration with honors from Georgia Tech. He currently resides in Atlanta.

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Daniel Harari

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Daniel Harari

Vice President, Land Acquisition

At PENLER, Daniel focuses on sourcing new multifamily development opportunities in Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Daniel has a decade of real estate experience.  Prior to joining PENLER, he spent seven years at The Related Group, one of the largest multifamily developers in the country. While at Related, he was responsible for sourcing and entitling over 3,500 units, participating in the lease-up of more than 2,000 units, and supporting the disposition of stabilized assets. His experience spans acquisitions, development, leasing, and asset management, with a focus on market analysis, sourcing and municipal engagement.

Daniel holds a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Georgia and is fluent in four languages. Originally from São Paulo, Brazil, he has spent most of his life in Atlanta, where he currently resides.

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Chris Doscher

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Chris Doscher

Managing Director of Construction & Development

At PENLER, Chris leads construction and development execution for all projects including coordination with architects, engineers and designers throughout the pre-construction phase, preliminary budgeting, assisting in the selection of general contractors and overall management of the construction teams through completion of each community.  Chris also oversees all renovations of Penler’s acquisition projects.

Chris has over 25 years of experience in the construction and real estate industry.  Prior to joining PENLER, Chris spent over 7 years at Cortland where he was EVP of Construction, leading Preconstruction for all renovation efforts, and was responsible for end-to-end delivery of new ground-up construction projects.   Chris completed over 25,000 units of renovation and new construction projects while at Cortland.  Prior to joining Cortland, Chris spent over 16 years at Gilbane, a national general contractor with annual revenues of $5B.  At Gilbane, Chris lead Preconstruction for the Southeast, including estimating, scheduling, purchasing and quality where he completed over $4.8B and 30M square feet of a wide range of projects including nearly $1B of developer multifamily, office and mixed use.

Chris received his Bachelors of Science from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He now resides in Atlanta with his wife, Grace, and their two children.

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Jon Gilliam, CPA

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Jon Gilliam, CPA

Chief Financial Officer / Managing Director of Finance

As Chief Financial Officer and Managing Director of Finance at PENLER, Jon is responsible for the financial management of the company and its investment partnerships. He oversees financial reporting, tax strategy, risk management, and cash flow planning, while also playing a key role in debt and equity capital efforts.

Jon has over 15 years of experience in multifamily real estate, fund management, and accounting. Before joining PENLER, he served as Director of Residential Financial Reporting at RMR Residential and Vice President of Financial Reporting at Carroll Organization, where he led the accounting function of a multibillion-dollar real estate portfolio. Throughout his career, he has been instrumental in acquisitions, investor reporting, tax structuring, property, partnership, and fund accounting, and financial process optimization.

Jon began his career in the audit practice of Deloitte & Touche. He is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and holds a Master’s degree in Professional Accounting from the University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelor of Science degree in Management from Georgia Tech.

He lives in Atlanta with his wife, Page, and their two children. In his free time, he enjoys spending time outdoors, live music, traveling, and staying active. He also serves as Treasurer and Deacon at Ponce Presbyterian Church.

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Drew Gaffney

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Drew Gaffney

Vice President, Acquisitions

At PENLER, Drew focuses primarily on the sourcing, underwriting, and execution of new acquisition opportunities. 

Drew formerly worked in acquisitions at GID (General Investment & Development) where he was responsible for underwriting new investments across core acquisitions, value-add acquisitions, and joint-venture development equity proposals. In this role he evaluated over $6.5 billion in proposed investment opportunities and worked on a team that closed $450 million of multifamily transactions. Prior to joining GID, Drew worked as a Senior Investment Analyst at PGIM Real Estate, where he was responsible for underwriting and evaluating multifamily debt originations across acquisitions, refinances, and credit-facilities. In this role he underwrote and analyzed over $3 billion of proposed debt transactions and worked on a team that closed $1 billion of multifamily loans over his three years with the firm. 

Drew is a graduate of The University of Virginia and currently resides in Atlanta with his wife Leigh. 

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David Deriso

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David Deriso

Director of Construction

David has over 35 years of experience in the real estate and construction industry.  At PENLER, David focuses on the construction of new multifamily projects in the southeast including coordination with the development team, architects, engineers and designers throughout the pre-construction phase, preliminary budgeting, assisting in the selection of general contractors and overall management of the construction teams through completion of each community.

David began his career as a Superintendent and Project Manager with Post Properties and later was the President of Lane Realty Construction.  During this time, he worked with the development teams constructing market rate garden style communities, mid-rise wraps, mixed-use communities and high-rise multifamily projects in Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, North and South Carolina, Alabama and Texas.  He has managed the construction and renovation of 10,000+ apartments.

Most recently he was the Vice President of Construction with North American Properties and was responsible for the multifamily communities in The Avalon in Alpharetta, GA as well as other award-winning mixed-use apartment communities in Atlanta, Nashville, and Franklin, TN.

David graduated from Shorter University with a Bachelor of Business Administration.  He is a licensed General Contractor and resides in Alpharetta.

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Alex Geeslin

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Alex Geeslin

Managing Director, Asset Management

As a partner and Managing Director of Asset Management at PENLER, Alex oversees the asset management platform. In her role, she focuses on maximizing asset performance, overseeing property management operations, managing equity and debt relationships and leading transaction execution.

Alex brings with her over 12 years’ experience in both single and multifamily asset management. Before joining PENLER, Alex spent 6 years at RangeWater Real Estate where she was Vice President of Asset Management. During her time there she was responsible for the operation of a $500 million portfolio of multifamily assets across the Southeast, managed joint venture recapitalizations, executed debt refinancings and oversaw the disposition of assets representing $550 million in value.

Prior to joining RangeWater, Alex served as an asset manager for Mesa Capital Partners where she was responsible for the operational performance of a portfolio of apartment properties. Alex started her career at Southeast Capital Companies where she oversaw the retail build-out and condominium sales of a mixed-use development and managed the development of a $140 million single family active adult community.

Alex graduated summa cum laude from the University of Georgia. She resides in Atlanta with her husband Trey.

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Mark Hinshaw

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Mark Hinshaw

Chief Operating Officer

Mark joined Penler in 2019, the year in which the company was founded. During his first six years with Penler, Mark was the Chief Financial Officer responsible for the financial management of the company as well as its partnerships. In 2025, Mark transitioned to his current role of Chief Operating Officer. In this position, Mark is focused on the overall operations of the organization. This includes operating performance and efficiencies, communications, execution between the teams across the organization, and partner, lender, and third-party relationships.

Mark started his career in the audit practice of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in San Francisco, where he also earned his CPA license. After PwC, Mark focused on commercial real estate, where he worked with Catellus Development Corporation, Rockwood Capital, and Jamestown. During this time, Mark gained extensive experience through a broad range of responsibilities including financial reporting, audit and tax compliance, portfolio management, investor relations, acquisitions and dispositions, and budgeting and forecasting. 

Mark received his Bachelors and Masters of Science in Accountancy from Wake Forest University. He resides in Atlanta with his wife, Anne Steele, and their two children. 

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Connor McAdams

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Connor McAdams

Director of Development

At PENLER, Connor focuses primarily on assisting with the management and execution of the development business and underwriting new opportunities.

Connor was formerly an analyst with Packard Capital (“Packard”), a family-office investment firm focused on real estate and private equity investments. At Packard, Connor was responsible for underwriting and evaluating potential development and acquisition opportunities with various sponsors across several asset types including multifamily, mixed-use, retail, self-storage, and hospitality. Additionally, Connor managed a sizeable real estate portfolio where he focused on monitoring and driving financial performance as well as stewarding large capital expenditure budgets to achieve maximum returns. Prior to Packard, Connor started his career at CBRE in the Valuation and Advisory Services department where he supported the appraisals of over $500 million of office, retail, flex, mixed-use, and industrial assets.

Connor graduated magna cum laude from the University of Georgia with a double major in Real Estate and Finance along with a Certificate of Personal and Organizational Leadership. He currently lives in Atlanta.

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