Urban Renaissance Group, a Seattle-based full-service commercial real estate company, announced that it is further expanding its Denver presence and has hired a new Denver market manager.

URG has had a Denver office since 2015 when it acquired Market Center, a 121,000-square-foot assemblage of five historic buildings at 1624 Market St. in Lower Downtown Denver. But the company is focusing on more investment in Denver, with a particular eye to Lower Downtown, the Ballpark District, River North Art District, Cherry Creek and along U.S. Route 36 between Denver and Boulder.

“We believe these neighborhoods are prime areas for transformational real estate projects because of their proximity to existing neighborhood amenities as well as accessibility by car and public transportation,” a company spokesperson wrote in an email to the Denver Business Journal. “These are locations which allow tenants a competitive advantage for recruitment. The assets we’ve acquired, and our repositioning efforts, aim to create community and connection throughout the submarket.”

Within those geographic regions, the company is interested in office, multifamily and hotel investments, as well as investments in technology and life sciences.

“Technology and life science are two sectors currently experiencing tremendous growth. Our focus on office for technology and life science seeks to meet the needs of tenants in this market,” the spokesperson wrote. “Our focus on multi-family and hotel development invites people to stay and enjoy the neighborhood beyond business hours, bringing vibrancy and connection to the street-level experience.”

Brad Schmidt, an industry veteran with more than 20 years of experience, will serve as URG’s managing director in Denver. He will be responsible for driving growth in development, acquisitions, and operations. Prior to joining URG, Schmidt was managing director of Chicago-based real estate developer Sterling Bay and senior director of Chicago-based Tishman Speyer, another real estate firm.

“Brad was selected to lead the Denver office because his extensive experience with development, acquisitions and operations over his 20+ year career in the industry is essential to our plans for growing our portfolio in Denver,” the company told DBJ.

URG has 199 employees across the company, with six in Denver. By the end of the year, the company said it expects to have 10 Denver employees.

The firm acquired the Market Center building for $29 million, along with Stars Investments and City Street Investors, according to DBJ reporting at the time.

In addition to Market Center, URG owns 2301 Blake St., a 55,000-square-foot historic office and retail building located in the Ballpark District that it purchased in 2016. In 2017, the company acquired 100 Speer, a 100,000-square-foot, three-story office space and broadcast studio, that is the home of KDVR-Fox31 and KWGN-2, for $23 million. In 2018, the company acquired 2399 Blake St., a 70,000-square-foot one-story office building for $33 million.

In all, the company has more than 12 million square feet of assets under management in Seattle, Portland and Denver.

URG said it has two development sites in downtown Denver but declined to share their location or an update on either project.

“URG’s key differentiator is that we are a full-service, vertically-integrated firm with a deep understanding of all the markets in which we operate; we are uniquely focused on creating transformational projects – through development, repositioning, and historic renovations – that connect people to place and with one another,” the company said.