Goldman Sachs real estate guru poached by Morgan Stanley

Shirish Godbole has been re-hired by Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing (MSREI) as its new India head, based in Mumbai.

Having joined just this week, he reports to Hoke Slaughter, Asia head of MSREI, which manages $175 billion of assets across the world.

Slaughter tells AsianInvestor: "Our deal flow is up substantially and the opportunities we're seeing are much more attractive this year, given the capital constrained environment in Indian real estate. 

"We are currently working on several situations involving high quality real estate and top-tier partners, in our favourite target markets and on terms that make sense to us."

His reference to "capital constrained" relates to the fact that interest rates are up in India and banks are cutting back on lending to the real estate sector and the wider economy. It is in this type of environment that developers have a greater need for capital that funds such as MSREI's can provide.

Godbole previously worked for Morgan Stanley from 1994 to 2007, in both New York and London, with his final role being the co-head of the firm’s commercial real estate finance business in Europe.

He returned to India in 2007 (he’s Indian) when he joined Goldman Sachs’ real estate principal investments group.

MSREI has invested in Indian real estate firms and projects throughout the country. On the equity side it has taken stakes in Mumbai-based Oberoi Realty, which listed in 2010, Panchshil Realty in Pune, Mantri Developers in Bangalore, and other growth companies in the hospitality and project management sectors.