Edward Lowenthal has served on our board of directors since August 2004 and has served as our independent chairman of the board since August 2015. Since April 2002, he has been president of Ackerman Management LLC. From 1997 until 2002, Lowenthal was a founder and served as president of Wellsford Real Properties, Inc. (AMEX: WRP). Lowenthal was a founder, trustee and president of Wellsford Residential Property Trust until May 1997 when it was merged into Equity Residential. Lowenthal has more than 30 years of real estate and merger and acquisition experience in both public and private entities.
He currently serves as a director of Omega Healthcare Investors, Inc. (NYSE: OHI), a healthcare REIT; and served as a director of Desarrolladora Homex, S.A. de C.V., a vertically integrated home development company focused on affordable entry-level and middle-income housing in Mexico from 2004 to 2013.
From 1997 to 2012, he was a member of the board of directors of Reis, Inc., an internet-based provider of real estate information and analytics and a successor, through mergers, to Wellsford Real Properties, Inc., and served as non-executive Chairman of Reis, Inc. from 2010 to 2012.
Lowenthal serves as non-executive Chairman of Tiburon Lockers, Inc., a privately- held owner and operator of rental locker systems, and as a trustee of The Manhattan School of Music.
From 1992 until 2000, he served as a member of the Board of Governors of NAREIT. Lowenthal received a B.A. from Case Western Reserve University and a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center, where he was an editor of the Georgetown University Law Journal.