Pelorus Equity Group Opens New York City Office, Announces New Hires, as Empire State Prepares for Adult-Use Cannabis Market

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif.,– Pelorus Equity Group, a leading provider of value-add bridge commercial real estate loans to cannabis businesses and owners with cannabis-related real estate, announced the opening of its New York office, which is led by Travis Goad, Managing Partner, and located in Union Square.

With an office already in Newport Beach, California, Pelorus’ expansion will support its rapidly growing portfolio, client base and investors. The Company also announced the appointment of Jessica Uris as a senior associate and Devin McGrath as an analyst for the Pelorus Fund, both of whom will be based in the New York City office and reporting to Travis Goad.

In addition, Pelorus has appointed Dentons, a multinational law firm and the fifth-largest global law firm in the world, as its corporate counsel. The Company sees this appointment as yet another mark of the maturation of the legal cannabis industry and its associated real estate needs.

The Company’s Pelorus Fund is a private mortgage real estate investment trust that has completed 55 commercial real-estate loan transactions and deployed $204 million to cannabis businesses and real estate owners in eight states across the U.S., comprising a total of 1,750,000 sq. ft. Offering a broad scope of innovative transactional solutions, the Pelorus Fund addresses the diverse needs of real estate investors and portfolio managers in the cannabis industry.

“Despite the challenges every industry is facing right now, Pelorus continues to build off the strong momentum in the cannabis commercial sector, experiencing impressive and historical performance,” said Dan Leimel, Chief Executive Officer of Pelorus Equity Group and Manager of the Pelorus Fund. “As the opportunity ahead of us in the underlying legal cannabis industry keeps growing, we’ll continue to build both the operational scale and depth of our business. This includes the opening of our New York City office location at a time when the East Coast cannabis markets are set to experience rapid growth. The additions of Jessica and Devin will help us continue to meet the growing demand we are seeing from owners and operators, as well as from our investors. We look forward to them working closely with Travis as we scale up and optimize our operations.”

“We couldn’t be happier to attract such great talent to Pelorus’ newly-formed NYC office,” said Travis Goad, Managing Partner of Pelorus Equity Group. “It’s a fascinating time to be in this industry, and both Jessica and Devin will be incredibly valuable as we rise to match the increased interest in the sector. They will certainly play important roles as we continue to expand and capitalize on this growing field.”

Jessica Uris has previous experience managing more than $1 billion worth of balance sheet loans and underwriting, conducting due diligence and closing commercial loans. She spent time doing the analysis of in-place, pro forma, sensitivity and discounted cash flow (“DCF”), modeling across all asset types. Uris will leverage her expertise honed while working in roles with Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC), New York City Economic Development Corporation, Ackman-Ziff Real Estate Group and CBRE Group, and will work closely with Pelorus Fund’s East Coast team as a senior associate, bringing additional support to the due diligence and underwriting process.

Devin McGrath joins Pelorus’ East Coast team as an analyst, having previously been in Citigroup’s rotating analyst program where he spent time on the CMBS syndication desks and trading convertible bonds. He previously spent time working at the Greenwich-based hedge fund Ellington Management Group. Devin will be evaluating and prioritizing potential investment opportunities.