As Vice President Capital Markets West Region, Christa is responsible for capitalizing all Ryan-owned and developed projects in the West Region by managing various aspects of the funding process from inception to final disposition. Together with Ryan senior leadership, Christa is also involved in overall investment strategy and is the lead contact for the capital relationships in the region including institutional and private equity partners and interim and permanent lenders. Prior to joining Ryan, Christa was Chief Operating Officer for Talon Private Capital. Talon is a privately-held real estate investment firm headquartered in Seattle, Washington focused on the acquisition, disposition and investment management of primarily office projects. As COO, Christa was responsible for leading all debt sourcing and equity relationships in addition to developing corporate strategy, financial budgeting and planning, and all company operations. Before joining Talon, Christa was Chief Financial Officer at Kemper Development Company, a family-owned real estate company located in downtown Bellevue, WA. KDC privately owns and operates more than 6 million square feet including 1.7 million square feet of retail housing over 300 stores/restaurants; 1.7 million square feet of Class A office in three towers; 1,300 luxury hotel rooms including the four-star Westin, Hyatt, and W Bellevue; and 360 exclusive residences. While at KDC she closed over $1.3 Billion in construction, interim, and permanent debt transactions and negotiated ownership transfers, property acquisitions/sales and was responsible for the leadership of the company’s accounting, finance and IT departments. Prior to joining Kemper Development in 2012, Christa was with Keybank Real Estate Capital where she most recently held the title of SVP and Regional Executive. In this role, she was responsible for the leadership of a team of bankers that covered the Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Salt Lake City and Las Vegas markets and provided interim, construction and permanent financing to private commercial real estate companies owning portfolios of $50 million to over $1 Billion in assets. Christa serves on the Board of the Boys and Girls Club of Bellevue and is on the Board and serves as Secretary of the Greater Kirkland Chamber of Commerce. She held past positions on various Boards, most notably the Executive Committee and Treasurer of the Bellevue Downtown Association and President of the Bellevue Police Foundation. She is also a member of the Urban Land Institute and its Urban Mixed-Used Bronze Council and the CREW Network.

As Chief Economic Development Officer, James leads a growing portfolio that includes business services, arts & culture, and public private partnerships across the City of Bellevue.

James is a seasoned entrepreneur, investor and founder of multiple successful companies. He is currently the Co-Founder and CEO of Vibrant Cities (formally Solterra.com). James have been an active real estate and technology investor for the past 20+ years and within the last 5+ years developing vibrant and smart multi-family mixed used apartment communities in Seattle and Portland. www.VibrantCities.com James is a thought-leader, speaker and writer on Multi-Family Real Estate Development, Sales Management, technology, & entrepreneurship. He was a regular writer for PCWorld and has been featured in PC Magazine, Inc Magazine, Entrepreneur, CRM Magazine, Washington Post and other publications. He was named by the SLMA as the “50 Most Influential Sales Lead Management Professional”. James is also the Founder/Chairman of Avidian Technologies, the creators of Prophet, the world leading CRM software in Outlook. Under Wong’s leadership, Avidian was the winner of the Seattle Mayor's Small Business Award. Avidian also won 3 years in a row as one of Washington State’s Fastest Growing Companies and 3 years in a row as One of the Best Companies to Work For. Prior to Avidian, James was the co-founder and President of Foci Technologies (acquired by Meritage), and held positions at Arthur Andersen and Chevron Corporation. James was the SBA's Minority Small Business Champion of the Year and winner of the PSBJ's 40 Under 40 award. He is a Past President of the Seattle Chapter of the Entrepreneurs Organization, is an enthusiastic Rotarian and served as a past board member (www.seattlerotary.org). James is Chairman Emeritus and a past board member of the Group Health Foundation. James graduated from the University of Washington with a BA in Business and from Harvard Business School's Owner/President Management (OPM) program. He lives in Bellevue with his wife that he has known ever since she was born and their 3 children (2 awesome boys and daddy’s girl).

As Chief Economist for Windermere Real Estate, Matthew Gardner is responsible for analyzing and interpreting economic data and its impact on the real estate market on both a local and national level. Matthew has over 28 years of professional experience both in the U.S. and U.K. In addition to his day-to-day responsibilities, Matthew also chairs the Board of Trustees at the Washington Center for Real Estate Research at the University of Washington; sits on the Urban Land Institutes Technical Assistance Panel; and is an Advisory Board Member for the Runstad Center for Real Estate Studies at the University of Washington where he also lectures in real estate forecasting. Mr. Gardner graduated from Saint John’s College, Oxford, U.K. with a B.A. in Economics & English

Andrew Warren, Andy, currently serves as the PwC’s Director of Real Estate Research. As the Director of Real Estate Research, Andy is responsible for monitoring all aspects of commercial and residential real estate, including space market fundamentals, capital market trends, regulatory changes and operational developments. For the past seven years, Andy has led PwC’s participation in the development and production of the Emerging Trends in Real Estate publication. Andy is a frequent speaker on issues affecting the real estate market and has also authored numerous articles for internal clients and national real estate publications. Andy also forecasts market performance for PwC’s “Real Estate Investor Survey”. Andy has over 30 years of experience in all aspect of commercial and residential real estate research. Andy has performed and managed real estate fundamental analysis and forecasting, portfolio construction, and buy/sell decisions for both debt and equity clients. Prior to assuming his current role, Andy served as the Managing Director of Real Estate Research for Principal Global Investors, a top 10 institutional real estate manager in the U.S. At Principal, Andy held a progressive level of analyst and management positions over his 25 year career and served as a voting and advisory member on a multiple real estate debt and equity investment funds. Andy has earned the CFA designation and is a Counselor of Real Estate. He is also an active member of the Urban Land Institute Research Forum as well as a participating member of ICSC, NCREIF, NAIOP, the Appraisal Institute and the CCIM institute. PwC’s real estate practice has a broad perspective and keen insight into your audit, tax and advisory needs, we’ll show you how much further your business can go. We support corporate owners/users, developers, hospitality organizations, investors and REITs across all industries. With local and global insights, combined with industry relationships, we provide clients with access to the information that matters most.