Dan Emmett

Emmett Realty Advisors

Age: 57

Specialty: Investment advisory services and asset management

Recent Deal: Buying the 80,000-square-foot Santa Monica headquarters of advertising agency Rubin Postaer & Associates.

Dan Emmett has scaled the heights of real estate in more ways than one.

L.A. native Emmett is a multifaceted investment adviser and outdoorsman who has climbed Mt. Everest and travels to such far-off locales as the Arctic and New Guinea.

But Emmett displays a decided taste for the local in his investments. He buys only L.A. real estate, primarily Class A office buildings, and manages everything he buys.

Emmett, a Harvard and Stanford alumnus with a 20-year winning record in buying real estate, has a talent for picking the right commercial properties to buy for his clients and then managing them with an eye for cash flow and value appreciation.

Jordan Kaplan, Emmett’s partner for the last 11 years, describes him as an independent thinker who makes up his own mind about markets (and stays out of the media spotlight). If the trend is to buy but Emmett thinks it’s time to sell, he will, said Kaplan, who pointed out that Emmett’s track record demonstrates that he is quite adept at swimming against the tide.

When everybody was buying in the 1980s and prices were zooming, for example, Emmett pretty much stayed out of the market. When prices later plummeted because of the recession, Emmett got back in and began buying.

With rents now rising again, Emmett’s strategy is proving profitable.

Emmett adopts a straightforward approach to everything he does, including co-founding a law firm in Jakarta, Indonesia and helping to design the court system of the African nation of Malawi, where he served as a legal commissioner.

Emmett is also active in the Bay-Keepers, an organization dedicated to cleaning Santa Monica Bay an endeavor that Emmett says is smart business because a clean bay means a better quality of life.

And that translates into higher property values. Emmett is active in other environmental organizations, including Sustainable Conservation and Environment Now, as well as with the Frank G. Wells Environmental Law Clinic at UCLA.

Bob Howard