William R. Nicholson

Principal

William R. Nicholson has 35 years of diversified experience in the real estate industry. Immediately prior to joining Heritage Capital Group and Heritage’s sister company, Business Valuation, Inc., Mr. Nicholson spent 15 months with BSE Management, a private equity firm focused on acquiring failed banks. In this role, he managed the due diligence and bank target processes. At Heritage, Mr. Nicholson concentrates on M&A advisory assignments and conducts litigation support and real estate brokerage through BVI.

From 2003 through 2008, Mr. Nicholson headed up his own firm, WRN Financial. The company focused on executive search for senior bankers, real estate consulting, and managing select real estate assignments through an affiliation with Heritage Capital Group.

After retiring from Bank of America at the end of 2002, Mr. Nicholson was a managing director for Chatsworth Securities. While at Chatsworth, he worked on entity and project financings for homebuilder and apartment clients of the firm. He also was involved in acquisition, divestiture, and advisory assignments with public real estate companies and opportunity funds.

With the acquisition of Barnett Banks by Bank of America, Mr. Nicholson joined Bank of America Securities as managing director. He oversaw the Real Estate Advisory Group – the firm’s national investment banking practice serving private real estate companies and investors. Mr. Nicholson managed offices located in San Francisco, Charlotte, Dallas and Chicago from his Jacksonville location. His transactions included an equity raise/sale of assets for Stiles Corporation, advisory work on behalf of the St. Joe Corporation, and an M & A assignment related to the sale of Heritage Homes of Orlando to a publicly traded national homebuilder.

In January 1992, Mr. Nicholson joined Barnett Banks of Florida, Inc. from PNC Bank. He served as director of commercial real estate from the beginning of 1992 until Barnett was acquired in late summer of 1997. He was chairman of the bank’s Community Development Corporation, vice chairman and director of Main American Capital, a mortgage banking joint venture involving commercial real estate loan securitization and a member of the bank’s seven member executive loan committee, which reviewed and approved all bank credits from $25 million to $200 million. While at Barnett, Mr. Nicholson formed Barnett Realty Partners, a mortgage banking and real estate investment bank, which represented Salomon Brothers and other institutional capital providers as exclusive Florida correspondents. Additionally, he managed the bank’s real estate syndication activities, and worked with Barnett’s larger real estate clients to provide innovative capital raising solutions. Representative Barnett Realty Partner transactions include a $300 million revolving credit facility for Olen Residential, originated jointly with Salomon Brothers, debt placement for Rooms To Go, and a $100 million multi-facility financing for Arvida/JMB Partners.

Mr. Nicholson spent ten years with PNC in Pittsburgh, managing the bank’s national construction lending group and supporting the international division on select overseas real estate transactions. In addition to directing the U.S. sales force and loan administration, he led the bank’s efforts in originating the closing of the largest multi-property real estate debt transaction in New Zealand in 1984; underwriting, syndicating and financing the Charles Hotel, retail and condominium complex in Cambridge, Massachusetts; and representing the bank in a $728 million financing for Olympia and York for the World Financial Center.

Mr. Nicholson is a member of the board of directors of BFC Financial (NASDAQ – BFCF). He serves on the audit and the compensation committees, in addition to his general board responsibilities.

Mr. Nicholson serves as a Business Development Advisor for Ascella Compliance, a division of Microfinance International. Ascella provides comprehensive compliance services to financial institutions and other non-bank financial service providers.

Mr. Nicholson graduated with a bachelor’s degree in political science from Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut and earned a master’s degree in finance and real estate from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Mr. Nicholson holds Series 7, 24, 63 and 79 securities licenses as well as a Florida real estate broker’s license. He is the past president of the Council for Sustainable Florida, past chairman of the American Bankers Association Real Estate and Finance Committee, and head of the ABA’s environmental task force. He is a Vietnam veteran and former captain in the
U.S. Marine Corp.

Mr. Nicholson currently serves as a member of the University of Florida’s Real Estate Advisory Board. In October of 2010, he completed the USDA’s Lender Liability training.