Doug Abbey is actively involved in commercial and residential real estate investment and development throughout the U.S. He is a leader in a number of nonprofit organizations related to affordable housing and land use issues. He works with GSB students to evaluate career opportunities in real estate and to expose them to research and educational opportunities in the field. While the focus of his course is real estate investment, students are introduced to broader issues of how land use decisions are created through a combination of market forces, demographics, and regulation, and how resulting land use patterns impact housing affordability and integration or isolation of households by income level.

Douglas D. Abbey is currently chairman of Swift Real Estate Partners. He is also a co-founder of AMB Property Corporation (predecessor to Prologis) and IHP Capital Partners. Mr. Abbey has more than 35 years of experience in commercial and residential real estate investment and development. He is a graduate of Amherst College and has a Master in City Planning degree from the University of California, Berkeley. He is a member of the Board of Directors for Pacific Life Insurance Company, Macerich Corporation and Apollo Commercial Real Estate Finance.

He is a Trustee and past Vice Chairman of the Urban Land Institute, past Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Golden Gate University and on the real estate committee of the UCSF Foundation. Mr. Abbey is a member of the Board and Executive Committee of Bridge Housing Corporation, a non-profit affordable housing developer active in Northern and Southern California.