Thomas von Hahn is co-coordinator of the Blakes Real Estate Group, made up of approximately 40 lawyers. He is well known as an adviser to pension funds and institutional and private investors in the acquisition and disposition of real property and mortgage portfolios, and has also been active in the privatization and disposition of government assets throughout Canada. Thomas has structured real estate joint ventures and partnerships and placed financing secured by real estate on behalf of both individuals and institutions.

Thomas is recognized as a leading real estate practitioner in Legal Media Group's Guide to the World's Leading Real Estate Lawyers, in PLC Which Lawyer? Yearbook, in Chambers Global: The World's Leading Lawyers for Business and in The Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory. In the 2010 edition of Chambers, he is recommended as "a very smart business person on top of being an excellent lawyer." In The Best Lawyers in Canada, Thomas was voted by peers as one of the leading lawyers in Canada.

Thomas has been an instructor for The Law Society of Upper Canada (Ontario) bar admission course in the real estate section. He is the Canadian president of the Canadian German Lawyers Association and speaks German fluently. An active member of the International Council of Shopping Centres and the International Bar Association, his articles on real estate investment and lending have appeared in publications of the International Bar Association. Thomas lectured at the Osgoode Hall Law School intensive program in business law from 2000 to 2003. Thomas has presented papers and appeared on panels on commercial real estate investment, financing, leasing and enforcement matters for the Queen's University Executive Seminars on Corporate and Investment Real Estate, Real Leasing, Insight, Federated Press and the Canadian Institute.

Representative transactions:

• Acted for HOOPP Realty Inc. on its C$130-million purchase of an undivided 50 per cent interest in Devonshire Mall, Windsor, Ontario
• Acted for clients of Bentall Investment Management LP in their acquisitions of Air Canada Centre Office Tower, Toronto; Bower Place Mall, Red Deer, Alberta; Monterra Reit portfolio; North Hill Mall, Calgary; Cloverdale Mall, Toronto; Westmount Mall, London; and in numerous dispositions, including Madison Centre, Toronto
• Acted for Merrill Lynch in its acquisition financing of the Brookfield consortium purchase of the C$2-billion O&Y portfolio, the financing of The Atrium, Yonge and Dundas, Toronto, and the financing of the acquisition by Brookfield affiliates of the remaining 75 per cent interest in Hudson's Bay Centre, Toronto
• Structured joint venture for Ontario-based pension funds in their acquisition of a 50 per cent interest in the Exchange Tower, a downtown Toronto office building
• Acted for German, American and Dutch lenders and syndicators on their real estate acquisition and lending programs in Canada
• Acted for the developer/borrower in infrastructure financings totalling more than C$160-million for territorial legislative building, office buildings and governmental residences in Nunavut, Canada
• Acted for Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia-based pension funds in acquisitions and joint ventures of office, industrial and multi-family residential assets
• Acted for Host Marriott in a C$135-million financing of four business hotels in Canada
• Acted for vendor in the sale of assets reported as the largest single real estate transaction in Canadian history