People

Co-founder · Deal origination

Mark Edwards

Mark began his career in London training with the American law firm Jones Day, after completing a Master’s degree in International Relations at the University of St Andrews.

Since 2011 he has worked in commercial real estate, acting for high-net-worth individuals around the world and for institutional partners in the UK and the United States across residential and commercial assets: apartment blocks and portfolios, supported housing, BTR and city-centre mixed-use. He has originated, led and delivered acquisitions totalling a GDV of over £800 million across the UK.

That buy-side experience — originating, structuring and securing assets for principals — makes Mark first and foremost a deal originator, with the market access, underwriting discipline and negotiation experience that few advisers can replicate.

Institutional mandates

• A UK institution, for a £200m supported living portfolio.
• A US infrastructure fund, for a £120m supported housing portfolio.

What Mark brings

• Off-market sourcing through direct vendor relationships and agent networks built over fifteen years
• Rigorous commercial and financial underwriting, so clients acquire with confidence and at the right price
• Legal and structural analysis on every transaction, drawing on his training as a solicitor
• Offer strategy that wins on more than headline price: credibility, certainty and timing
• Execution to completion, then the business plan: repositioning, leasing and asset management
• Discretion: your identity protected, approaches made in Calibra’s name

Co-founder · Operations and capital

David Giovanni

David is an entrepreneur, investor and employer who has built residential property businesses from the ground up. In 2009 he developed a model for buying distressed assets and off-market apartments directly from developers and receivers, including whole blocks in Manchester, the North West and across the country. Working with other high-net-worth investors, he acquired more than 2,000 units in seven years, generating net asset growth of around 100% every eighteen months for much of that period.

He also developed the Shot Tower in Chester: 72 homes around a Grade II*-listed eighteenth-century leadworks, completed in 2022.

In 2014 David co-founded Ascend, initially to manage the group’s own apartments. Through partnerships with build-to-rent operators it grew into a full-service property management business. Gatehouse Bank took a stake in 2018, when Ascend was managing over 1,600 homes across the bank’s two build-to-rent funds, and in 2021 Ascend was appointed Principal Regional Lettings Partner to Sigma Capital Group plc, by which point it managed around 10,000 homes. Its move into maintenance and refurbishment lifted rents and occupancy across the portfolios it ran.

Since the sale of Ascend to Gatehouse Bank in 2022 David has focused on property finance, founding the Bluecroft Group of companies.

David in numbers

• 2,000+ units acquired with co-investors, 2009–2018
• c.10,000 homes under Ascend’s management by 2021
• 150 staff across five offices at the sale to Gatehouse Bank

Timeline

• 2009 — Distressed and off-market acquisition model; 2,000+ units over seven years
• 2014 — Ascend co-founded with Ged McPartlin
• 2018 — Gatehouse Bank invests in Ascend; 1,600+ homes under management
• 2021 — Principal Regional Lettings Partner to Sigma Capital; c.10,000 homes
• 2022 — Shot Tower, Chester completed; Ascend sold to Gatehouse Bank
• 2023 — Bluecroft founded
• 2026 — Calibra formed with Mark