Kate Freer's trajectory from Realstar to Get Living and the Canadian institutional model reshaping European living assets

Kate Freer's appointment as CEO of Get Living, effective autumn 2026, marks one of the most consequential leadership transitions in Europe's build-to-rent sector this year. Her move follows more than 11 years at Realstar Group, the Canadian real estate investment and management company with over C$9 billion in assets under management globally, where she built one of the continent's most recognisable multifamily platforms from scratch. The transition arrives at a moment when the living sector has cemented its position as Europe's largest investment sector, according to CBRE's European Real Estate Market Outlook 2026, and institutional capital from North America continues to define the competitive landscape.

The numbers behind Freer's tenure at Realstar offer a clear measure of execution. During her time at the firm, she helped grow the UK multifamily portfolio and the UNCLE brand from the ground up to approximately 6,400 units with a gross development value of £2.6 billion, according to Institutional Real Estate, Inc. That trajectory, sustained over more than a decade, turned UNCLE into a benchmark operating platform in the British rental market, with assets spanning London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, and Dublin.

How did Realstar's UNCLE platform become a reference in UK multifamily?

The UNCLE brand emerged as a distinctly institutional approach to purpose-built rental housing in a market historically dominated by fragmented private landlords. Realstar channelled Canadian institutional capital into developing and operating large-scale residential communities with consistent service standards, professional management, and long-term hold strategies. The model drew directly from Canada's mature multifamily market, where institutional ownership of rental housing has been the norm for decades.

Scaling to nearly 6,400 units across five major cities required not only capital deployment but also the creation of an integrated operating platform capable of managing leasing, maintenance, community programming, and asset performance across geographies. The UNCLE brand became synonymous with a tenant-centric approach that prioritised retention and operational efficiency, qualities that attracted institutional limited partners seeking predictable income streams from residential assets.

In September 2025, QuadReal Property Group fully acquired Realstar's UK and Ireland residential operating platform and the UNCLE brand, as reported by Proptech Connect and Business Wire. The transaction, which encompassed the management of nearly 6,000 residential units, represented a significant consolidation within the institutional living assets sector. QuadReal, itself a major Canadian pension-linked real estate investor, absorbed a platform that had already demonstrated scalability and operational resilience across multiple UK and Irish markets.

The acquisition underscored a broader pattern in European real estate: Canadian institutional capital, whether deployed through development or acquisition, has become a structural force in the living sector. Realstar's exit from direct UK operations through the QuadReal deal did not diminish the strategic template Freer helped create. It validated it.

What does Freer's move to Get Living signal for Europe's build-to-rent sector?

Get Living, one of the UK's largest build-to-rent operators, gains a CEO whose track record is defined by the full lifecycle of platform creation, from initial asset development through to institutional-scale portfolio management and eventual platform sale. According to Inside Housing and Institutional Real Estate, Inc., Freer's appointment was announced in April 2026, with her expected to take the role in autumn of the same year.

The timing is significant. Europe faces a 925,000-unit gap between additional housing demand and completions, according to data from the European Investment Bank cited by CBRE. This structural undersupply is exacerbating rental growth across the continent's major urban centres and reinforcing the investment case for purpose-built rental housing. For Get Living, which already operates large-scale neighbourhoods in London and Manchester, Freer's experience in building and scaling a platform through similar market conditions represents a direct strategic asset.

Freer's Canadian institutional playbook, characterised by patient capital deployment, integrated operations, and a focus on long-term income rather than short-term trading, aligns with the mandates of the pension funds and sovereign wealth vehicles that dominate capital allocation in European living assets. The living sector is expected to remain the biggest driver of investment in Europe throughout 2026, according to CBRE, and operators with demonstrated scale capabilities are positioned to attract the largest share of that capital.

The Canadian institutional model in European context

The influence of Canadian institutional investors on Europe's residential markets extends well beyond any single platform. Canada's pension and investment management ecosystem, characterised by large pools of patient capital and a preference for direct real estate ownership, has produced a generation of cross-border operators comfortable with the complexity of European regulatory environments and the operational demands of residential asset management.

Realstar's trajectory illustrates this model with particular clarity. With over C$9 billion in assets under management globally, according to the firm's own disclosures as of September 2025, Realstar operated across multiple geographies and asset types, but its European living assets strategy, anchored by the UNCLE brand, became the most visible expression of the Canadian institutional approach to rental housing outside North America.

The competitive landscape in European multifamily now features several operators with transatlantic roots or capital structures, each pursuing variations on the theme of institutional-grade residential platforms. What distinguishes the Canadian model is the integration of development, asset management, and operational excellence within a single platform, rather than relying on third-party managers or fragmented service providers. Freer's career arc, from building that integration at Realstar to now leading Get Living, embodies the operational philosophy that Canadian institutions have exported to Europe.

Portfolio metrics and the scale imperative

The numbers associated with Freer's Realstar tenure offer a benchmark for what institutional-scale residential platforms look like in practice. Approximately 6,400 units and £2.6 billion in gross development value represent a portfolio of considerable density and value, concentrated in the UK's most dynamic rental markets. The subsequent acquisition by QuadReal, covering nearly 6,000 of those units, confirmed the platform's institutional-grade quality and the liquidity of well-managed residential portfolios.

For the broader European market, these figures illustrate the scale threshold that institutional investors increasingly demand. Capital allocators are directing mandates toward operators capable of managing thousands of units across multiple cities, with standardised processes and data-driven asset management. Platforms that fall below this threshold face growing difficulty in attracting institutional capital, a dynamic that favours consolidation and rewards operators with proven scaling capabilities.

The 925,000-unit demand-supply gap identified by the European Investment Bank reinforces the structural opportunity. With completions failing to keep pace with demographic and migration-driven demand, rental growth is expected to remain robust across Europe's core markets. Operators positioned to deliver new supply at scale, while maintaining operational standards, stand to benefit from both rental income growth and capital appreciation.

A leadership transition with sector-wide implications

Kate Freer's transition from Realstar to Get Living is more than a personnel change. It represents the transfer of an institutional operating methodology, refined over 11 years and validated by a major platform acquisition, to one of the UK's most prominent build-to-rent operators. The move reflects the maturation of Europe's living assets sector, where leadership increasingly comes from professionals who have built and exited institutional-scale platforms rather than from traditional development or fund management backgrounds.

Freer has been an active participant in industry forums, including serving on the GRI Global Committee for the Multifamily and BTR Chapter at GRI Institute, where cross-border investment strategies and operational best practices are regularly examined among senior real estate leaders. Her visibility within this network underscores the degree to which the Canadian institutional playbook has become a reference point for European multifamily strategy.

As Europe's living sector continues to absorb the largest share of real estate investment capital, the operators who combine institutional backing with demonstrated operational scale will define the market's next phase. Freer's career, from founding a platform to selling it to a major institutional buyer and now leading a new one, offers a template that the sector's capital allocators are watching closely.

The European housing deficit is structural, not cyclical. Capital will follow operators who can deliver units at scale, manage them professionally, and generate the predictable income streams that institutional mandates require. Freer's appointment at Get Living signals that the Canadian institutional model, far from being a niche import, has become central to the way Europe's rental housing market is being built and financed.