The following article is published in the March 28, 20245, edition of The Washington Business Journal as part of the publication’s Best Real Estate Deals of 2024.
Jodie McLean is obsessed with using data to build, track and improve the communities where she builds. It’s how she’s left her stamp on transformational mixed-use projects such as Union Market District in D.C. and Mosaic District in Merrifield.
Her analytical skills led her to Edens, a developer based in South Carolina at the time, where she became a financial analyst as a new college graduate in 1990. McLean rose quickly at the company: In 1997, she was named chief investment officer, and five years later founder Joe Edens Jr. promoted her to president at age 33.
She took the reins as CEO in 2015 and now oversees more than 200 employees and $6.8 billion in assets in 13 major markets as one of very few female chief executives in the traditionally male-dominated field.
McLean relies on her analytics foundation to measure the impact of her projects via a “matrix” that tracks education, health, crime and opportunity in the firm’s markets.
She also counts trips and time spent at Edens’ shopping centers. For every 1% of dwell time people spend — otherwise known as minutes spent just hanging out — Edens receives about 1.3% of additional wallet share, she said.
But she ultimately wants her projects to be remembered for the things that can’t be measured in tidy Excel formulas.
“If we could create places where people could make human connections and feel emotionally connected, then economic prosperity, soulful prosperity, social prosperity and cultural prosperity would all follow,” McLean said.
Take, for instance, Mosaic District, a 31-acre project in suburban Fairfax County, with its colorful murals, fountain and weekly community farmers market. McLean wants the patrons in the spaces she develops to “feel” better spending time in them compared to others, creating an emotional response from those who frequent them.
“I think we underestimate people’s real need to feel a part of community,” she said.
It was nearly two decades ago when the developer undertook the ground-up development at Mosaic District. At the time, it was also working to redevelop the wholesale food distribution area in Northeast D.C. known as Union Market. Both projects proved successful by all accounts.
The company later moved its headquarters to the region.
In late 2023, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser tasked McLean to co-chair the Gallery Place Chinatown Task Force alongside D.C. Deputy Mayor Nina Albert and Deborah Ratner-Salzberg, a partner with Uplands Real Estate Partners and former head of Forest City Enterprises. The task force was commissioned shortly after Monumental Sports & Entertainment announced it had a deal to take the Washington Wizards and Capitals to a new arena in Alexandria.
While that deal ultimately fell apart, the task force developed a vision to transform the 130-acre area surrounding the arena, including a proposal for a “civic spine” along Seventh Street NW with a new “People’s Plaza” to create a more vibrant space between the Portrait Gallery and the arena. The task force is now wrapping up its final recommendation to the mayor, McLean said.
“I think the accomplishments and the time spent on this was time really well spent, not only for what it has done to stabilize this area — to drive the future of this area — but I really think this is the heart and soul of our city, and has a huge rippling effect throughout our entire city.”
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