Paul Bubny is editor of Real Estate New York

NEW YORK CITY-Maintaining liquidity rather than chasing opportunities is a priority at the moment for Mack-Cali Realty Corp. That was the upshot of the presentation by Mitchell E. Hersh, president and CEO of the Edison, NJ-based REIT, at the Citi 2008 Global Property CEO Conference, held at the Breakers in West Palm Beach, FL yesterday.

"Right now you need to be very cautious about expending capital," said Hersh. However, he emphasized that Mack-Cali is strongly capitalized and could be more open to acquisitions as the capital markets start to stabilize. "When it's the right time to do something, we will be in a position to do it."

In the Q&A period following his opening remarks, Hersh made no bones about his bearish stance, saying that he was "very concerned about the economy. There's a real lack of clarity" as to the depth and breadth of market woes or their causes. He noted that in general the leasing environment has been "somewhat tepid" in the past few months and that tenants have been slow to make decisions, or have been erratic in the decisions they do make.