Brian A. Doyle
Founder of property management firm volunteered with Loyola High, Our Daily Bread, Special Olympics
Brian A. Doyle, a founder and partner in a Timonium commercial property management firm and volunteer, died Friday from pancreatic cancer at the University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center. A resident of the Phoenix area of Baltimore County, he was 52.
“Brian was … probably the smartest guy in the room,” said Ernest I. Moyer Jr. of Pikesville, his business partner. “We couldn’t have done what we did without him. He was so good with numbers and very intelligent.”
Eric O. Halvorsen first met Mr. Doyle when they were freshmen in 1985 at Drexel University in Philadelphia and pledging Lambda Chi fraternity.
“We became roommates in 1986 and stayed roommates until we graduated,” said Mr. Halvorsen, of Rodgers Forge. “He was the best. We were best men at each other’s weddings.”
Brian Michael Doyle was born in Baltimore and raised on Ruxway Road in Ruxton. He was the son of Dennis Doyle, former president of Charter Insurance Group, and Judy Doyle, a former real estate professional at Coldwell Banker.
A1984 graduate of Loyola High School, he obtained degrees in accounting and finance from Drexel in1989, and became a certified public accountant.
After graduating from college, Mr. Doyle joined what is now Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu LLC in Northern Virginia.
In 1990, he joined a cousin, Tim Doyle, who had a consulting firm under contract to Resolution Trust Corp., which liquidated assets such as mortgage loans that had been held by several savings and loan associations and banks in New Jersey and New York that were later closed.
From 1990 to 1995, he was a commercial property sales associate with MacKenzie & Co., before going to work for Miller Corporate Real Estate. That was where he met his future business partner, Mr. Moyer.
While both men continued working for the firm, they established MDRE Equities LLC in 1995. In 2004, they left Miller and opened an office in Hunt Valley to oversee properties they managed in East Coast and Midwestern states.
“We expanded to nine states with 19 commercial properties that are comprised of shopping and data centers, office buildings and industrial-related strip malls,” Mr. Moyer said.
“Brian … was a wizard at numbers and paid attention to detail. He was also a wizard at organization,” he said.
Since 2007, the firm has been located on West Padonia Road in Timonium.
“I think he was super successful because in business he had a knack for what many people don’t have. He was good at both sales and numbers,” said Mr. Halvorsen, a commercial insurer in Baltimore for Brown & Brown Insurance.
“Some people have one or the other or vice versa, but he was a CPA who could also sell. He had a mixed skill set, understood the numbers and could explain why buying or selling a building made sense. He was a very engaging person,” he said. “That’s why he and Ernie were so successful. Plus, he held himself to a superior high standard.”
“Brian was a very caring person who was devoted to his family and friends,” Mr. Moyer said. “He was very social and had his high school and college friends. We’re all going to miss him.”
“He was a guy who always wanted to have fun, but what made him different he never missed an opportunity to help someone who needed him when they had a challenge in their life,” Mr. Halvorsen said. “It was a priority that defined who he was.”
Mr. Doyle served as chair of the Loyola High School Alumni Board of Governors. He also was a weekly volunteer with Our Daily Bread and was a Special Olympics coach and mentor.
An avid waterfowl hunter and a member of the Outlaws, a hunting club, Mr. Doyle enjoyed spending time at a second home he owned on Taylors Island in Dorchester County.
He also liked golfing and was a member of the Towson Golf and Country Club.
A Mass of Christian burial for Mr. Doyle will be offered at 11 a.m. Saturday at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, 5200 N. Charles St.
In addition to his parents, who live in Timonium, he is survived by his fiancee, Allison Satchell of Easton; three daughters, Lily Doyle, Charlotte Doyle and Fagan Doyle, all of Phoenix, in Baltimore County; and two sisters, Kerry White, also of Phoenix, and Kelly Oakes of Charlottesville, Va. His marriage to the former Kathleen Burmaster ended in divorce. A Loyola High School graduate, Mr. Doyle chaired its Alumni Board of Governors.