Primary Job Title Director Primary Organization 
Ares Commercial Real Estate
Gender Male
William L. Browning is a Director of ACRE and currently serves as a member of the Audit Committee.
Mr. Browning has dedicated his time to serving on boards of directors since January 2012. From 1999 to January 2012, Mr. Browning was a senior client service partner at Ernst & Young LLP (“E&Y”), a global leader in assurance, tax,
transaction and advisory services.
From 2008 to 2012, Mr. Browning served as the managing partner for E&Y’s Los Angeles office, which at the time of his departure was E&Y’s second largest practice in the Americas and the largest public accounting firm in Los Angeles with over 1,200 professionals and over $400 million in annual revenues.
Mr. Browning’s extensive industry sector experience includes: real estate and REITs, financial services (commercial banks, asset management, consumer finance, credit card and mortgage companies), private equity, energy (upstream/downstream, refining and natural gas), engineering and construction, and technology.
Before joining E&Y, Mr. Browning began his professional career with Arthur Andersen & Co. in 1976, where he was admitted to partnership in 1987 and named office managing partner of its Oklahoma office in 1994. At Arthur Andersen & Co. in Oklahoma and in Los Angeles, California, Mr. Browning served clients in a wide variety of industries and led the firm’s domestic banking practice and regulatory compliance practice.
Mr. Browning serves on the board of directors of McCarthy Holdings, the holding company for McCarthy Building Companies, Inc., one of the top 10 U.S. commercial builders and the oldest American construction company, as well as on the board of directors of Community Bank, based in Pasadena, California.
Mr. Browning is also an adjunct professor at SMU in Dallas, Texas. Mr. Browning volunteers on the board of CARE, a non-profit organization focused on assisting young adults with chemical abuse issues, as well as on the Dallas Summer Musicals board.
Mr. Browning holds a B.B.A. from the University of Oklahoma and is a certified public accountant in Oklahoma, California and Texas.
