Matt Waters, CGLA, CPA, MBA, MCR, CGMA is the founder of The Lease Accounting Institute and will be your instructor for the CGLA program.  

Matt has 20+ years of lease accounting experience. In addition to leading The Lease Accounting Institute, he currently serves as the Director of Lease Accounting and Sustainability at CoStar Real Estate Manager where he has helped over 1,000 customers streamline lease accounting processes and systems.

He is a leading expert on lease accounting and his insights have been featured in Bloomberg, Reuters, Accounting Today, CFO, Corporate Real Estate Journal, and other trade publications. Matt is a frequent speaker at lease accounting events and webinars.  He is a faculty member for CoreNet Global's Master of Corporate Real Estate (MCR) program and the National Real Estate Tenants Association's Certified Commercial Lease Administrator program. Matt is also the host of The Lease Alert Podcast.

Before joining CoStar, Matt led lease accounting teams at The Home Depot and American Tower. The Home Depot is the world's largest home improvement retailer and American Tower is one of the largest REITs in the world, with over 100,000 leases.

While at The Home Depot, Matt oversaw a project to consolidate the accounting for thousands of leases into one central area to streamline the flow of information and prepare for ASC 842 lease accounting changes. 

Matt holds a bachelor's degree in accounting from Auburn University and an MBA from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. 

In his personal life, Matt is a devoted husband, father to three teenage boys and an avid runner. He has completed 10+ running events at the marathon distance or longer including a 100-mile ultramarathon. In addition to running, he enjoys spending time outdoors hiking, biking, kayaking and camping.

 Jennie Waters, M.Ed. (Matt’s Wife) serves as Registrar for The Lease Accounting Institute.  Jennie earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Auburn University and a Master of Education degree from Auburn University Mongomery.  Psychology and teaching are two pillars of instructional design, so Jennie has been invaluable during our course development process. 

Jennie has worked professionally in both education and business environments, but the accomplishment she is most proud of is still underway, as she and Matt are raising three boys.

In addition to instructional design, Jennie helps with the rigorous recordkeeping requirements that enable The Lease Accounting Institute to maintain our prestigious status as a QAS Self Study CPE provider on NASBA’s National Registry (through our sister company Lease CPE LLC, please see the national registry statement on our home page). 

Danny Waters (Matt’s Dad) is a training and development executive who spent 30 years leading the learning organization of Motion Industries, a multi-billion dollar division of Genuine Parts Company. 

After serving in the Army during the Vietnam War, Danny used the GI Bill to attend college at Georgia Southern, where he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in industrial management.  He started at Motion Industries as a Fluid Power Specialist but soon moved on to become one of the founding members of the training department.  He was promoted to lead the training team and oversaw the transition from entirely in-person training to modern digital training methods.

Matt basically grew up in the corporate training room and traveled all over the United States and Canada “assisting” while Danny conducted seminars.

Danny retired from Motion Industries as AVP of Training and Development and now provides executive leadership and support to The Lease Accounting Institute.