All Forum Posts by: John Wijtenburg

@Kris Benson

The premier hotel conferences are:

• The Americas Lodging Investment Summit (ALIS) - January in Los Angeles
• Hunter Hotel Conference - March in Atlanta
• AAHOA Convention - March/April in DC Area
• NYU International Hospitality Industry Investment Conference - June in New York City
• The Lodging Conference - September/October in Phoenix

There are some smaller conferences throughout the year related to specialty subjects, like law, data, and design. Many of the brands also have conventions/trade shows that may be good to look into. The Choice Hotels convention could be good for reaching accredited investors.

Other than that, I've found the Opal Conferences, and others like it, to be great for getting in front of accredited investors and family offices.

Assembling property is tricky. It takes loads of patience and persistence.

Make sure that you know exactly how much you're willing to spend on each property, and be prepared to overpay for the last piece. In many cases, once the neighbors see that you're trying to assemble the property, they're going to raise their price. 

Your best bet is to assemble the property using options.

Contact each owner independently. Set up the option with contingencies for acquiring the remaining properties in the assemblage. In some cases, the other owners may want to participate in your development so be prepared to consider a joint venture or lease situation.

If you're acquiring properties with long-term leases, you may have to include relocation costs. If they're retail, you may have to pay the existing tenant for lost income and replace the space in your new development.

Assemblage is all about creativity.

Build a flexible financial model to quickly model different scenarios while you're negotiating.

Good luck!

Doesn't sound like a real seller to me.

Call the broker to gather more information and feel him out. Offer to sign a confidentiality agreement to try to break the information loose.

You can often underwrite a deal using a market rent survey and industry standard expenses. This should be enough for an offer.

Make it clear what additional information you'll need during the inspection period before your deposits are non-refundable. Also, don't be afraid to lob a low-ball offer, and explain that you can't come up unless you have more info.

If you like the real estate, just get it under contract. The rest will come together once you control the property.

@Will Stanton

Check with your state licensing agency on the education requirements. Here is a link for Washington: https://www.dol.wa.gov/business/realestate/

As for CRE education, start with a good book. The "for Dummies" series is usually a good place to start, and they're usually available at your local library. The book will give you a sense of the terminology and basic strategy.

I was an economist at Fannie Mae before getting into commercial real estate. I thought I knew something about real estate, but it took a minute to really grasp cap rates and certain asset management concepts.

In my experience, immersion is the best way to learn. Experienced investors and brokers love talking to ambitious young real estate professionals. The key to gaining their attention is to spend some time learning and come prepared with well-thought out questions.

Specialization is critical in commercial real estate. Pick an area that you love. The big four are multifamily, office, retail, and industrial. Beyond that, you could look at specialty asset classes, like hotels, medical, senior housing, or student housing.

Good luck, and please feel free to get in touch with any specific questions!

Yes. You would look for a construction bridge loan.

Consider approaching a community banks that knows the market. They will look to have you open a depository account, but it's a pleasure to deal directly with the decision makers.

You'll refinance the construction loan upon completion. This will return some equity and put you into a permanent loan at more favorable terms.

@Wendy Gu

I would discuss this with a quality ADA attorney in your area. With a public space, like a restaurant, you'll want to consider your guests, as well. An ADA lawsuit from a patron is an unnecessary burden if you can avoid it.

Logistics warehouses are white hot all over the country in well-located areas. You probably have good access to highways to make it attractive for a CBP. 

I'm not very familiar with the logistics space, but it may be worth having a discussion with a local developer.

@Sam Burnoski

You may want to consider an SBA loan. Your qualification depends heavily on the use, but this could be an option for a high leverage loan.

Alternatively, consider more creative capital structures. Most of the time, CRE lenders look at loan-to-cost on value-add deals rather than loan-to-value. In this case, you can usually get a senior loan to 65% and mezzanine to 85% or more.

There are also structured options available, which gives you single high leverage loan, and the pieces are broken up (syndicated) on the lender side. This type of loan is very popular with the private equity debt funds. They can be expensive, but they are a lot more flexible than community, regional, and national banks.

A good mortgage broker should be able to fill your entire capital stack - senior, mezz, pref equity, and common equity. Your biggest concern will be limiting the cost of capital.

Information is so ubiquitous today that CoStar is slowly starting to lose dominance. The value you'll get from it really depends on your objectives.

I managed an acquisitions team for a family office for five years, and we only got robust services like CoStar after making a few transactions two years in. It was helpful for comps and market data. We also used it for sourcing off-market deals and special situations.

Generally, if you're very active, CoStar is a must. If you're only doing a couple deals per year, you can probably get all the data you need by building good relationships with brokers, e.g. comps and market trends. They'll provide this info for free to further your relationship.

Some other considerations:

• CoStar - good for lease and sale comps
• Real Capital Analytics - good for sale and refi comps - also collects some lender data
• Trepp - THE source for CMBS data, including property performance
• CityFeet - on market sale and lease information
• Crexi - on market sale information
• Reonomy - property information with owner names and contact info
• LandVision - GIS with multiple data layers

There are many more, but these are the ones that I've used or heard good reports.

It’s probably worthwhile to get a land planner to weigh in. Even though 70 acres works for 200 homesites on an Excel spreadsheet, the reality of how that land is situated may allow for far fewer. For example, it could be 70 acres in 20 linear foot strips.