Category: Uncategorized

Was talking to someone yesterday regarding the frothy pricing in the LA market. She made the reasonable observation that pricing in big city markets seems to be on a long, one way rise. This is a version of an argument I hear a lot: Millennials don’t want to move to the suburbs, because they prefer city … Continue reading “The LAW has not been repealed”

Do you know who is in the cat bird seat right now? Entrepreneurs with retail concepts that require very large spaces and have the ability to drive customers themselves, without need for “walk-in” traffic. Why? Well, retailers are generally getting slaughtered right now; who wants to go to the mall when Amazon will deliver whatever … Continue reading “Who benefits from the demise of department stores?”

Recently, I’ve noticed a lot of unpriced listings coming on the market. By “unpriced”, I mean properties where the Seller is basically saying “I want to sell, but I’m not going to guide you to the price I expect”. I get why sellers do this… they aren’t sure what their property is worth and they don’t … Continue reading “Why I dislike unpriced deals”

We’re looking for a smart, motivated intern to come help us and, in the process, learn about the business. Tasks will include everything from filing, to arranging deliveries of construction materials, to reviewing potential acquisition opportunities, to tagging along for meetings with architects, contractors, leasing agents, etc. The harder you work and the more energy … Continue reading “Internship opportunity”

Just had an interesting conversation with long-term partners of ours that I think bears repeating here. They asked the following (paraphrased) question: Why are you buying now, when interest rates are definitely going up and, therefore, values will be going down? The premise of the question is totally reasonable. When rates go up, prices go … Continue reading “Why buy in a rising rate environment?”

By now, pretty much everyone acknowledges that the housing affordability situation on both coasts is a major cause of income inequality and, probably, a drag on growth. Have been thinking about what the next administration could do to improve things. The problem is obviously that cities control zoning and city governments tend to listen to home-owners, … Continue reading “A Race to the Top for housing”

Thought you all would appreciate some pics of a small project we’re building ground-up. The permitting on this one was an absolute bear, but now it’s done, the plumbing is in, the foundation is poured and we’re into framing. Amazing how fast framing goes…  

Want to see insane city land-use in action? Here’s a city-owned ~170,000 sq ft lamp-post storage yard: Note its location, 1.5 blocks from a major Red Line stop and three blocks from Sunset Junction, the coolest part of Silver Lake: [Map revised with help from PM – thanks!] At 170,000 sq ft, if this property were … Continue reading “Maybe my favorite example of insane city land-use”

Right now, the thing on everyone’s mind in real estate is the likely impact of increasing interest rates on asset values. As the economy continues to improve, the stage is being set for the Fed to increase rates in order to manage inflation. The Fed would probably have done this anyway, but Trump’s proposed combination of … Continue reading “Thinking through the implications of interest rate increases”

In the beginning of Adaptive, we found ourselves in the annoying situation of having more deals than capital to do them. We “solved” this problem by doing these deals on a fee-only basis (eg in exchange for cash fees but no upside in the deals). I put “solved” in quotes because this was a terrible … Continue reading “Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel”