I had a great conversation this week with Robert Ritzenthaler, President and CEO of REM Capital. Robert has an interesting story… growing up in the DFW area he was exposed to construction at an early age, as his dad ran a construction business. When he went to school, he studied finance, and began his career on Wall Street. After the market crash in 2000, he got into commercial real estate and joined a NYC-based commercial real estate firm where he leveraged his experience in construction and finance to help grow the company’s portfolio. He then decided to start his own firm, REM Capital, where he and his team have acquired over $300M in multifamily real estate. I wanted to focus this episode on operations and how Robert has vertically integrated management/construction into his business, despite investing in multiple different geographical locations. We also discuss how he is approaching underwriting given the volatility in the interest rate markets. Robert also shares what he describes as his superpower, which is relentlessly asking questions – he credits this trait to advancing in his career more quickly. If you’re interested in seeing our investment opportunities, go to www.alignedrep.com/invest to get on our email list. Thanks for listening, catch you all next week! 5:32 – How Robert became exposed to the construction business 8:49 – What Robert learned from large organizations and how he used these insights to build his own 11:36 – We discuss the book “Traction” and how his team implements the strategies discussed in it 13:22 – Robert elaborates how his diverse background gave him a competitive advantage in the RE business 15:29 – We learn how asking tons of questions and taking notes can rapidly grow your skills/career 20:03 – Robert discussed how they operate and what types of deals they’re looking at 22:40 – How Robert built his business infrastructure given the geographical challenges they face 29:34 – We talk about how underwriting deals has become challenging and how he is looking at deals at this point in the cycle 35:41 – The key to quickly growing a portfolio (and organization) 39:25 – The advice Robert would give his younger self 41:11 – Robert talks about his most significant business related failure and what he learned from them 44:56 – Robert discusses his vision for the next 6 to 12 months and gives tips to the audience
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