Unlocking Long Island's Commercial Real Estate with Ron Koenigsberg

Are you one of the many busy professionals working in offices day in and day out? Do you wonder how some people grow their wealth fast, retire early and play on work days? Well, you're in luck because Ginny Bolling hosts this show Pivots of Prosperity where she interviews people that can do just that play on work days. Many guests have become financially free. She also interviews people that are on their journey and people that are in support roles like attorneys, contractors, brain brokers and others. Commercial real estate is the common element. She is on a mission to be sure. Busy professionals know they can own substantial commercial properties too, like apartments, self storage facilities and others and not have to do the work managing them. Passive investing is the key. Syndications are the typical method. Tax write offs are some of the biggest rewards. Ginny and partners find the deals, build a strong team and business plan, then offer the investment opportunities to passive investors. New episodes are released every Tuesday at 12, so watch for new releases. If you want to get involved, let us know. You need to get pre qualified to hear about most deals. See the show notes for contact information.

Hello, hello. Ginny Bowling here with Pivot to Prosperity. And today we have Ron Konigsberg. Thanks Jenny. Not how I was going to pronounce it.

Don't worry about it. It's not an easy one. I understand. Yes, yes.

Ron, thank you so much for coming on. And you are a cc. I am, I am. You have quite the reputation in Long island and I gotten the chance to talk with you a little before we come on here. I did not ask you about a bio. So let me let you introduce yourself and.

Sure, we'll go from there. Sure. You know it's, you know, thanks for having me, Ginny. You know, I'm 60 years old, I'm the son of a commercial real estate syndicator. You know, my dad started out, he owned an NASD broker dealer and sold investments and really, you know, he brought my brother and I to many of the sites that they were acquiring in terms of general partnerships. My brother became a real estate lawyer, I became a real estate broker. And realistic commercial real estate has always been in our blood. I think that I'm more associated with my dad. We both have a sales background and my brother is a commercial real estate attorney down in Miami. I'm here in Garden City, Long Island, New York. I have several times won Commercial Broker of the year. You know, everyone's trying to 11,000 brokers, everyone wants to be number one. So it's what we do a lot of transactions. So yeah, it's fun to be here. I definitely pride myself on a person that, you know, wants to be part of the commercial real estate community and add value.

And you specialize in representing the sellers, right?

I do, I do. I do just work on exclusives. I just work on. Just work on properties in my market. Just work on Long island properties. Properties. Really know I'm from here. You can, you know, the New York accent probably gives that away. And just work. Just work for sellers, don't work for buyers. Just represent exclusive listings. Commercial properties, no homes, shopping centers, office buildings, industrial properties, and multifamily. So, yeah, we've got ourselves a good piece of this pie, but we're always looking to grow our market share.

Yeah, that's. And, and we were talking about the market today. But before we move into that, let me back you up a second, because you did reference multifamily and industrial, and we got off on talking about offices. But the, the. I think you said the industrial isn't so much on the island. Right, right.

We just don't have a great inventory of multifamily or industrial properties on Long Island.

But you do have some.

Okay, we do have some, of course. Absolutely.

Okay. So as far as the. Your specialty, that would be shopping centers.

That I would say yes. Yeah. Over the years, and most of my transactions have been retail. Triple nets. Shopping centers. Shopping centers, yes.

And how. How do shopping centers perform on the island there compared to on the mainland? Would you say there's any real difference?

Listen, I know that historically our vacancy rates have been 4% or below where they are right now. So, you know, I think nationwide it's probably double that, you know, on, you know, on a vacancy rate. So I think, to answer your question very specifically, I think our vacancy rates are very low. I think there's a lot of traffic. I do think that Nassau county in particular, in Suffolk, a little bit less, has tremendous density.

Yeah, definitely. That makes it much, much different from what I see here in Florida. There's a lot of shopping centers that are truly at the 80% area occupancy.

20% vacancy. That's where the profits are. The last 20% is where all the money is. Everything else is just to pay the, you know, pay your mortgage and pay, you know, pay your taxes and your other expenses. The 20%, that's where the income is. That's, that's. That's the good stuff.

It's interesting. It is. And I enjoy trying to figure out where and what tenant should go where I haven't spent my career Doing that, obviously, because I, as I told you, most of it's been eminent domain. And even though I've been a broker for 30 years, most of that was consulting. So. But I love to try to figure that out. And I always thought it'd be interesting to find a way to ask the public, you know, do what, what.

You know, essentially, that's what I believe happens most of the time. I think that, you know, you know, when we advertise, I don't do leasing, but people say to me all the time, you know, what do you think the tenant should be in there? And my attitude is, I don't know. Let's. Let's let the market decide. Let's see what comes after. We really advertise the availability of the space. And same thing with shopping centers. Once we, you know, advertise the real availability of the space, let's just see who comes over and, you know, and starts to buy it so that it really. Is the market responding.

Is there any particular tenant that predominates in Long island that is in many of the shopping centers?

You know, you know, we have this traditional mom and pops. I think that if you went through, you know, funny, if I just went through my listings right now, if I pulled up, I think you're going to see. I don't, you know, pizza places, nail salons, hair salons. You know, I think that traditional tenant mixes are the most prominent thing. I'm pulling one up right now. Let's see what we got. We have a grocery store which is 1,000 square feet. So it's not really a grocery store. Let's just say it's, you know, you go in there to pick up. We have a little bit of a fashion boutique. They're out there selling some clothes. We have a hair salon, we have a nail salon. I forgot this one. These are popular. Let's talk about puppies. Let's talk about dogs. Let's talk about, you know, let's talk about. There's a lot of. Since the pandemic, a lot of places that cater to dogs, a lot of yoga studios. You know, I don't want to jump into this one too deep because it's always a hot button issue. Dry cleaners to talk about that in a minute. Tattoo shops. There's a Chinese restaurant, and there's an ice cream shop in this particular. In this particular one. And again, as. As I told you, I believe that right now at this point, we have 20 or 21 exclusive listings, and I'm just picking out the next one. And this particular one, let's take a look at the tenant mix on this one. You know, I'm sure it's very similar. You know, this one we have a nail salon, a barbershop, a cleaners, a deli, which is probably exactly what that is. A restaurant, another restaurant. They have two stores, same thing, mom and Pops. Services that we need. If I was going to say, you know, again, I've been a broker since the mid-90s. I think the things that have changed is we've gone to a lot more services. Nail salon, barber shop. This is actually a shoe repair. You know, great service. You invest a lot of money into your shoes, you want to get them repaired. Cleaners, deli. This is a computer hospital and this is a restaurant. So a lot of services, A lot of services. I think we've gone from the goods which we could buy, you know, on the Internet, to a lot more services.

Yeah, that makes sense. It really does. And now, do most people walk there or drive there?

We're a driving community. Everything on Long island is about parking for right now. Although I do see the future being different.

I do see more say more go there.

Well, you know, it's funny, I sat with a major mall owner, I guess, you know, maybe about in 2005, and he said to me, and I said, parking is everything. It's just everything, Everything. We want front parking. You know, in Florida, I'm sure you want the same thing too. Parking is critical. And he said to me, Ron, he said to me, Ron, 94% of the time your car is sitting idle. I was like, I know, but it's the 6% of the time that I need it, that I'm using it. And he said, right, but how? Is there a better way? Better way? Could you imagine a self driving car, he said, in the future, which just picks you up and drops you off. You don't have to deal with anything. So, you know, as we get closer to Ubers and we get closer to pick up and drop off, is there a possibility in the future that parking isn't as important? Maybe. But for now I can promise you we're counting spots. And I'm sure everybody in Florida is as well.

Yeah, to a point. And it's interesting though, Orange county, being the main county here in central Florida, is changing to a form based code where they're trying to put parking in the rear and want the buildings out front for people to be walking. It's quite an experiment. They're trying to get out there.

Well, you know, we have Some of everything. This is a, you know, Long island, you know, it's an older. Many towns are very old. People like front parking. It's something that people like to park their car, go to a store and get back out. Maybe our elements, maybe our weather is a little bit hotter than. Than, you know, Florida weather. But I wouldn't want to push that. I wouldn't want to push back parking on because it's too easy to miss it.

You miss the driveway, and guess what? You might go to the next place.

Sure, sure, sure, sure, sure, sure. And we love our front parking, if possible.

So how many taxis are there in Long Island? I haven't. Like I said, I haven't been there in decades.

Okay, well, I think that you're thinking really we're a bedroom community, you know, toward the, you know, toward the five boroughs of New York City. And, you know, it really isn't bustling as Manhattan is, and there's very little taxis in Manhattan as well. Manhattan's a thing. Yeah, I mean, taxis really and truly are mostly a thing of the past. It's Ubers. Yeah, it's Ubers. It's Ubers. Yeah, it really is.

I guess I was there during the pandemic. It was weird. There were not many people out.

Not many people, not much of anything. But I will tell you, one of the biggest things that I've seen is. Yes, is. Was what's happened in taxi cabs. Yeah. No question about it. The value of taxicabs had gotten as high as $1 million. For each of the medallions. They only offer like 14,000. For. For many years. It was 11,878. And then they offered a few more. Something I always knew, being a New York City guy, but, yeah, those, those million dollar medallions probably trade for 100,000 or less. The value is gone. Sad.

When you say medallion. That's the taxi license.

License. Yeah, the license. It's something that they put on the hood of the car. It's a medallion. And that. That Medallion can operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, but they're just not being used. Right now. People are using Ubers, which. The market speaks to you. You know, we're very reactionary in my market. For instance, I started in the mid-1990s, and if I wanted to sell a shopping center, I needed to make a phone call to a buyer or fax him the one page listing setup. Okay. Right now, 87.5% of all new property acquisitions start online. I used to advertise in the new York Times. It has been a while since anybody's advertised in the New York Times. So I love technology. I love staying current. I'm always, always, always looking for the next way to be competitively advantaged. I went into coaching. I was a student at Massimo Group coaching platform and coach called me up. I'm not really doing it very much. Coach called me up, wish me a Happy New Year January 1, 2024. And he said to me, how you doing? Embracing AI and I said embracing AI I think got the wrong phone number. He said I want you to embrace AI. And I really have. I use it all, all day, every day, chat GPT for all sorts of things. Mostly because I'm dyslexic and it helps me write very well. My emails have gotten so much better.

Yeah, it's interesting. I only recently decided to, to put in the time and it's amazing. It's really been impressive and I'm, I'm training mine to, to know me and, and do all the things that, you know, can help so much. But got to communicate well with it.

Yeah.

Tell everybody what your website is.

Sure. We. It's funny. I opened my own firm, I went to American University and I opened up American Investment Properties 7-4-2001 and my website is AI props props.com and because it's AI props American investment Properties I've get a lot of people asking me how I knew 25 years ago that the future of commercial real estate was going to be in artificial intelligence. I didn't. It just happens to coincidentally be a pro.p s.com we're an active firm. It's been a tough market for the last few years, but things have really turned around in 2025.

I'm trying to think of ways you can make that I make your, your website stand out even more as you know that you have an AI bot that walks through your property.

Sure. I love embracing technology in all sorts of kinds and I use it. I don't think that anything is going to replace the human connection. I think that people do business with people that they like, they trust, that they feel are educated and good professionals. And you know, that's the reason why I think that, you know, we continually grow our market share. We're very, very, very astute to with specialists in this market and.

Yes. So walk us through what the typical transaction would be on a shopping center. How long does it take for instance and real briefly.

Sure, absolutely. Most shopping centers, office buildings here on Long island that, that I work on are not owned by Major corporations, for the most part, our deal size is usually 1 to 10 million. Okay. So you know, the major shopping centers, a lot of times those are dealt by the REITs are also dealing. But for the most part, the properties that I'm working on, they're family owned. Many, many, many times there are partners, but a lot of those partners might be family members as well.

How big is the shopping center? How many square feet would it typically be?

My average size deal is 5 to 10,000 square feet. Wow, man. These are not huge shopping centers. These are five to 10, you know, these are five to 10 stores. Two million to five million is probably most of the transactions that we do. I'm very structured in how we approach every single transaction. I really don't like to deviate from doing a broker opinion of value. I want everybody to study the comps. I don't want anybody's opinion or what happened 100 years ago what they think happened. Let's dig in. For all of us to have complete transparency, to understand all the comps, to really dig in, understand the value and have us decide based upon the comps, have us decide based upon what really is transparent, the value of the building. Now I'm going to outperform that building. Nobody hires me to, you know, bring in market values. They hire me to outperform the market. So we got to figure out how to outperform the market. But we really need to understand the value first. We never skip that step. First thing is we have a full understanding of the broker opinion of value. So my 44 page broker opinion of value also has a, has a listing timeline. It does usually take us on average, Ginny, from, from bringing in the information and signing, you know, the agreement to get us up and running. It takes us six weeks to typically find a buyer for most properties. Takes us a month and a half. That's six weeks.

Is it usually someone that lives right there?

Yes.

Really?

Yes, yes, yes, it is somebody. It is typically. It's usually not the shopping center owner that everybody thinks is going to be buying it. As I mentioned to you earlier, while it used to be a lot more relationship based, being I picked up the phone or I sent a text, I mean text that didn't exist, or I sent a fax, you know, message. It is reactionary. We buy premium spots right now by reactionary, we're working on Crexi, which is a website, my own website, aiprops.com, loopNet, costar. We buy premium listings. I believe our information is in our marketplace is the most professional. We don't have anything missing. Our OMs are typically 25 pages filled with really concrete information about the properties. So my job is to communicate with, professionally, accurately and well with the market. So I want people to know if they look at one of our listings on the market, you know, on, online, or one of our offering memorandums, it's accurate. It's accurate, you know, so that is a major, major stumbling block I see with other firms. And while it's not faxes anymore and maybe not outgoing phone calls to sell buildings, it's still, it's still, you know, we are really in touch with the sellers and our job is to outperform the market, is to figure out ways, spend nights and weekends to figure out who's going to pay a little more.

And are they usually getting debt on it?

Debt? I thought you said dead. No, we have mostly live buyers. Sorry, a little bit of humor for me. No. And are they getting debt?

Yeah. 70%, 60%, 50.

I would say. Right. I would say that somewhere between 50 to 70% debt, you know, and that's, and that's a function of the marketplace. And I would say 60% of our deals are financed and the other 40% are all cash deals. He's saying all cash. Why wouldn't they use financing? 70, you'll see. I'm a percentage guy. 70% of all transactions in the United States of America are 1031 motivated. Somebody replacing another property to defer the capital gains taxes.

1031, section 31.

Yes, tax section 1031 of the IRS code.

Did you get that statistic from somewhere, the 70%?

I will find out where I got it from. But yes, when you're a commercial real estate broker, you know, 1031 transactions represent a big portion of your Life. So yes, 1,000%, I did get that. And I'm very confident that, you know, 70% of all transactions are somebody selling a property and saying, hey, I want to defer my capital gains taxes. And you know, I sold this, let's just say smaller multi family, you know, investment property for two and a half million and I want to take that money and go buy myself a 10 million dollar asset. And you know, it's more unique thing.

It'S a great thing, it's very powerful. I, I'm in the middle of one myself, but I hadn't ever heard that statistic. And I, I'm, I'm wondering if, if that many actually know what the program is. It startled, it startled me. But I, because I'm Starting to represent this company as a 1031 person. But, but I haven't gone through all the training as yet.

So it's like just stay very close to the 1031 intermediary. Ask the rules. And you know, there's really two main rules. 45 days to name three properties, 180 days to close. But there are a million rules. So definitely speak to the 1031 intermediaries. They're used to it. It's every day for them.

Yeah, right. And it. I can't believe I didn't do it before, but that's terrific. So. And then you have a unique specialty, a unique skill. Why don't you tell everybody about that?

Which unique skill? You mean interpersonal communication or.

Yeah, that's, that's the one.

Yeah. I wrote a book. Yeah, no, I wrote a book. It's called Power Broker how to be Successful in Business and Life. And it's really and truly think that it's because I'm a dad. I fundamentally believe that 85% of your financial success, 85% of your financial success is due to your skill in human engineering, in the personality to an ability to lead people. Dale Carnegie said that. He said about 15% of one's financial success is due to their technical knowledge. 85% is human engineering personality. You know, and being able to lead other people.

I, I have to agree that. And, and the rise of, of Masterminds the last 10 years has been unbelievable.

Right.

And I think that's really helping people to zero in on that more and more too. Do you have, do you, do you lead some groups too? I think you mentioned you do coaching.

Well, I'm a student. I'm a student. Yes. I am a student of the Massimo group. I've been a student. There's. And yeah, the bottom line is, is that I really embrace being a student. And no, I've never been a coach, but you know, LinkedIn has been a great way for me to. About a year ago I wrote my book and I started to really share on a daily basis what I believe the keys to success are things like 85% is due to, you know, to human engineering. And I wrote this book and truthfully, I've grown really from a couple of hundred people, maybe 200 followers to. I believe it's about 15,000 right now in a year.

Amazing.

So, yeah, it's amazing, it's fun and I'm really enjoying. Thank you. Yeah, no, I'm enjoying it. At age 60, I feel like I'm a young guy. I Feel like I'm halfway through my career because I want to work, you know, for many years to come. I enjoy it.

Wow, that's great. And you have young kids. Tell people how old your kids are.

Oh, man. I'm a 60 year old dad with a 10 year old. With an 11 year old. Chase turned 11 and a 12 year old. It's the most fun thing ever. I'm so happy about that.

They are. I was a late mom too, but okay. Yeah, it's great. It. It is. So, as I say to everybody towards the end, because we're going to have to wrap this up, is there pivotal person or event that brought you either to where you are now or that's propelling you towards something in particular?

Well, I think that, you know, one of my favorite baseball players of all time is Johnny Bench. Old baseball player, has been retired probably for 40 years. He said, you know, no man disappoints their dad. I was like, wow. Yeah. I think that my dad was very pivotal for myself and my brother. I mentioned that my brother's an outstanding commercial real estate attorney down in Miami. And, you know, I am a top tier commercial real estate broker. Yeah. I think that my father, you know, had a lot to do with our success. I think that he lived a very. He's 89 years old, doing great down in Florida, and I think he lived a very structured life. And I think that he anticipated and communicated beautifully to myself and my brother that he expected great results from us. I don't think. I think, as Johnny Bench said, we don't disappoint our dad. So I think he was the pivotal person in my life. I wouldn't be surprised if, you know, if you heard that. I heard recently somebody asked, you know, Tom Brady, small boy, said to him, you're everybody's hero. You're the great, greatest quarterback of all time. Who's your hero? And he cried. He said, my father's my hero. He cried. He said, my father's my hero and always be my hero. I think that, you know, I understand that sentiment. I think people along the way take on roles. You know, I think that people along the way may have somebody who's taken on a father role for them as a man, that's very important. You know, it may not be their actual dad, but they, you know, someone comes along. I. I recently went to a wedding of somebody who worked for me, and the mother got up and said, ron. She called me Mr. Ron, said, Mr. Ron, thank you for taking my son. And I didn't see this coming and great, you know, great, you know, great, you know, you know, he found himself accountable to me. Go figure, you know?

So where is your dad located in Florida?

Oh, Aventura. Aventura. Yeah. Aventura, Florida.

The land of shopping centers, right?

That's right. That's right. That's right. You have a lot more shopping.

Still doing any transactions?

No, not anymore. He is the owner of a few properties, but he really is, at this point, close to 90. Very retired. Yeah, very retired.

So part of this program where we do Pivotal people, local legends and pivotal people, It's a series that we do. If you want to do a shout.

Out to him, my father, Milt Konigsberg. I am my brother, Jay Konigsberg, Florida people. Yeah. Well, my brother is a dynamic. He is a dynamic commercial real estate attorney down in Miami. And, you know, my dad is a real estate owner and really retired at this point, so.

What's your dad's first name?

Milton. Milton. Milton Konigsberg. Yeah. That's certainly.

So sometimes we just do like a hashtag or an at and get them, give them some attention, some love. Right. But if they want to come on the show, then they actually get a lapel pin. If they're like the movers and shakers you're describing, that says they're a pivotal person.

I would be glad to get back on. My brother's time is so hard to get, but, man, I'd love to be on a podcast with my dad. His brain is incredible. I don't think think that anything changes when it comes to, you know, interpersonal skills. I think his interpersonal skills are amazing. I think that he's an excellent, you know, salesperson in that he really understands listening and he understands how to really be of service.

Well, let's do it. Let's go ahead and get him on. If you want to even get your brother too, but it's up to you, and that would be awesome.

I agree. Get him the. I would love that.

All the appreciation, too, because I'm sure he's helped a lot of people to make a lot of money.

Certainly. Absolutely. No, he's. He ran a big corporation and, yeah, he pivoted us. No question about it.

Okay, well, let's make it happen. Very good. All right, well, thank you so much for coming on. Tell people how they can get in touch with you, and we'll put it in the show notes as well.

Absolutely.

Some people are just listening, so you may want to spel.

Sure. My name is Ron Konigsberg. It's you really and truly, I think I, you know, we really put out great content Every day on LinkedIn we share with the business community. That's Ron R o N Konigsberg. K O E N I G S B E R G Please check us out on you know me there and AI props, I have a landing page for Ron koenigsberg dot com. My book is Power how to Be Successful in Business and in Life. And yeah, I hope to be doing this for 40 more years.

I know. It's in my blood too. I just turned 67 and it's like, yeah, I can do a lot more.

You got 40 more years than you. I do.

All right. Very good. Well, thank you. And I'll leave it to you to make arrangements for that. That would be awesome to have the great.

I'll be in touch. Jenny, I would love. Thank you.

Very good.

Thanks again.

Sure. Bye.

Bye.