63: Pivot With Adam Gordon

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This is Real Estate Investing Live from New York with James Nelson, the principal.

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Now, here is your host, James Nelson. Happy New Year and welcome to show.

Number 63 of real estate Investing Live from New York. This is your host, James Nelson. And wow, we just keep rolling and we all know how challenging last year is and certainly we've got our work cut out for us this year as we find our way back from this pandemic. But I think in speaking to people, investors, everyone is so optimistic about the future and coming back. And that's what the show is a lot about. When you listen to the interviews, some of these legends in the business and how they faced hardship, how they've overcome adversity, and, you know, look, there's the old adage, if it was easy, everyone would be doing it. But what you're listening to, what you're hearing about are the skills that are going to help you become a successful investor. And today, guest is no exception at all. Adam Gordon, who I've known for close to 20 years, will be coming on the show. He is president and managing partner of Wildflower. And I named this episode Pivot because that's exactly what Adam has done throughout his career. And it's just amazing to me how he has always been at the forefront of the hottest trends and, you know, started in the storage business, then he's done high end single families and now he has been focusing on logistics. And it is amazing to me that he's been able to shift and study and become ahead of the game, so to speak. And so I think for many of you who are looking to reinvent yourselves and figure out what to focus on for the new year, I think you're going to get a ton out of this episode. And lastly, before we go to the break, I just want to give a shout out and a thank you to one of our loyal listeners, Ian from New York. And I just want to read part of this email because this was just so gratifying to me and why, really why I'm doing this. He says, hi, James, I'm a new addict to your podcast and wanted to drop you a quick thank you for what you're putting out there for people like me. I caught the real estate bug post undergrad and became obsessed with the built environment after exploring the different sub markets at New York City and reading some books. Skyscraper Dreams I think was the one that did it for me. He didn't have a finance or real estate degree and I'm paraphrasing here because I don't want to reveal his identity, but he talks about how he started off as a residential broker. Now he's working as a broker in one of the big publicly traded shops and he does say that it's been a challenge for him and a struggle, especially working for commissions, but he is optimistic about investing and one day creating his own account. He said, I've gotten used to getting back up and pushing onwards no matter the adversity of face and what I admire about your podcast is that you highlight these types of stories, sweat equity, hustle, curiosity and passion. So I just wanted to thank you and tell you what you doing refreshes ambitions for people like me and inspires us often. So Ian, that was really cool. I really appreciate you reaching out to me. And Ian just emailed me at jamesperiodnelson@avisonyoung.com Look, I'm a real person. You can email me, you can even call me on my cell phone. 917-362-1485 Shoot me a text, email me, make sure and link in with me through social media channels. It's James Nelson NYC. You can find me on Instagram, on LinkedIn, on Twitter, follow Me I'm here as a resource. I'm here to help you out. I want you to become as successful as possible. So you know, please reach out to me directly. And lastly, don't forget to leave a review. You know, subscribe to my podcast whether it's on itunes, Spotify, wherever you're getting this, leave reviews. Tell your friends. Really appreciate it. It's what helps spread the word. So with that, we're going to take a brief word from our sponsor and we will get right back to that interview with Adam Gord.

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And now it's time for our investor Spotlight and with us today, I'm thrilled to have my good friend Adam Gordon who is President and Managing Partner of Wildflower Limited And Adam was born in New York City and he graduated from the University of Michigan with a BA in International Relations with high honors and then earned an MBA in Finance from the Wharton School. He has long been a committed environmentalist and served as the Director's Cabinet at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. His residential projects have been widely published. After Wharton, Adam worked at Trammell Crow. In 1990 he purchased property in the Bucktown area of Chicago and a factory outlet village in Manchester, Vermont. Propelling his career as a developer, Adam began a pattern of identifying capitalizing on early entrants into emerging real estate strategies, urban mixed use, luxury factory outlets, urban infill, self storage, E commerce and vertical film studios. Throughout the years, there's been a continuous thread of classic automotive restoration and eventing. Adam's passion for these events has culminated in a trophy at pebble beach, so we'll have to ask him about that. In addition to his role as a developer, Adam is collaborating on a series of various agricultural projects. He's spoken on real estate, alternative energy and entrepreneurship at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, Wharton Business School, Columbia, NYU and Dartmouth. Welcome Adam. Thank you so much for joining us.

Good to be here. Good morning.

Wow. Looking forward to hearing your story. I've got to say, you are truly the modern day Renaissance man. So let's start from where it all began. What was it like growing up in New York?

Interesting. I'm a fourth generation New Yorker, but my dad moved me to of all places, Ohio, where I spent most of my childhood. And I very much had the sense of being an outsider there. You know, I'm not culturally in Ohio and my mom's got a Brooklyn accent. We eat bagels and great Chinese food and we would go back to visit all of our family in Ohio, I mean in New York a few times a year. So growing up in Ohio, I tend to immerse myself in things that I was curious about. And from a very early age that was natural history and the environment. I worked at the local natural history museum, I worked at the Audubon Society. And then later when I turned 16, it was cars. Cars in the beginning for me were two things. It was a way to get out of the house. And then I like to go fast. And it was also scratching an early business itch I had, which was to have some pocket change because I really didn't have any. And so I used to buy and sell cars, restoring them and fixing them up and hopefully turning a profit. Wow.

Like I said, that's a huge variety of interests. You've got environmentalism on one side and race cars on the other. But now it's all making sense. So you studied, you ended up with an international relations degree. So in high school, did you think you wanted to go into foreign affairs, politics? What piqued your curiosity there?

You know, you grow up in the household and you have the ideas that you have. And although my father read the New York Times every day and insisted that I do so, you know, there's a sense of the wider world. But then I also had the field of view or the frame that I had. And you know, my dad said, okay, you go and you study and then you become a lawyer. And then from a lawyer you go into business, because that was sort of what people did and what he did. And there was sort of a path set out. But as I studied and learned and experienced life a little bit, I found that the path that was set out for me wasn't necessarily the path to happiness. So I spent a summer working as an intern, or they used to call it a court runner at a law firm in Dayton, Ohio. And at lunchtime I would sell salad and herbalized tea from a mobile vending cart called La Salad. And I had a big rainbow on there. And not only did I hate the job working at a law firm, and I noticed very quickly that everybody seemed quite miserable, but also I loved being an entrepreneur and going out there and pitching my salads. And I was making more money at lunch in an hour and a half than I was making the whole day. So I quit the job and sort of quit the idea that I was ever going to become a lawyer.

You know, I really like the fact that you tried different things out and some of those internships actually informed you of what you didn't like doing. And that was certainly my case during one of my college summers. I ended up working for one of these big US corporations in the auto business. And I mean, it was really plush. There was golf outings, you know, a couple times a week. But there wasn't that opportunity to really do something creative. And so I'm glad I had that experience. But it was short lived and really informed the future. So that's great. You could figure it out. But the salad business, did you ever have thoughts that maybe that would grow into something bigger or was that really just helping pay the way?

I learned a lot about the fragility of businesses through two little entrepreneurial ventures. I had the salad business. I sold after the first year to a buddy of mine. I found my marketing tool was a friend of mine who was really attractive. And so she was sort of an early influencer of people coming in to buy salad. The friend that I sold it to would show up in army fatigues. It's hard to make these things up. And the business totally tanked. I had another business with my best friend. So my last name is Gordon. His last name is Mayerson Gourmet Enterprises, your complete party helpers. So Mark and I would go over and do catering and light bartendings, which consisted of Mark doing the work and me talking to the husbands about my future. So we built that business up until we got so busy we outsourced it to another buddy of mine. And I probably shouldn't be telling this story, but it was a pool party and it was bartending set up, and we had this great business chugging along, and Tommy was standing behind the bar and he saw a guy put his arm around Tommy's mother who was at the party. And Tom ran from behind the bar and threw the guy in the pool. Tommy was a big guy. And that was in one second, the end of gourmet enterprises. So brands are fragile, and I learned early on, but I never really had any fear of starting businesses and failure. What I did learn, though, is because I didn't have a lot of capital being very risk managed. And it's something that I think about to today. So we don't take wild risks in the work that we do.

You know, it's amazing that you had that entrepreneurial spirit. I just finished Guy Raz's book, How I Built this, which is me too.

Loved it.

Yeah, fabulous read. And one of my favorite podcasts. And he talked about early on a lot of these great business visionaries. When they started out, entrepreneurship wasn't a thing. Today, everyone knows what that is. But, you know, having the, you know, the confidence to start a business during that time, I'm sure what was certainly unique. So is that how you ended up then at Wharton? Did you say, okay, I've tried my own business, I want to try to do something more institutional, if you will. Was that when you applied to business school?

I spent two years working after college, and it was immediately clear to Me and everybody that worked with me that I lacked any skills of used to business in a serious way. So after a couple of years out, I applied to the schools and was fortunate enough to gate admission to Wharton. When I got there, I assumed that I was going to go into bankruptcies, turnarounds and workouts, which is what I did in this between my college and business school experience. But one day we were broke. So we used to go after classes to these seminars, and people would come in from all over the world to teach you about their business and hopefully recruit you if you were an interesting candidate. We used to go not only to listen to that, but we used to go because they used to serve free food and cocktails. So one of those evenings I went and there was a company with this funny sounding name, Travel Crow. And I didn't know anything about real estate, but this is the very early days of a PowerPoint like presentation where they would come up and they put slides. Don't join us unless you want to be a millionaire. Make partner in three years. And I, you know, I kind of raised my hand, I said, you know, those things sound pretty good, so sign me up. Yeah, sign me up. And so Trammel, pro at that time, based out of Dallas, would hire a certain kind of, you know, brown shoe guy in a good way. And I didn't fit those molds at all. You know, I was a little more. A little more of sort of a street savvy entrepreneur. And so they looked at me and they said, there's no way we're hiring you. And I went on a Friday. Trammel had opened a little office in New York City. And I took the train and I went into their office and I said, look, you know, I'm at Wharton. I'm a finance major. Let me work for you for free. And at the end of the summer, if I'm worth more than nothing, pay me, because I could use the money. If I'm not worth it, then you haven't lost anything. You probably get a little bit of leverage. And they hired me, and that was how I started my real estate career.

Wow. I hope for those of you listening, I know we have a lot of college students who unfortunately are about to go into this job market after this pandemic. And it's tough, but listen to what Adam just had to say. Putting yourself out there and maybe working for free is not the ideal, but it's about that experience, getting that opportunity and showing that you work hard. So that's tremendous that you did that. Now you said, was that in Chicago where you did one of your first real estate deals or did that come later?

That came later. So I worked for Trammell in New York for the summer. Then they invited me down to headquarters in Dallas. You know, spectacular company. I learned a tremendous amount. Dallas wasn't for me and I had the realization that where you live was important. And I wanted to get back to New York City, which has always been my home and you know, will always be my home. So I went to work as 80s Wharton grads tended to do in investment banking. And I would say short of being in a monsoon followed by a car wreck, it's probably the least attractive way you can spend your time. So I was really eager to get out of that environment. I was never going to be a good investment banker because giving people advice I didn't believe in and watching my bosses live in abject terror for the next bonus and jockeying for political position, a whole series of like very bad tribal conditions. So I got approached by a couple of guys who were doing deals in Chicago who needed a little bit of financial insight. And not that I had it, but they believed I had it. So I got a couple of partnership interest and deals in Bucktown in the renovation world. And I went in and saw what they were doing so I did a few deals with them. Then my family had relocated to Vermont and I saw this burgeoning factory outlet store market and I saw guys were building these buildings, but then I saw these shopping centers that had very, very low rents. And I thought, gee, if I can buy out the tenants or wait out the tenants and then take these low rent paying shopping centers for a low price per square foot and put in high rent paying factory outlet tenants, the numbers are going to work. And that's what I did. So I bought a. My first property was $55 a foot and I signed my first lease at $30 a foot net. And you can do the math. And so at 29, I hit the. In my mind back then being broke, I hit the jackpot.

How did you raise first of all that idea? I mean first of all that community and you've got a lot of people who, some are up there, they go up there to stay and ski and it's a beautiful community. So to kind of tap into that demographic and recognize that need that was under serviced, very, very smart. How did you raise the money to buy that first deal if you were still living on odds and ends?

My last bonus from Bear Stearns was $100,000. So it was approximately 60 grand after tax. And I worked off of my dining room table and I kind of net net made a tiny bit of money in Chicago. So I took that money and kind of tried to live off of it. And when I signed the lease with a tenant to take all the vacant space in the first shopping center that I bought, and I was under contract but not closed, I then took the lease and the contract to 42 banks. And at that time, you had to go physically to the bank. So I went to every bank in the region. Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, upstate New York. And I got 41 turndowns for all the reasons that a good banker should. I had no experience, no capital, and no business doing this deal. But then finally, in Manchester, Vermont, I found a banker named Chet Andrews, who I'll always be grateful to. And Chet took a chance and loaned me essentially 100% of the capital to buy the deal. And that's, you know, that's what got me started.

Wow, I am so glad that you shared that and not taking no for an answer. And 42 visits to the bankers and not giving up, I'm sure a lot of people in that situation would have just thrown in the towel. So that's a real testament. And I'm sure what, as you said, set you up for success in the future.

So I think it's what you associate pain and pleasure with. So for me, I always had a sense from a very young age that I had to get out of Dodge, like I had to get out of Ohio. And when you're broke, as I was, and I don't want to use a sort of fancy term, you know, limited capital or not, you know, whatever it is, not well capitalized, I was broken, and so I had no downside. And so for me, I knew I had to get it done. I was striving for financial security and I was going to just do whatever it took without any fear of failure.

Really, really appreciate your sharing that. And I would have to think and imagine, out of all of our aspiring investors who listen to this show, I would think the number one thing holding them back is a fear that they don't have the capital, they don't have the ability to jump in. And so you're a great power of example there and really appreciate your sharing how you made that happen. So after the factory outlets, did you decide that? Were you all in on real estate from there? Were you looking for your next factory outlet? Where did you go from there?

So I was involved in the factory outlet store business. Vermont is notoriously anti development, anti business, anti growth. It's very contentious there. And I got involved in that. I made as many mistakes as you could make on every side of the business. But in the process I learned. I owned, operated, managed, did all the construction on my properties, handled all the financing. I didn't have partners. So I was able to kind of make, make my mistakes and have a long term vision and reinvest in the properties. But I saw that I was going to be limited by the size of the market. And so I was sitting down with a guy who was at a REIT that wanted to buy one of these shopping centers. And I was just curious, I said, sort of, you know, what else is interesting out there? What new businesses are there? And he said, well, you know, funny, my brother is starting a self storage company in New York City. And I said, what is self storage? I never used it, I didn't know anything about it. So he took me over to see his first development. It was American Self Storage and what became Storage Deluxe. And I looked at that and I thought, this is super interesting. And so I went to StorageUSA, it was one of the most active developers and I went to one of their directors of acquisition and we went out and had a chat and I said, let's start a business together. Let's develop in New York City because this works. I need an industry guy. I've got some finance expertise. And your, your career is going to go in one of two directions. Either you're going to do it and it's going to work and you'll be thrilled, or it's not going to work and you can go back to your old job. But if you don't do it, you're never going to know. And a fellow named Steve McKnight and I started Madison Development with that premise in mind.

And what was the first deal that you did together? And tell us how you were able to capitalize that.

So the first deal that Steve and I did together was in Hollis, Queens, all the way out in Eastern Queens. And it was the redevelopment of a grocery building. And we brought it in, we financed it with a buddy of mine from business school had joined a family office and he put up about 102% of the capital for Steve and I. I had a little grub stake for my business, but they essentially invested the capital. StorageUSA, Steve's old company, managed it. The former director of construction from Storage USA was our essentially contractor partner that came in for a piece of the business. And we learned along the way. And then Steve and I grew and a couple of years later sold our first portfolio for I think just under $100 million. Wow. Then from that point, Steve and I had sort of proven ourselves to the investment community. In that process. We kind of learned to build at scale in New York City. And then Steve and I met over lunch during the recession. We had sold our portfolio not because we had any great insight or inspiration, but also, but really more because there weren't opportunities. So we kind of stopped. We stopped through the recession and then we came out of the recession, 2011 and started developing again.

Amazing. I'm still thinking about that first deal where the family office gives you not 100%, 102%. So they're contributing towards the construction and the fees as well. So how do you convince them that they should finance basically the entire project and what's in it for them?

I think people have to recognize that the value in the deal is the deal first and foremost. And the world is awash with capital. But finding solid sponsors who really understand their business plan. So my partner Steve was an expert in self storage. Our construction partner had built over 200 facilities. Having real expertise, having a sound and thoughtful business plan, having a significant margin for error in your numbers, which I don't see very often when people bring me deals. So having a wide margin and then presenting that plan with clarity and integrity and being very candid with potential financial sources about the ingredients for the recipe you need. If you need cash, be honest about it. If you need guarantees, help them understand it. Because people really appreciate when the bluster goes away and people just approach the entire process with integrity.

Amazing advice. That's fantastic. So I'm trying to think, when we met, it was probably close to 20 years ago and by then I guess you had transitioned into ultra high end single family homes in the West Village. So. You know what amazes me most about your story is about how you've been able to pivot. So you've already done outlet malls in Vermont, then you come to New York and do self storage. And I guess the next chapter was doing high end single families, Is that correct?

I was doing that at the same time, James. So I define myself as an entrepreneur approaching real estate now in New York City. I don't approach myself as the storage guy or the multifamily guy or the townhouse guy, but I get curious about things at all scale. So I've always been fascinated by design. And while I was doing the storage, I had a separate business redeveloping these townhouses because I frankly get obsessed about design and the way people live. And when my first son was born, we bought a loft down in Soho, and I had a big this before Pinterest, I had a big book of clippings from Architectural Digest and World of Interiors and El Decor and House Beautiful. And so I worked and designed this property, and when it came time to sell, did really well. And that was not just a function of the market, but for whatever reason, people appreciated the design. And I thought, this is pretty good. I should do this again. And so I did another townhouse, and that was successful. And I kept going. And then, you know, we were able to achieve a number of price records because the level of thought and care and refinement in the. That we brought with something people appreciated. I also was, you know, in the residential world, was fortunate enough to meet Steven Harris. So when I started doing my first townhouse project, I went around to see all the townhouses in the market. I mean, I obsessively do research about whatever it is I'm involved in, whether it's a car or a transaction or a new business opportunity. I love to learn, and I'm just super curious. And there were three townhouses that were really the ones that I felt not only understood aesthetics, but also design and understood how to best utilize space. Stephen Harris designed all three, and so I called him up and that began a collaboration, which was over many, many projects together. So I'm really grateful for Steven, as much as anything, teaching me the business the way Steve taught me the storage business. Yeah.

And I can certainly give a testament firsthand, seeing some of your work and the attention to detail. Now, you did mention risk earlier on in your story, and I would many investors, if you're specking a single family home, that could be perceived as the riskiest investment. Right. Because there's only one way out. Once you've bought at a certain basis, you've told me what it costs to renovate these homes. There's really only one way out, which is selling it for a premium price as opposed to a rent. So how did you think about risk when you went out and executed on these projects?

So, I mean, my view of risk has evolved over time for a variety of reasons. At that moment, when I started in the townhouse business, to give you an example, I bought my first deal on East 81st street off Park Avenue for $1.4 million. The price per pound, when you're down in the low $200 foot range, was a fraction of what apartments cost. And there was also because the luxury condo market hadn't really arrived and the townhouse conversion market hadn't arrived because I was really early in it. You had a great comp set and you were far below replacement cost. And so I was building into a market with a tremendous amount of room. When I bought Jane street, for example, which sold for nearly $14 million, I bought that for $3 million. Now that house today, unrenovated, would probably cost nearly three times that. So the, the margin for error isn't, isn't there anymore. And that's one of the many reasons I don't do townhouses. But I agree with you. We're. We're much more diversified and scaled and we lease, for example, in the storage business to thousands of tenants. So you don't have that same sort of binary outcome. I also have found over time the condominium business and the townhouse business, it's about timing and fashion, which aren't really very useful business strategies. And so I haven't done a residential project except for personal ones in five or six years and do not ever intend to go back.

Timing is such a big component of success in this business and you always seem to get ahead of the game. You see where the next opportunity is. And so with that, maybe talk a little bit about Wildflower and when you set that up and what the business plan was there.

Sure, when we came out of the recession, we knew we wanted to build with scale. And Steve and I have been a great team for 20 years, but we needed to build out that team. And so I began kind of search for a cfo. I was fortunate enough to meet Matt Dicker, who was at Canyon for many years and had not only the personality and temperament on the capital side, but the experience and outlook. So Matt joined me. Over time, Steve enjoyed a lot of success. And so Matt and I decided to form Wildflower together to think about other opportunities for impact in New York City. So we formed Wildflower really specifically first to begin an E Commerce, but then also to get involved in other social impact projects like community solar and other things.

So I'm trying to think what year this was. I mean, E Commerce was already ratcheting it up. Did you just know this was here to stay? Because it seems like to me, I mean, now logistics is at the top of every institutional investor's wish list. Did you just see an opportunity that no one else was focusing on or how did you know that it was your time to make a move into this sector? So.

I'm reading obsessively just because it's what I want to do. I don't feel like it's a homework assignment. And if you read the New York Times on a daily basis, you will see what's happening out in the world. And I saw, and it was very, very clear to me that Amazon and the rise of E commerce was coming to New York City. It wasn't there, but it was going to come. And when I started researching further in the industry, what was also clear was that the old building typology, the old warehouses, did not work for the new uses. Just like in storage, where we could build ground up much more efficiently and profitably than doing renovations, the old buildings did not work at all. And so we went to our largest partner in the storage business, Prudential, and I remember very vividly, Matt and I sat down with Todd Goldberg, the head of Northeast, who we adore, and we said, hey, Todd, we want to do this project as a pivot. We want to pivot into E commerce, into warehouses. And Todd said, look, you guys are the storage guys. Stick to what you know. And we said, well, we're not the storage guys. We're the real estate guys. And this opportunity is, I mean, to us is so obvious, and it's so much bigger than Storage could ever be. Well, long story short, Prudential didn't back us. Someone else did. Amazon has leased two full city blocks from us. We're now, I think, Amazon's most active developer in New York City. And every Hanukkah, we send Todd Goldberg a card from the storage guys in front of one of our buildings. And we're still good friends.

I'm sure he'll be back in your next venture. So do you become a victim of your own success? I mean, I would imagine that there's so many developers now looking to jump into this space. My understanding is there's very few opportunities in New York. I mean, look, we're densely populated and built, so to find these types of footprints, it can be challenging. And I would imagine as a result, it's become very, very expensive. So are you now experiencing that same point where I guess with your single family home business, where you were looking at the profit margin saying, wow, this is starting to look a little thin. And if so, are there other asset classes that you're now starting to think about?

We're acutely aware that this is a window just the same way that FedEx and UPS built out their distribution networks over decades. Amazon is doing this with unprecedented speed. But it's not an infinite opportunity. And there are relatively few properties which actually conform to all of the specifications that they need to, to, to be interested in a site. We've done seven deals this year. Will we do seven deals next year or the year after? I don't know. We have a substantial off market pipeline that we've built. We also get our share on market, which is, you know, a small share like everybody else. But what we always do is we're always very, very focused and not either buying marginal assets or overpaying for the assets that we buy. We're very comfortable not doing deals and more often than not, we're the second or third or fourth guy in because people come out guns blazing that know very little about the business. They know very little about what it costs to build in New York City. And then they get into due diligence and there's this, this huge whoops moment after which the broker or the lender or the seller come back to us and say, hey, are you guys interested at the bid you put in? And that's not emotional for us. But I think the other part is we have a city in trouble and there's a lot of important problems to solve. And if we take our business minds and help solve the problems and see a lot of similarities, and I'm not pontificating, but I'm having been out in the boroughs when people didn't want to invest there 20 years ago, investing back in these communities is really critically important. And there's so many rewarding opportunities to do so. And not just rewarding financially, but just rewarding in terms of having impact. We did the largest community solar project in the Bronx on Zaraga Avenue. We've done four or five others. We're continuing that business and that is equally important to anything else that I'm doing. I think the other part of it.

Is that on how that works, the community solar program.

Sure. Well, storage buildings, industrial buildings have large roofs and that roof is real estate. And that real estate can be leased out. It can be leased out to a tenant and the tenant can use the power. It can be shared among members of a community who don't own roofs, people who live in apartment buildings that they can receive discounted electricity or can go to other off takers, but we have these large roofs. It's great for the environment, it's obviously clean energy. And so we've been particularly focused on, you know, reducing the marginal energy expense for people who live and work in the communities where we invest. And so this Community solar project again. You know, you sort of take a rooftop and then you divide up the benefits of the energy among subscribers who live in that market area.

That's fantastic. Now, it's really interesting, your commitment also to the environment. And in the intro I was talking about how you're passionate about oceanography. Maybe talk about how that happened. And I guess I don't know if there's any parallels to the real estate business, but I guess, do you think about building sustainably? How does that all factor in? How does it all tie together?

I wanted to be a marine biologist or a field ecologist, and that wasn't happening in the household that I grew up in. So I had my work at the Museum of Natural History, feeding the raccoons and all the other things that they let kids do. And I had seven fish tanks in my bedroom where I was doing all these breeding experiments. And I just stayed close to that world. I was fortunate enough to get involved at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and get to spend time with real scientists talking about and learning about the problems and solutions that are facing the planet. We have a ranch in Northern California which we have converted over to all organic ranching and raising 100% Japanese Wagyu beef for local Michelin star restaurants. And I just, I get a kick out of it. And in a, you know, tiny way, I want to give back to that community.

That's really cool.

Wow.

So just for our listeners, thinking about where the next opportunity is, because you've got an incredible track record of kind of finding the asset class, the business plan, and without, you know, sharing the secret sauce. But I mean, are we kind of now getting to the point where everything's been done, where, whether it's co working, whether it's life sciences, I mean, you know, what, what's next for you? Or do you go back to the beginning and do something contrarian like going back to doing outlet malls? You know, I don't know what's next.

I'm honestly, I'm not contrarian at all. I mean, there are very basic trends and if we observe the trends, the opportunities will follow. And that's not just in a real estate sense. The aging of our population is creating tremendous opportunities. If, if you have an elderly parent and you're thinking about putting him in a place near you that you would be proud for him or her to spend their lives, it's quite difficult to find. Right. If you have a child, as I do, who are graduating from college and thinking about moving to New York and Finding the city unaffordable. The opportunities for not only affordable housing, but what you could call creative housing or micro housing are going to be tremendous around the country and around the world. I mean, we have a homeless problem, and a homeless problem is in part a housing problem. So there are really obvious opportunities. And if I and Wildflower wasn't involved with building a film studio and E commerce warehouses, we would definitely be looking at some of those other macro trends in the city and pursuing them.

Perfect. So what advice would you give to an aspiring investor looking to get into this?

I would say don't come into the business at all if you're an aspiring investor. If you're just coming in to make a lot of money and have a house in the Hamptons and Sagaponic and go to the ocean, it's a very difficult way to make a living. If, on the other hand, you feel compelled to make a difference, if you see opportunities and you feel like you have to get involved and you feel like you want to bring your skills to bear at whatever cost, then it's pretty interesting because we're in the middle of cycles. We have very kind of, I call baroque careers because in the course of a day I can be involved in marketing, management, finance, social, environmental. You know, I get to deal with all kinds of really fascinating people in the businesses they run. So it's a fabulous career if those are your goals. But I think that very often I'm meeting people who are either pitching towards finance or pitching towards consulting or pitching towards real estate just for what they perceive is going to be the tremendous return. And it's probably not going to work out. It's a fairly steep pyramid and this is a competitive place with a lot of very talented people. So, I mean, it's marrying that with a very pragmatic passion. I think also trying to find somebody who is highly skillful and shares your values and associating yourself with them very early in your career is life changing. Had I not met my partner Steve, or met Matt, or met Robert De Niro, I would not have had the opportunities that I've had. And so I've tried to capitalize on them. But I recognize that you've got to collaborate and work with really high quality people and teams if we're going to be successful in the business.

I really love that answer. And it's about passion, and I'm so glad that you said that. So I live in Greenwich, Connecticut and my kids, when they see the big house on the water and they say, oh, who Owns that. Oh, he's a hedge fund manager. Well, how about this one? He has a hedge fund too. And then you ask my kids, what do you want to do? Well, we want to become hedge fund managers. Well, do you even know what they do? And the point is, if it's just about, you know, what you think will make you the most money, that is certainly not a career path for success or more importantly, happiness. And so I'm really glad that you pointed that out.

I think the other part of it too, James, is I try to have my own life, not the life other people think I should have. And I also, I think it's really important to kind of bifurcate. So if you read Men's Journal, they say, well, if you love surfing, open a surf shop. I'm not so sure that's a great game plan, but invest the time to surf if that's what you love to do. I mean, for me, it's been having a close connection with nature, getting involved in these design projects, whether it's being involved in car projects and I've got a couple going on now, I've always had passion projects alongside my work. And I think it not only makes you a more interesting person, but it makes you definitely a much happier person.

So true. No, that's incredible advice. So I have to ask you before we end, tell us about the car that won in Pebble Beach. And haven't you been involved in some of these races? I don't know if they're the enduro kind of round the clock, but maybe tell us a little bit about that. Sure.

I've raced a Mille Miglia twice in Italy. I got to pebble beach because I was really totally taken with post war Italian design. And if you think about a design object that you can actually drive and get places in, whether it's any of the modern cars that we love, but particularly for me, the golden age of cars in the 50s, 60s and 70s, it can take you to Italy. And so I got to have the opportunity to purchase a one off Lamborghini Miura roadster, which is the only open Lamborghini Miura. And we went through an extensive restoration project and then brought that car to pebble beach where it hadn't been seen for over 40 years. So that was really, that was a total thrill for me and kind of like climbing Everest in the car world. But now the cars that I'm most interested in are actually old trucks. So I like Broncos and Defenders and that kind of utilitarian Americana and early English vehicles to cruise around and just have a good time.

That's awesome. Well Adam, this has been phenomenal. You've got an incredible story and I know the people listening are going to get a ton out of this. So just really, really appreciate your joining us today and sharing your thoughts.

I'm happy to. Thanks James.

Wonderful. This is your host, James Nelson of Real Estate Investing Live from New York. We'll have a quick word from our sponsor and we'll be right back.

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We'll talk again next week. Sam.