GI290: Selling Apartment Buildings with Joe Smazal

GI290: Selling Apartment Buildings with Joe Smazal

Joe Smazal is a multifamily broker in Chicagoland who has personally sold over 240 properties, comprised of over 5,300 units, valued at over $940 million, focusing primarily on apartment buildings worth over $2 million.

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Transcript:

Charles:
Welcome to another episode of the Global Investors Podcast. I’m your host, Charles Carillo. Today we have Joe Matsel. He’s a multi-family broker in Chicago Land who has personally sold over 240 properties comprised of over 5,300 units a value at over $940 million focusing primarily on apartment buildings worth over $2 million. So thank you so much for being on the show today, Joe.

Joe:
Pleasure to be here, man. Thanks for the invite.

Charles:
So you’ve been a broker for many years. Can you tell us a little bit prior to becoming a real estate broker a little bit about yourself, both personally and professionally, and what kind of drove you into real estate?

Joe:
Yeah, sure. I grew up in Iowa. I, my dad started in advertising business and then he was traveling a lot and ended up buying and operating a small business in, in Davenport, Iowa, in Bettendorf, Iowa is where I grew up. But I bring it up ’cause it taught me a lot about being an entrepreneur and the sacrifices that you have to take and, you know, he did that so he could be around the family more, but there was still a lot of stressful times and long hours for him. And you know, he taught himself a totally new business. So I learned a lot from him growing up, just observing what it takes to provide for a family. And then my mom you know, at the time she was a stay at home mom, but she was a seamstress as well.

Joe:
So she did like alterations and stuff for clothing and wedding dresses and that sort of thing. And she was hustling too, you know, every night, you know, when we were winding down or after we went to bed or whatever, she was like in the sewing room working. So you know, observed a lot from, from her as well about you know, the sacrifices that she made to be there for us and also, you know, contribute to our family’s livelihood. So anyway, I went to the University of Iowa. I didn’t really even like think about going anywhere else. I just, it was like an hour from home. It was a reasonable price. It, some of my friends were going, it felt like a cool place to go to school. I wasn’t, I was an okay student <laugh>, like b’s you know and wasn’t really my focus, like schoolwork wasn’t my focus of school, I felt like, and that carried through to Iowa.

Joe:
But I had an awesome time there. And then in a totally unoriginal series of events, I moved from a Big 10 school to Chicago, which is kind of a, it’s a beacon for, you know, ambitious people from the Midwest. So I moved to Chicago in 2009. It’s a crummy time to get a job. Took a job. I thought I wanted to do medical sales ’cause I didn’t, I just didn’t know. I just, it felt like a, I don’t even know why I thought that. It just felt like a cool job, felt like a job that, you know, you could be ambitious in and be rewarded for hard work.

Joe:
But nobody really wanted to hire somebody in medical sales that didn’t have any experience. So I ended up getting a, a job as like kind of an, they called it an account manager. It was like a hybrid between a sales guy and basically like a delivery guy for a a specialty hospital bed company. And the guy was an incredible entrepreneur. He was an inventor and I worked directly with the CEO who gave me a lot of opportunity. He saw a lot of, he just saw a lot of hustle in me. I was ambitious. I was eager to prove myself and was excited to be working too. I liked working more than I liked studying. So I, you know, I liked the idea of having an opportunity to make money and advance in a career. So I think he saw that in me and, you know, gave me a lot of opportunity to do kind of presentations and travel around the country.

Joe:
And then a few years after doing that, it just, like, you know, being a salesperson in in medical sales is kind of like a delicate dance where, you know, you’re you have a job to do and you have a role, but it’s also just you’re in the hospital or you’re in the nursing home a lot and it’s just kind of a grind. And it just overall didn’t feel like really what I wanted to do, like in 10 years. And I guess I had the foresight to see that if it wasn’t something I was gonna do kind of forever, I saw myself doing for, in the long run. It was easier to pivot back then before I was, you know, married and had kids and stuff. So that led me to explore getting into real estate.

Charles:
Interesting. And, you know, within real estate with the firm you’re working with now, but you worked at another firm prior, I believe. How did you kind of narrow your focus down to what your, what your asset class you’re focusing on within real estate? Because I mean, real estate has, there’s a dozen different asset classes that you can focus on, and I find the most successful people, especially brokers within the industry, have a very narrow fo focus of what they work on.

Joe:
Yeah. the truth is, I got lucky. You know, I didn’t I didn’t really know much about real estate when I, when I got into real estate other, and I didn’t even know much about Chicago. You know, now I drive around the city and I think I know every street. You know, I, but I didn’t know much about it, but I ended up interviewing with a few potential mentors at Marcus and Millichap which is a big national firm that a lot of people it’s a lot of great brokers that stay there for a long time. A lot of people learn there and some stay, some, some go. But I just, you know, there were three different mentors that I ended up talking to. And the one that I felt like I clicked with the most, the apartment buildings, there’s a guy named Jamie Klau, and he was a, you know, it just felt like kind of a good timing for both of us, for me to get involved.

Joe:
And this is in 2011, so you know, the, a lot of the gusto had been taken outta the brokerage community for the prior couple of years. You know, some people had been kind of weeded out because it was a tough time in the market. And some like senior guys just used it as a time to retire ’cause it was tough. And you know, it just ended up being a really good time for me to ramp up, you know, just like if you were an investor and bought something during that period, you know, being a broker who was working really hard at that time, it, you could get ahead because a lot of the brokerage community was kind of tired and market conditions were tough, but I didn’t know any better. So that was kind of a tangent, but to answer your question, I kinda lucked out to get into the apartment business, you know, now it’s something I, I’m an expert in and I specialize in, and I, you know, buy little apartment buildings. It practice what I preach. And I think that it’s a great vehicle for real estate investment long term. And it’s just something I know and I’ve always understood it, it just kind of clicked with me early.

Charles:
Yeah, it’s one of those things. I bought my first apartment building or multi-family property in oh six, and I remember buying, and again at the end of oh eight, and it was, I mean, like you say, people were weeded out. It was, I mean, oh 8, 0 9, there’s people that were full-time in oh six, beginning of oh seven, completely outta the business, completely different. Industries they’re in. Nothing to do with real estate. I mean, it just, the people that were, I found that were full-time in real estate that made it through in oh nine and 2010, they were like serious, you know, the true people that had built a business, you know what I mean? A client list that they were working with. And I had one real estate agent I was working with. And you know, he just, I mean, he had built over many years a business while so many us got what weeded out. I mean, he was still around ’cause he had a true business. The other ones were kind of just like, you know, flying by the sea pants and picking up what was, you know what I mean?

Joe:
Yeah. I to I think that there’s a, I think that there’s a big difference in brokerage for people that approach their brokerage practice as a business and people who approach it as, you know, they’re kind of chasing deals. And if you’re chasing deals, you’re very much at the mercy of market conditions and you can find a few deals that click and, you know, make, you know, make a good living doing it. But I generally think that that’s fleeting. I think you know, I’m, I’m approaching it as a very long-term business. So when market conditions aren’t as favorable, you know, it used you double down on, you know, kind of your front of the pipeline stuff and make sure that you’re still in front of your clients doing the right things and, and advising on, you know, their long-term investment decisions. I think when, when things are a little bit rocky is when good brokers and good investors you know, end up getting getting ahead more than when things are good.

Charles:
That makes sense.

Charles:
For Investors looking to purchase apartment buildings in, in Chicago or greater Chicago, I mean, what are some of the top considerations that they should be aware of when entering this, this market? This MSA

Joe:
You know, if it’s somebody that’s from outside of the city, I think, you know, knowing, starting with a geographic focus, I think is a good start. You know it’s a city of neighborhoods. Every neighborhood ends up being a little bit different has different, you know, demand drivers tenant preferences operational considerations. So I think really knowing what type of submarket that you want to be in is a good place to start. Because, you know, operating in Lincoln Park can be a lot different than operating in South Shore. And both of those neighborhoods have reasons to invest, but they end up just being kind of different considerations. So I think starting there within the neighborhoods, you know, I think understanding even who the aldermen or older women are and just the different kind of nuances that come with who the local politicians are in those areas and how that can influence a particular ward, I think is kind of the next level. But I’ll, I’ll stop there and that ramble too much. No,

Charles:
That makes sense. Is being, you know, super diligent and super informed on where you’re buying and I think that’s very, very important. When I start buying apartment buildings it was just small multifamily properties. It was like, for the first six years I self-manage ’em. And I had one area of this city in Connecticut that I was, I was living in, that I focus on and if you like, really saw a picture, if I saw a picture on Craigslist or something of a property, I have an idea of where it was because you just knew the street so well and you kind of knew where you were staying and you’re like, oh, that’s kinda like a little iffy over there for me. Don’t really like that too much, but if I ever spoke to a broker or something like that, you could like narrow it down to like, you know what I mean? Like exactly what works and then like what doesn’t work square footage wise, the whole nine yards, you know?

Joe:
Yeah. I mean, and then there are levels to it, you know, once you get into finding what type of neighborhood you’re looking for, you know, then it’s block by block, street by street. And then you’re really kind of fine tuning what type of property you want to own. I have a bias towards advising people to own, you know, to buy what they want to own for the longer term. ’cause I just think generally if you’re buying apartment buildings you end up, you fairing better if you’ve got kind of a longer hold period in mind. You’re less at, again, kinda less at the mercy of market conditions. So, you know, by the type of real estate you wanna own for a while.

Charles:
Yeah, that’s, that’s great advice. I think new investors get caught up on getting involved with short-term plays, I think with multifamily and getting debt, whereas if they just got, you know, longer term debt, it was a longer horizon, investment horizon they’d probably fare much better, I think. ’cause You know, yeah,

Joe:
I think like, I think just LinkedIn and the social media world in general, especially the last few years have influenced that a little bit. You know, you, you go on your, you know, your newsfeed or whatever they call it on LinkedIn, and it’s just like people talking about their IRR or their, you know, equity multiple after a couple years and like, it’s, it’s great if it goes that way, but you know, I just think generally approaching real estate investing as a longer term thing. And you know, as if you’re investing in real estate, I kinda like to look at it as like operating a business as opposed to just like making a passive investment. Even if you’re doing it with somebody else or, or you’re, you know, you have the party third party manager. I think it’s better to kind asset manage those investments and look at it as its own like kind of living, breathing business rather than, you know, investment, like, you know, buying a stock or something like that. Yeah.

Charles:
You’re definitely buying a business with whatever multi-family property you buy, you’re buying a business. I mean, that’s, that’s the only way you can really put it.

Joe:
Yeah, very much so. You know, there’s just like, and I think if you go in with that mindset, just like approaching brokerage as a business, going in with buying an apartment building as a business changes your perspective a little bit. And I think it you know, then you make sure that you allocate, you know, time the way that a business should use its bandwidth, you know, and in marketing and asset management, it just, it ends up being a different perspective and I think aligns the priorities of owning an apartment a little bit better than thinking about it as an investment. When

Charles:
You’re speaking to a potential client, I mean, how do you recognize serious investors from tire kickers, Joe?

Joe:
I think the, the first thing that came to mind when you said that was how quickly somebody talks about a cap rate. If they lead with, you know, I wanna buy a six cap, seven cap, eight cap, whatever then I think that there’s probably some more education to do, not necessarily that they’re not serious, but that you know, the cap rate on a, the, the type of apartment buildings I sell, in particular kind of mid-size apartment buildings and your cap rate, my cap rate, the next buyer’s cap rate the lender’s cap rate, the appraiser cap rate, everybody kinda looks at it differently. And your business plan going forward is much more impactful for the success of the investment than you know, what the seller’s cap rate is based on trailing financials. So I think understanding how quickly a cap rate can move based on how you’re underwriting a deal is really critical in apartment investing.

Joe:
And, you know, a lot of the clients I do a lot of business with, they know they’re, they’ll look at the sellers trailing financials to get a sense, you know, some don’t, but you know, they’re really looking at a rent roll. But more than that, they’re looking at the layout of the building, you know, the finishes of the units, what they’re gonna spend, if anything, what they’re gonna do going forward. And they’re much more concerned about what their cap rate is on a, on a going forward proforma than they are, you know, the seller’s historical operations. So the cap rate conversation is one that I think is generally pretty indicative of where we are and kind of the yeah, I don’t dismiss it as them being not serious, but I think if they’re quoting those early, it’s generally some education vault. Yeah,

Charles:
No, that makes sense. Can you, I mean, how, how cap rates are really found? I mean, how people establish it, right? Like you said, there’s all different parties and everybody has a different thinking of what it might be when someone asks you, what would you say as how someone would locate a the cap rate for an area? Is it looking at my past deals that are similar in that area, or I mean, what, what would you say? What is your answer to that?

Joe:
Yeah, I mean, I think the most important thing, however you end up underwriting it, is to make sure that it’s apples to apples. So when we’re looking at sales comps, we’ll do our best to get rent and expense information. And investors when we present a, an offering memorandum, there’s an expectation of some consistency in the way that they’re presented. So, you know, we’re gonna underwrite we’re gonna write underwrite two deals, you know, there, there’s nuances to ’em, but basically with a lot of the same kind of like rows on the Excel. And obviously something has an elevator versus not having a, you know, there’s, there’s, again, there’s nuance. I’m not trying to like oversimplify it, but we wanna make sure that there’s vacancy factors, that there’s management fees, that there’s janitorial, that there’s leasing commissions, that there’s a budget for repairs and maintenance, cleaning and turnover marketing, all these things. So it, you know, it could move a cap rate a hundred basis points. So to answer your question, I think the most important thing is to put to put the buildings in their operations and in the same consistent template and then try to look at cap rate as apple’s, apples as possible on the underwriting. I think

Charles:
That’s, I think the comparables, when people ask me, I think comparables are one of the things I always, I I rare, I regularly, let’s say, see that are off, right? When people are telling me a comparable is, you know, miles away or they’re telling me, oh, it’s the same year built, or it’s close to it, but this has 12 units and that has 120 completely different amenities. I mean, you know what I mean? Like you said, the elevator, like all these, all these things, and it makes it where, you know, we have technology, which I think people stand behind, but walking the comparables and like mystery shopping them and to your subject property of what you’re doing, there’s really, I mean, it really comes down to even driving the area. I mean, it really comes down to a lot of stuff you have to do, kind of boots on the ground because you can look on, I mean, I can look on Google Maps and say you know, here this is the building and there’s a Starbucks here and it’s gray in there, but between these different things, I don’t see it. There is a train track or there’s a bro, you know what I mean? There’s some body of water and I mean, you may see it a little bit, but it’s like it changes the neighborhoods. Like ni you, you know, when you’re driving like, whoa, what just happened? What I, where am I now? You know,

Joe:
Massively. So, and I think in addition in knowing the, the nuances of a, a neighborhood and, and understanding the location, it’s like, you know, just as two examples, you know, we could sell a deal for a, a four cap if the rents are 20% below market. And then, you know, we could see a deal that it, you know, it could have been listed on CoStar or whatever as like an eight cap, but maybe the taxes are massively under assessed and there’s a new assessment out that’s gonna increase the taxes. So it’s so much more to the story of that particular deal and then adjusting for those things to, you know, to be able to kind of quote a cap rate to have a target. But I think one of the toughest conversations that I have really regularly is when appraisers call me asking for cap rate information, because it just is it’s tough to quote them on these, like we talked about earlier, kind of these living breathing businesses where it, it can change pretty dramatically. It also

Charles:
Depends on, I mean, who’s buying it too. I mean, I’ve sold apartment buildings before that I thought the cap rate was super low. I was like, I would never pay this, but person owns four other apartment buildings within a stone throw. So for him, he’s cutting that management down over there on that side. A person that’s just new to the neighborhood can’t do that, you know what I mean? So he has an advantage.

Joe:
Exactly. Yeah. I mean you can, you can have some efficiencies of scale or you can parlay your staffing from other properties. And there’s also, I think people get so caught up in like what cap rate makes sense to buy. I mean, there’s just a lot of reasons to acquire real estate and acquire apartment buildings, like the tax benefits, you know, the hold period. A lot of people in Chicago are very kind of territorial of inventory in a particular neighborhood of the city. So if a 50 unit apartment building comes in the market in Ravenswood or Lincoln Park where there’s a real scarcity in that type of product, the generational hold buyers are gonna pay up for that. And they’re not concerned what the cap rate is on a year one basis, and they’re not reckless, and it’s quite the opposite. They just know that, you know, they want to own something for 20 plus years, and in 20 years their experience tells them that the building’s gonna be worth considerably more and they’ll be happy that they bought it and they’ve got global cash flow elsewhere in their portfolio. So I think people like sometimes make these determinations on like what cap rate is market, and then anything that you buy that’s above that cap rate is a good buy. And anything you buy that below that cap rate is, is not, and it’s just so much, it’s so much more particular to the investor than that. It’s

Charles:
Also the cap rate game. You start going higher neighborhoods might start becoming less ideal, let’s just say. So you, you know, it takes someone that knows those intimately. My dad had been a multifamily investor since like 1984, and I never heard him even mention cap rate. And he’d meet up with like these, you know old school kind of investors and they’d buy properties on the back of napkin stuff you’d do back in the eighties and nineties, and it would never, I never heard my dad say cap weight once, you know what I mean? It was like back of the napkin math and they were just like, you know, true cash flow investors, right. Kind of thing. Yeah,

Joe:
Those are those are some of my best clients too, you know, that I could send ’em a deal and, you know, they could drive by it and on, you know, the steering wheel of their car determine what the property’s worth for them. You know, it just it’s not for everybody, but that’s like that old school mentality, I think. Like if a deal, if a deal works on a napkin, it’s probably a good deal. And if it doesn’t, if you’re really having to finesse and excel, you know, maybe not. Yeah.

Charles:
If you gotta really sharpen that pencil or get on the 12 tab Excel spreadsheet, maybe it’s not so much a deal. Right. So so from the other side of it, I mean, when you’re talking to new investors, what are some of the things that maybe they stand out, you know what I mean, they stand out from other investors, what do they do that might put them ahead of other investors and maybe you get a new listing that comes in that you pass to them first before other ones?

Joe:
Yeah. I think communication is a big part of it. You know, giving feedback you know, on the front end being fairly specific with acquisition criteria helps, you know, not being so specific that that property is a needle in the haystack, but, you know, being specific enough where I know what they’re shopping for. And then as you know, I’m kind of opening up the deal flow understanding if it’s, if a deal’s a pass, you know, understanding maybe just a couple quick bullets on what wasn’t a fit about it. That really helps tailor what I send to them, you know, in the future. And then, you know, through the kind of continuum of chasing a deal, I think not being shy about sharing qualifications, track record information if it’s somebody without a long track record of acquiring buildings sharing a little bit about their process and source equity and anticipated lender that they’re working with.

Joe:
Some people, if they’re, if they’re cagey about those things, you know, it’s kind of a red flag. Not that, you know, the first time I talked to someone I’m like, send me proof of funds. It’s not, it’s not like that. It’s just when the time comes and we’re presenting an offer, it behooves the investor for the broker to know who they’re representing so that they could tell, you know, if you’re the seller on a deal of Charles and I say, you know, Hey, I’m representing Bob you know, he’s, he’s new to this sub market. He owns a handful of other buildings in Florida. Similarly, he’s made relationships with local managers. Here are the two banks that he is gonna run the deal by. It’s a much different conversation than like sending a an LOI from somebody or a PSA from somebody that is like an unknown commodity in the market. So I think sharing qualifications so that the broker can present the offer in the best light possible goes a long way.

Charles:
Yeah, no, very, very, very well said. I think one of the things that I used to be as mistakes I used to make was that I wouldn’t respond as fast as I should have been to brokers with deals and over like the last five or seven years, I have a rule of like, no matter what they send me, I mean, unless it’s like some blank, it’s spam to someplace I’m not buying. But if it’s like, you know, someone sent me one-on-one, I review it and I get back to them no matter what within like usually a couple hours, no more than 24 hours and give them feedback of I’m interested or I’m not, and I always get a response thanking me for that.

Joe:
It is a good move. And I think it also ’cause brokers and even sellers, you know, because it, it kinda gets, it gets to them eventually if we get far enough along with it. But like, you know, it is an indication of how you’re gonna be to transact with, you know, so if you’re responsive when you’re vetting deals, you’re gonna be responsive when we’re working on a deal, if you’re just direct and and honest, you’re gonna be direct and honest when we’re transacting together too. So it’s just like, and for, and for brokers, we’re kind of auditioning for you too. So I want to be communicative, I want to be direct. I want to be a good kind of conduit for inventory for, for you, because when we’re really, you know, my best clients, we’re doing a lot of business, we’re building our businesses together, you know, so it’s, it really is not to be cheesy about it. It really does turn into a partnership. So the beginning of establishing kinda the expectations for that partnership are really impactful. And then, you know, when brokers trust that you’re that you do what you say you do and you’re communicative and you’re fair and all these things, and you get the best deal flow that’s just how it goes.

Charles:
Interesting. Yeah. I think one thing I have a friend of mine that is a hard money lender, and he’s like, if before we even get to a loan, if I’m having issues tracking this person down, it’s like a no go. I’m just like, done with it. Because if they haven’t given ’em the money yet, why doesn’t want to give ’em the money out <laugh>, you know what I mean? I’m never gonna hear back from them,

Joe:
Man. I think I don’t know if it’s just like a little bit more experience in doing this or like it’s more of a sign of the times, but like, just dealing with people that are nice people to deal with is so it just improves efficiency of your day, improves your mood, and then you’re also, you know, that you’re representing somebody who’s just like a, a fair person to deal with, you know? And so like, it, it ends up being a reflection of the broker, how the buyer performs, you know, if the seller, it’s just the overall experience is gonna be much more positive. So like you know, being even keel, being direct and just being like a normal person, I feel like goes along with these days

Charles:
Pretty straightforward. Yeah. Yeah. So Joey, it’s a very competitive market, being a real estate broker especially a multifamily, I mean, there’s a lot of brokers out there and there’s a lot of national firms out there that you guys compete with. How, what would you consider is your competitive advantage over other brokers in your

Joe:
Space? You know, I have I don’t know that there’s a lot of secret sauce in it. I don’t know that I’m gonna give a real exciting answer other than for the last, you know, 13 and a half years I’ve been really consistently focused on selling mid-size apartment buildings on the north side of the city. And so the byproduct of that is you’ve got these, all these relationships, you’ve got a track record and all just compounds, so it gets like easier over time because, you know, you have a, a reputation in the market and then you have all these relationships. And I think like when you look back at that, you’re like, man, you know, that really kind of snowballed into something. I don’t really like, you know, I haven’t taken my eye off the ball in terms of focusing on a different geographic area or a different size deal or, you know taking much time away from like, with my investments, you know, those are all like very, they’re small deals that are easy to manage.

Joe:
My wife and I do it together. So it’s just like I think doubling down on my focus has really been probably the biggest differentiator from competition. And then as a broker, it can be kind of a grind. So just like sticking with it <laugh> through different cycles and making sure that you’re always feeding the front of the pipeline. I just, I, I think that I treat people well along the way too. Like, I, I really don’t wanna burn bridges. I’ll be honest with somebody, even if it’s not convenient to be honest with them. And I think that that goes a long way. It, it’s a small world, you know?

Charles:
Yeah. No, that’s, that’s, that’s a great answer. I think the focus is a super important thing, and you see it on in real estate, you see it with different people that might, you know, investors that might change their asset classes are focusing on, and they’re like, oh, we’re not doing this now, we’re doing this now and we’re not, you know, this is the big thing we’re doing now and it’s completely changing. It’s kinda like that, that shiny object type thing. And I don’t know, it just, it brings you down as if compared to someone that’s been doing something for decades, and this is like, this is my specialty. Like you said, you just narrowed it down exactly these size properties, this side of the city. But but for overall these decades of what you’re working with, with investors, multifamily investors, mainly, what are common mistakes? You know, as we kind of wrap up here, you see them make

Joe:
You know, I think we, we touched on it earlier, but I think I think not treating it as an operating business is a, you know, or not understanding the operations enough. I think some people, you know, you were talking about a little bit earlier, kind of like looking at an area that, you know, if you look at a deal you know right away whether it’s gonna work for you. But if it’s a new area to you and you don’t establish enough kind of baseline knowledge, you know, you can think that operating an apartment building in South Florida is the same as operating an apartment building in Chicago. And just understanding the different considerations on the front end and understanding how the property’s gonna operate I think is the most important way to evaluate kind of on the front end whether an investment’s gonna work out well.

Joe:
Because it’s all, it just all comes down to the operations. And then, you know, I guess what a, a guy that I’m friendly with who’s a client to Drew Brennaman, he, he said something that resonated with me that just popped in my head when you when you mentioned that question and when you asked that question was kind of marrying the debt with your investment objective and with your anticipated hold period. So, you know, flexibility on prepayment if you intend to sell it sooner. And then just kind of trying to have maybe a maturity jive a little bit more with your anticipated hold period. You know, we’ve seen debt be a really, really important piece of the puzzle lately. And you know, there’s been some properties that operate in Chicago incredibly well, and you’re seeing strong rent growth, but you know, they have maturity and inconvenient time and it can derail an investment entirely. So I think doing your best to put appropriate leverage, and not only leverage amount, but just like the source of the debt flexibility, if there is gonna be any, I think goes a long way also.

Charles:
Yeah, not being able to refinance a a good deal is definitely a, definitely a major problem and a bad day, right? Yeah,

Joe:
Yeah, totally.

Charles:
So Joe, how can our listeners learn more about you and your business?

Joe:
Yeah, I’m pretty, I’m pretty easy to get in touch with. I don’t think I’d be a very good broker if I wasn’t you know, accessible. So yeah, I usually post my like real estate type stuff on LinkedIn. I don’t, yeah, my Instagram is pretty, pretty much my kids and like maybe a golf course that I’m <laugh> chasely playing. So like LinkedIn is probably the best way to like, just kinda stay in touch. And then from there I’m just, I, I’m easy to get in touch with if you’re interested in, in multi-family investing in Chicago, I feel like it’s my job to, to be a resource. And I’m really active in the space and, you know, I like meeting new people ’cause I think it makes me it makes me really effective at what I do to not only know the real established people, but know the people who are gonna be new players in the market. So yeah, know if you reach out and like you said, as long as it’s not kind of like a, like a spammy LinkedIn message that we get all the time, like, you know, I’m gonna respond Oh

Charles:
Yeah. Spammy LinkedIn messages. I know those, it, it makes me not wanna accept any messages now because then you get and you’re like, oh wow, five messages in once <laugh>,

Joe:
Dude. Yeah, they’ve gotten bad. Like, I go, I can tell by the first one whether I just mute the conversation or whether it’s gonna be something substantive. But it doesn’t seem to discourage the people that are doing that. You just, you sometimes look on the thread and it’s like 15 messages, like it is what it is.

Charles:
Well, thank you so much for coming on today. Joe, looking forward to connecting with you here in the near future and have a great rest of your day.

Joe:
Hey, thanks again. It was fun.

Links and Contact Information Mentioned In The Episode:

About Joe Smazal

I sell apartment buildings in Chicagoland. Current and prospective clients will find me to be honest and direct, and I’m proud of my reputation for putting my client’s interests before mine. In 2014, I joined Interra from a large national firm. Interra’s platform is effective for my clients, and it’s been rewarding to help the firm grow and improve.
I have personally sold over 240 properties, comprised of over 5,300 units, for a total consideration of over $940,000,000. In recent years, I’ve been the most active broker in the sale of $2MM+ multifamily buildings in Chicago.
In addition to being a broker, I’m a devoted dad (Jack and Will), overachieving husband (Kate), proud Chicago resident (Lincoln Park), erratic golfer (VERY erratic), multifamily owner/operator (small buildings/great locations) and homegrown Hawkeye (marketing and entrepreneurship).

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