Loading summary
Transcript143 lines
- [00:00]
A
Real estate was a dirty word.
- [00:02]
B
What were you doing leading into the crisis?
- [00:03]
A
People would be going like, man, what the hell are you doing up there? I mean, you're in the boondocks. So every dollar I would make, I'd always spend it on dirt.
- [00:10]
B
Why are you worth 6%? What are you capable of doing that your competition is not. You can call it the secret sauce or whatever.
- [00:18]
A
When the pandemic hit, March, April of 2020 to December of 20 sold over a billion dollars.
- [00:25]
B
Are you shocked by how quickly it's growing or. Or it didn't come quick enough?
- [00:29]
A
Every city in the United States grows north.
- [00:31]
B
Why does every city grow north?
- [00:33]
A
That should be on the first page of any real estate book or college.
- [00:37]
B
Something like an artery popping. Is that gonna happen in 26, 27?
- [00:41]
A
No one wants to hear anybody say recession, but we've been in a recession for about six months.
- [00:47]
B
When you're laying in bed at night thinking about this market, as somebody who knows it better than anybody, what are you actually thinking? I got a lot I want to
- [01:01]
A
learn from you today. Well, I don't know about learning, but I can certainly tell you what I
- [01:06]
B
think before we dive into your real estate career. When I talked to your kids about you, they. And specifically Alex, who's a good friend, and she was kind of giving me some nuggets to chew on. She. She said, my dad, as busy as he was, he always was at everything. I only remember him because he never missed any. And she specifically went into detail and said. I said, well, give me some ideas of how he went above and beyond. And she said, when we would have track meets at 5am I would wake up, My car was already going. There was a bottle of water in the cup holder. There was a note written. When we'd get home, the bath would have been drawn and ready. And so I kind of wanted to start on how did you think about raising your kids? And how are you able to go from being Rex the real estate guy to Rex the guy that wakes up at 4am and makes sure my kids are 100% taken care of?
- [02:11]
A
Well, I think that's something that you're having your kind of your mind set in your heart when you have children. I mean, as you all know, I mean, your children are young. I mean, they leave the nest pretty quick, and you only have so much time to be able to really spend with them and kind of teaching them and. And helping them along. I think for me, it was a lot of fun to be able to kind of get up and try to be that guy that, that father that maybe I knew better than to talk to them when they were getting up to run cross country or track or whatever it may be. My wife didn't, not so much so. But, but you know, you get up and you, you wake them up and you know what they've got to do. So you. I'd start the car, get the heater going, put the bottles of water in there and then write them a note and, and never say a word. And then when they got back and when they, then I'd bring them, bring them their breakfast and, and I enjoyed doing things, enjoyed fixing them breakfast and good doing that thing, you know, they were all into everything, cheerleading, basketball, socks. They did. They played out every sport, basketball, track, cross country, cheerleading. And it was just a heck of a lot of fun to see them, you know, grow up and, and be involved in both athletics and, you know, cheering and things like that. But, you know, it's a little things like that. I think that maybe the, your children remember that are meaningful, that, you know, you don't have to do that. You could just say, get. You got to get up. But you try to make it. I always thought it was kind of fun to try to make it special and let them. I think they kind of know how much you love them by virtue of how you treat them and how you raised them. And you look up and they're off to college, to TCU or wherever it may be, and you still get to see them and they're still your child, but you don't get to spend that. The type of, I don't know, time and quality time that you can as you're. When you have them in your, in your own home.
- [04:25]
B
Why didn't you say anything to him? Why did you?
- [04:29]
A
They don't. Nobody wants to be talked to at 4:30 or 5 in the morning. They don't want a motivational speech. They, in the few times that I was out of town on working or something, they said my wife would come in and go, it's a bright and sunny day and you know, open the blinds and they're going like, shut up. You know, but, but it's. I think then when they get in, when they get back and they've had their bath, they've had breakfast, you can start the conversation about how the day may go and, and, and give them the hug or something like that. But it's just like you kind of, kind of you have a feel when to talk and when not to talk and that Goes into the business world as well. You got to know when to shut up, right?
- [05:18]
B
Yeah. Did somebody treat you that way growing up? How'd you learn that?
- [05:23]
A
Oh, I had a mother that was probably the kindest human I've ever known in my life, really. She exuded kindness. She lived by the mantra that if you can't say something nice about someone, don't say it.
- [05:37]
B
Hmm.
- [05:37]
A
I haven't necessarily been able to do that. Haven't pulled that one off.
- [05:42]
B
You're still learning.
- [05:44]
A
Yeah, I've tried, but I'm not that great at it. But my mother, she wouldn't say. I never heard her say an ill word about someone. She. You might. She might. You could see it in her eyes. But she wouldn't ever talk negatively about anyone and was super kind and sweet and taught me, hopefully, whatever element of kindness I've been able to instill in my soul and my life, she helped me. She helped evolve that. She emulated that. And I think that's something we all need. I mean, I mean kindness. And hopefully you have it and you shield in. You try to use it in helping people and through life. And it doesn't mean you're weak to be kind. I think it actually shows an element of strength to those that it means something to.
- [06:39]
B
It doesn't really cost anything to be kind.
- [06:41]
A
It doesn't cost a thing.
- [06:42]
B
You don't have to spend a dollar.
- [06:43]
A
You don't have to spend a dollar. Now, not to say that if you have to be, you can be a hard ass. But kindness, as long as you can be kind, I think that's what we all should be. I think everybody should try to live their life and. And try to convey kindness to others. And I think it's an important component, important attribute.
- [07:08]
B
All right, y' all have heard me talk about better pitch for years on the podcast. I'm super proud of their founder, Nico, who is a great friend of mine. He's one of the best young entrepreneurs I've come across. And in just two years, he's built an incredible company that is now rebranding as collateral partners. And honestly, it makes perfect sense. From single family investment decks to complete brand overhauls, ongoing partnership support, to market research, they deliver institutional grade work that actually moves capital. Think of them as the difference between looking like a startup and operating like an institution. They're really your entire institutional marketing department, the team you wish you had in house, but can't justify hiring ex Goldman directors who understand your business, ex PE associates who craft your narrative and world class Designers who make it all look effortless. Go check out collateral.com and mention the Powers podcast and they'll give you a complimentary one pager. Enjoy the episode. All right. You have made probably one of the largest dents in North Texas, the DFW metroplex of anybody in the land business over the last. How long you've been doing this? 30 or 40 years?
- [08:24]
A
Well, 46 if you can't. 80. That's when I got in the business. This will be the 46th year, so 45 years.
- [08:31]
B
So how did you get into the business? And maybe even before that has being from Salina and being in that region that's now becoming maybe one of the hottest areas in the world. Like how does being from Salina and what you viewed from there shaped what you've been able to accomplish over the last 40 years in North Texas?
- [08:54]
A
Well, I think growing up in a, in a rural environment where you work hard, work was a very important component. And where I was, the way we were raised, if when you got to about six years old, you went to the field and you got up before sunup and you were in the field working from really sun up to sundown. And you know, and I think it instills the drive and work ethic that maybe hopefully kind of parlays over into life. And so, you know, obviously when I was growing up, slime was about a thousand people. Okay. And most people there were more farm based. I mean there wasn't much commuting back to Dallas. It kind of started a little bit back when TI opened in Richardson. There's a few folks would go to Halliburton or TI but for the bulk of it, everybody in the community was, you know, farming or ranching. And I think that my grandfather was up every morning at 4:30 and he was down, down where our operations were by 5 o'. Clock. And he instilled that kind of work ethic in me. To early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise. I mean it really is element of truth to that. And so in the early bird catches a worm type venue, but he would, and then he would get home and watch gun smoke and he'd be in bed by 7:30, 8 o' clock at night and not now. I didn't emulate that necessarily, but I think that that work ethic can drive in working on the land and with the land and seeing how my grandfather respected the land and my father always would try to buy land and understood the value and always believed and he was right. That growth was coming at the time up Preston Road, which now is Preston in the tollway, but that growth was headed north. And as I think you know from being successful in the real estate business, all cities grow north. The only city in the United States that doesn't grow north is Minneapolis St. Paul because it's restricted by geographical constraint. But every city in the United States grows north. And so it doesn't really take a rocket scientist to figure out what direction to position yourself in, but it does take discipline, and it does take patience, and it does take vision.
- [11:46]
B
Why does every city grow north?
- [11:49]
A
I don't know the answer to that question, but every city goes north because you're correct.
- [11:55]
B
And to be honest with you, you're the first person that's ever told me that. And now I'm sitting here thinking about it going. Every city that I've cared about is all growing north.
- [12:04]
A
It's almost like that should be on the front first page of a. Any real estate book or, or school, any type of college and. Or textbook or whatever you might have. It would be that to. To teach and to understand that every city grows north. But most people haven't really aren't aware of that. I mean, I try to be aware of it because it's kind of. If you don't understand the trajectory of growth and why it's going that direction, and I don't know that I can answer fully why it's across the United States, but it is and it does. And it's been historically correct for as long as we've been in existence for 250 years. And some cities grow faster than others for various reasons. I was lucky growing up in a town north of Dallas that was positioned just by geographic positioning for success. I mean, 20, 30 years ago, people would kind of not laugh at me, but you go like, man, what the hell are you doing up there? I mean, you know, you're in the boondocks. And. And so every dollar I would make after you pay Uncle Sam and you pay the overhead, I would plow back in and buy 50 acres or 40 acres or if I could afford 100 acres. And, you know, I'd never really had much cash around because I'd always spend it on dirt. And so my wife, you know, she's. She works full time with me, and she works very hard. Very bright young lady and hardworking. But now they're in high school. It's 2004, 2003. 4. And my wife comes in my office and pushes the door, too. And that's never a good sign. And she goes, you know, you have a problem and you know you have to stop. And I'm going like, well, you know, I kind of weaseled around and wiggled around a little bit and just kind of kept doing what I was doing. And then flash forward to the pandemic in 2020, and we're sheltering in a place. My wife and I are the only one in the office working because everybody's supposed to be sheltered in a place, right? So I'd look at my wife, I said, I don't know how long this is going to last, and I don't really know that I've ever seen anything like this. But we're not going anywhere or doing anything until she stops. And so she and I, in that one year in 2020, from March, April of 2020 to December of 20, sold over a billion dollars between just the two of us working in that office. And one was a 4,000 acre veal ranch west of Fort Worth here. And you take 130 million here and 140 million there, and it starts adding up relatively quickly. And she comes in my office in October, November of 2020, barely pushes the door to and says, well, I just want you to know that I'm glad you didn't stop. And I thought, well, that's probably as close as you're ever going to get to an apology. So take it, run with it, be happy about it. So I think it was 16 years later I got my little Italian wife, got an apology or got that out of her anyway. And so I think she meant it.
- [15:41]
B
Has it come quicker than you thought it would? Like, did Salina happen or really call it North Preston Road in the tollway? Are you shocked by how quickly it's growing or has it been? I guess if you've been around doing it for 40 years, maybe it could seem like it didn't come quick enough. How have you thought about it looking in the rearview mirror?
- [16:01]
A
I think it happened maybe a cycle before. I thought it would by virtue of the pandemic. Okay. I think when the pandemic hit, it might have pushed our market forward 10 years. And I kind of, I was, in my guesstimation estimation, I was thinking our market would probably ready, be ready for what we're seeing today in 2030 and the push from the pandemic and the growth that occurred because of that. I think it made it happen in 2000, maybe 10 years before that. I think 2020 is maybe 2021, 2022 is when everybody started realizing there's enough rooftops here to drive retail. And there's reasons at that juncture in time the hebs and the Costcos and the Walmarts and targets of the world start showing up because the rooftops are there. And you can see that the growth is really. So we went from about 15,000 people to 55,000 people in, in the last six years. In the last six years or so, the fourth fastest growing city in the United States. We were number one in the DFW area for two to three years. We're number four today as it sits in the United States for growth. So. And I think there's, besides being, north of Dallas, the infrastructure that. Forward thinking from regional planning. The Dallas North Toll Road being extended all the way up service roads now to Celina, through Celina, but there's a half a billion dollars being spent from U.S. 380 north to FM 428, which the city very kindly renamed Glendinning Parkway after my family being there since 1887. Not just me, but maybe confluence of me and, and that opens by the end of this year and it's a half billion dollars being put in play which will extend all my six lanes up to my ranch and dump out at my development's door. So my development there, King Places was probably opened in 22, finish it in 22. I'm. I was probably four years or five years early to the party. Okay, but now. But I'd rather be early to the party and not get invited at all. And so I put the infrastructure in early by virtue of a development agreement I had with the city, knowing or feeling confident that the main lanes were coming. And so those main lanes will open I would think by December, end of December of this year. And then I plan on building my final, when I say final, my corporate office building there on that project in design right now and doing a mass timber office building up there for my last hurrah, so to speak, for moving my offices from Salina to Dallas to Plano to Frisco now to back to Salina. Kind of feels like I'm kind of coming home after having a, you know, not a trip around the sun, but, but it's, you know, had to grow and kind of move with the market to survive.
- [19:40]
B
And it's a lot different to go into the city of Dallas than it is to go into the city of Salina.
- [19:47]
A
Well, I hate to be a negative, I don't think I've said anything much negative yet on our conversation here today, but I try to Stay out of Dallas.
- [19:57]
B
Yeah.
- [19:58]
A
Just because of the lack of leadership and the lack of forward thinking by the, by what you would deem the leadership there, which is a lot of
- [20:09]
B
big city thinking in general.
- [20:11]
A
Yeah, a lot of negativity. I mean I tried to move the Dallas Cowboys stadium to Dallas and landed in Arlington, as we all know. And Laura Miller was the mayor at the time. And I did my best to try to get put myself shoes on to sell why it should be at the corner of I35 and 6:35 in the city of Dallas. And I guess I didn't have my saleshoes on tight enough. I couldn't talk any. I mean she was talking about potholes in the streets instead of. I mean I needed $650 million. I didn't need to fix the pothole that day, but I got 100 million out of the, out of the county, but ran out of gas after that and lost the deal. But I was always been disappointed about how difficult it is to maneuver. And I did assemble, I helped Perot. I was kind of the straw man that assembled all of the sites to build American Airlines center in 1999 and 98, 99, 2000. And I was successful doing that. But there wasn't much bureaucracy to get in my way. Yeah. And that was probably my last big foray in Dallas was assembling the American Airlines site.
- [21:36]
B
How many transactions did it take to put together the Arlington site for the Cowboys?
- [21:41]
A
What have you had to do? A lot.
- [21:42]
B
How'd that deal work out? Like did you get one main plot that you knew you needed? How did that whole thing shake out?
- [21:49]
A
That deal? There was one main plot with all the single family homes. It just got taken through eminent domain around it. And there really wasn't much of a real estate play there because there wasn't. Now having said that, now there is with Lowe's and that type of thing. But at the time around that stadium, there was nothing to activate it besides the stadium and there wasn't much. Now I think you could deem it to have some true mixed use component with it, but it's taken a while to clean that area up and to make it viable.
- [22:26]
B
But do you go to the city of Arlington and say we'd love to be here or did you go to the city of Arlington and said not only do we want to be in Arlington, we want to be right there? Or did they, did they present you several options?
- [22:38]
A
Well, let me. I didn't do the Arlington Stadium deal. Okay. I was hoping to land them in the North Dallas market.
- [22:48]
B
Got it.
- [22:49]
A
Arlington pretty much won the draw, and they agreed to, you know, float the sales tax initiative and the bonds and to. To give enough of the public private partnership dollars to make the deal come to fruition. That's why it's there. And. But I mean, kudos to Arlington. I mean, I mean, I think anybody. I mean, they paid the bonds off 10 years early. And I mean, to say it's a success is an understatement. Yeah. I mean, we've got, what, nine games from FIFA being played there in June and July. I mean, big deal.
- [23:33]
B
Yeah. All right, well, then we can talk about the deal that you did do up in Frisco.
- [23:38]
A
Now that one. And we can talk about that is. Right.
- [23:40]
B
Describe to me, just like for anybody listening, describe your way. What was Frisco 15 years ago, 20 years ago, what was it by the time you did the star deal? And then I just want to break down how that star deal worked out, because it's an iconic deal, I think, for the region. But it wasn't so obvious when you did it.
- [24:04]
A
That deal was obviously unique. I don't know that you can ever come back and trump that with regard to moving a professional sports team from Irving to what is now Frisco and the star project. But I had sold that site to Andy Beal, who back in early 90s. Then I resold it to a hospital, and then it left the hospital's hands and the city bought it. So I'd sold it two times before, and I knew Jerry and Steven were about. They were about ready to ink a deal to move, to build a new headquarters in Irving. And I kept telling my friend Matthew Kieran in the office, I said, they don't belong there. They need. There has to be a better spot than that. And we were driving home from a meeting and we said, that's a sight. March of 2013. And I pitched it to Stephen and Jerry, the next maybe might have been two days. I had a little architect, had a land planner from Houston that I knew. Well, that did it. I had him draw a sketch up, which, ironically, is pretty close to what it is today.
- [25:21]
B
Oh, really?
- [25:22]
A
And I sent it to you. Actually, I emailed it to you.
- [25:25]
B
Yeah.
- [25:25]
A
But Stephen's first comment and yours was, I'm intrigued. Tell me more. And I said, you know, Frisco's bought this property thinking that they were going to land Nebraska Furniture Mart. They got left at the altar and they really don't know what to do with it. And they're Looking for a home. And not only that, but the ISD is looking to build a new stadium. And Instead of spending $60 million on a stadium, maybe we can get that money thrown this away in a public private partnership. So we hustled around and presented it to the city of Frisco about a week and a half later, and within 60 days from start to finish, closed it and got over $130 million worth of economic incentives from Frisco. The ISD, the EDC, and the Community Development foundation all put in $30 million a piece. And that's Ford center is what. And now the Ford center is used for high school football on Thursday, Friday nights. And that's their stadium instead of building another stadium. So. And then we came up with the concept of the mixed use retail commercial component around it. And the Cowboys and Blue Star have done an admirable job of fulfilling that conceptual plan and making it. Now that project is. It's what every NFL team aspires to do. Houston's doing it right now. Houston's taken the Star project and is emulating it down near Katy and where they have your corporate headquarters and your workout facility and the training facility all in play together to activate the whole mixed use project. But it was a heck of a lot of fun. It was exciting to know that maybe you were the guy that kind of had that one moment in life to where, you know, we're going to glue that deal with that property and make this deal happen. And, you know, Jerry's always been. There's only about two or three people in my career that I can tell you are truly charismatic. Jerry Jones is one. Jerry Jones is one of the most charismatic people. I don't care he'd have been successful as a preacher on television or. And. But he's one of those guys that when you're doing a deal with him, he looks in the eyes, you kind of like a coach. It's charismatic. You go out there and you'd run through a wall and you kind of wonder why you did that. And Jerry's got that charisma about him. And Stephen's one of the most brilliant businessmen I've been around, actually. He's Jerry's right hand man. And Jerry doesn't do a thing without Stephen. And they're quite a team. And tag team, but it was a lot of fun. I mean, he'll grab you by the leg and squeeze your leg. You know, he goes, you know, this is. This is a Super bowl, buddy. A great idea, great idea. You know, even if you're not making a hell of a lot of money, he kind of makes you feel good about it. And when you're around people that make that make you feel good about doing a deal, that's an art form in itself and he's got it and he's got the, he's got the art form and he could sell an ice cube to an escort. Come up for sure.
- [29:06]
B
Had they come to you and already given you the idea of what a star would be or did you come to them and say this is how you need to think about your practice facility and all your corporate offices or had they kind of said we're looking for something like this?
- [29:22]
A
Actually it was my idea in tandem with Matthew Kieran in my office, we came up with the concept of moving not only their world headquarters there, but the practice facility there and integrating office and retail around it. And they took that concept and idea along with and kind of put it on steroids and made it. It's a world class project. And you'd have to say Frisco's a world class city. I mean George Purefoy was a city manager at the time and did more for Frisco than anybody I believe is in it ever for Frisco. And George was tough but he was fair and he wanted what was good for Frisco. And when we took the deal the idea to George, his eyes lit up and you could see that he was going to make it happen.
- [30:21]
B
Do these small towns have an advantage that big cities don't have? They can make big things happen rather quickly. Is it a small town advantage?
- [30:31]
A
I think so. I think that Frisco was not only there's their city leadership but the school district leadership were aligned and it took the school district, the school district had to commit 30 million with Frisco as they did it. And in the economic development Corporation they were all working in lockstep instead of fighting one another or arguing with one another and, and breath of fresh air in my business to see public private partnerships unfold like that because most of the time somebody's bitching and griping about, you know, that developer wants public money or, and, but public private partnerships is what is, what is really set our area apart from most areas. I mean every major development that's been done here, the Dickey's arena, public private partnership, I mean stockyards, public private partnership, star public private partnership. Every and in a manner that is beneficial for both all the citizens in those in those cities and also the developer and the users. So I think it's certainly been enlightening for me to learn how to instill and how to work public private partnerships into various projects, be it master plan, single family subdivisions or mixed use developments and the tools that one needs to use. I mean, when I got in the business in 1980, if somebody started using acronyms like PIDS, TERS, MUDs, MMDS, I mean, you'd think they were speaking Swahili or something, but. But now they have to roll off your tongue like it's natural because you have to use them in an everyday and understand them and understand what an in city MUD or a, or or a TERS is or a public improvement district, a PIT or whatever it may be, whatever tool you may use to try to help make a deal, make the numbers work. And a lot of times those types of public private partnerships allow infrastructure to be like in Salina, for example, we didn't have sanitary sewer trunk lines run six miles southwest or six, but the city used the developer in public improvement districts to extend those sanitary sewer lines and water lines to facilitate new development. All along those lines in the future, instead of going in and having to float a $300 million bond and going in debt, and instead you put the pack of rocks on the developer's back and say if you make it up that hill and you still okay, it's going to be a good deal for us both. Yeah, but here's your rocks and start hiking up there right now. And so a lot of these salon is a prime example that used those public private partnerships to extend major sewer lines and major water lines in order to facilitate the growth that we're seeing today. And instead of going into major debt, when is as you know, and you can spend $300 million on sewer and water lines pretty quick, how do you
- [34:15]
B
know what to ask for when you go in for a public. Like how do you even know? Do you take feedback from them? Or do the best developers kind of have a first ask right out the gate?
- [34:27]
A
I think on the front end of it, there are land use attorneys that specialize in that foray of which component is best fit for like a public improvement district's good for a single family project, whereas a ters, a text incumbent refinance zone may be better for a mixed use project. And a municipal utility district or municipal management district may be better for something that's outside of the city and the etj, the extraterritorial jurisdiction. But it you kind of know by being in the business, which works better for the project. But I Will say I've been doing this for 40 some odd years. Like I said before in the 80s, if somebody had been rattling this stuff off, I probably wouldn't have known what the hell they were talking about.
- [35:24]
B
It's safe to assume that DFW is going to keep growing quite a bit. How do you think about if you were placing dollars? You don't have to give me your whole strategy but like how do you think about where you're buying? Are you trying to get in front of growth by a certain amount of years?
- [35:42]
A
Is it?
- [35:43]
B
Obviously location matters, like how are you, you have a good idea of where things are going one from being in the market. But you probably also know all the big land tracks around North Texas as well as anybody. How do you kind of know that's where I want to be?
- [35:59]
A
Some of that element of its intuition but I mean, but I think that it doesn't take a rocket scientist to kind of figure out where the growth patterns are. In Fort Worth, North Fort Worth and now west Fort Worth, obviously that's growing out towards Alito in those areas are the two areas I would be focusing on in the Fort Worth market would be the North Dallas Alliance Corridor. To give you an idea of how far forward thinking or crazy I am, I just bought an 815 acre track up on I35 in Gainesville, Texas which is another 25 miles north of Denton. And the reason I did that was I sold 300 acres just south of Gainesville and Sanger to Blue Star Land for a commercial for industrial project which I think you're very cognizant about. And you know Walmart built their regional distribution center there in Sanger. And then the day we purchased our track which has about 2 1/2 miles of frontage on I35, HEB announced they just bought 600 acres in Valley View which is 5 miles south of Gainesville for their new distribution network for this market. And so price and location driven. Yep. And I mean the three rules in real estate are location, location, location. So now that's a bit of a kind of deviation from where I've focused most of my career, which I focused along the Golden Corridor, I call it of Preston Road and the Dallas North Toll Road that runs north of Dallas all the way up to the Red River. And that's where I've tried to position myself more so as the kind of go to broker in the market. And you know that includes Frisco, Prosper, Salina, Gunter and that's where a lot of the bigger deals that we've done over the last eight to ten years have unfolded. And when you've got things going on like the PGA headquarters moving to 380 in the toll road and you got the cowboys moving to the toll road and you know, Lebanon Road or where it may be, Warren Parkway. But then you've got AT&T moving 12,000 new employees out to Plano and they all, everybody there is going to be looking for not a new place to live or reposition or maybe a new home. And you kind of follow the growth patterns along that toll road, Preston Road corridor in our market, in that golden corridor market. And the same thing would apply to Fort Worth. I mean, I would think that the two corridors I would I 35 north and you've got I 20 going west. And those would be the two areas I would be focused on. And I have focused on. As I mentioned previously, we were fortunate enough to sell the 4,000 acre veal ranch project early on in the pandemic. And then I've glued together about 15,000 acres North Fort Worth over the years, Sendera Ranch and 3,000 acres here and 2,000 acres there. And, and most of my deals in Fort Worth have been North Fort Worth over the years and then recently the veal ranch project out west. But Fort Worth has got a lot going on, a lot going for itself right now and has really kind of become hotter with regard to the perception of everybody in the market. And it doesn't hurt when you've got alliance to the north. And it doesn't hurt when you've got Ross Perot dragging Fidelity and Schwab and these other financial giants up here. To you wouldn't say Fort Worth, but it's Westlake. And to me, it's kind of all in one bundle. I mean,
- [40:23]
B
packaged up, how important is DFW Airport to the whole equation?
- [40:27]
A
Huge.
- [40:27]
B
Because when I think of going west, Fort Worth, you're just getting further away from an airport. We obviously don't have a love field. And I don't know if up in Collin county they'll end up building another commercial airport up there or if it'll always be dfw. But in all these large tracks that you're selling, how much does DFW airport, how much is it taken into the equation?
- [40:51]
A
I think DFW Airport's one of the, one of the two or three top reasons you're seeing a lot of these large companies moving to dfw, be it Dallas or Fort Worth, you know, you're in the center of the Continental United States. You're about a two and a half hour flight to New York or a two and a half hour flight to California. You're international. You can go anywhere in the world from this airport. So when the Goldman Sachs builds their new headquarters in uptown and has 5,000 new employees, I mean, don't think that airport isn't important to them. Or when Schwab and Fidelity move into Westlake and they're probably what, 15 minutes from the airport and they can get anywhere in the world and be at the airport and call it 15, 20 minutes. And it's a huge driver of our economy. And I don't think anybody. And you know, you take all the things we have going for us. Besides, you were talking about there is going to an airport, commercial airport in Collin county, in McKinney is just opened there. The first flights will go out of there this fall and it's another option, but I think you tagged it with DFW being the driver and love field being an ancillary type component. But when you move to this state, I mean people overall are friendly. We have good schools, we have a low cost of living. The officers here will still protect you and your, your family feels comfortable going to the mall or going to a shopping center. Not going to get mugged, not so much like in San Francisco or other places or in Portland, Oregon where you may end up, you know, may turn the blind eye to that criminal that's maybe our policeman and protect our families. Everybody feels protected here. I mean you have no state income tax, which is huge. As long as we, if we don't screw our own model up. I believe that dfw and I think you've got to say dfw, the Y' all Street will become, will overtake New York as a financial center of the United States. I believe that Dallas, Fort Worth, DFW will become what New York is perceived to be today. London and Europe. And I believe DFW will become the new financial epicenter and of continental United States. Now I don't know if that'll happen in my lifetime, but I believe it's happening now and will evolve over the next couple of decades into the financial epicenter of our, of our entire country. That's a big statement. I know that's a huge statement.
- [44:06]
B
Do you have any opinion? A lot of the growth in North Texas has been driven by a lot of the H1B visa transplants. Obviously in this administration there's been a halt to that. And I've heard from home builders that there's been a halt to selling homes because there's not as much H1B visa buyers out there. Is that something to think about? Is that happening? Do you have an opinion?
- [44:33]
A
It's real. That's happened in Biden's final year of his administration in 2024, I believe there were 20 between 21 and 23,000 H1B visas issued in North Texas. And in Trump's first year in 2025, that went to a little less than 2,000 H1B visas, which is. So a lot of these home builders were basically designing their subdivisions for that type of buyer, that cultural buyer, and from the alignment of the homes to align with their beliefs. And some subdivisions with some clients of mine that are major builders and developers of homes and projects in Frisco through the pandemic, 20 through 20 through 2024, 25, some of those subdivisions were 92% cultural buyers. And in the fall of 24. Well, certainly in the fall of 25, by October, November of 25, the traffic from the cultural buyer looking for homes, indoor buying fell, was off by 60% and sales are stagnant. A lot of those H1B visa holders are concerned that they may be deported and not their visa not be renewed. And so that sector of the marketplace has caused the single family market to be tepid and. Or I don't know if you want to say cold, but I mean, sales are off 25 to 30% and we overbuilt, so we always do. I mean, if you look at a cycle and a super cycle or usually a cycle is a normal cycle is seven to 10 years. And this cycle has lasted, in my opinion, from 2012 to today. So it's 14 years. We're. We're overdue. Yep. And I think we're entering a. No one wants to hear anybody say recession, but I think we're. We've been in a recession for about six months. Yeah. And. And what do you want to call it? And I think it's going to take in our market over there in the, in like maybe the Salina area and area over there. I think we may have 18 months in order to work through the inventory and to get it back to what might be deemed a more of a healthy and healthy single family market. But all those lots will get sold, those homes will be sold. And now I think is a fantastic time for young home buyers to buy.
- [47:25]
B
Yeah.
- [47:26]
A
Because it's changed. It's been a seller's market for five full years, maybe longer, but sure, for sure. Five and Builders were making more higher margins they've ever made in their career. And that's turned and it's a buyer's market. And so young couples, young people that are looking to buy a home, I believe now the next six months to a year will be one of the best times to get a deal and buy the home, buy a home for your first time homebuyer, etc. And the opportunities are now more buyer driven instead of seller driven in my opinion.
- [48:11]
B
You've been through a few recessions. How do you think about them now? They're all a little different, but they all kind of rhyme. What's your strategy to get through a recession?
- [48:24]
A
I don't know that I have a strategy. It's kind of like you always when you're in business, you never want to over leverage and you don't want to get out over your skis so far that you can't land without falling. And I think that being able to kind of pull in and kind of sit tight for a couple of three years is kind of the mantra that it takes to kind of work your way through a recession. But we've seen a considerable slowdown in, as you mentioned, home on home sales. And then we're also seeing kind of the same slowdown because there was a lot of the drive for these and you don't want to use the term speculative long term investments that might be out 25 miles north of Fort Worth or 25 miles or 30 miles north of, of Dallas or 40 miles north of Dallas. Is it when the market's hot, as you know, there's another buyer behind that buyer. But when the market pulls in, those, those buyers, that second and third buyer are hard to find. So now having said that, I believe that we're in the best spot in the United States. I wouldn't trade it for anywhere in the continental United States. I'd rather be in north Dallas, north Fort Worth than any place in, I'm going to first going to say the continental United States. I might even go out on a big lamb and say the world. I think we have more going for us here than any other place maybe in the world. From both location, geographic, government, government, governance, not only cost of living, but the quality of living and quality of life that this, that our area affords. I believe in my career there was always some other place that was the belle of the ball, you know, New York, San Francisco, L.A. miami, Phoenix, Denver. In my six or seven cycles there was always some other place that was hotter, better to go to. Well now we're the bell of the ball. And. And I believe if we don't screw it up from a governance standpoint, we were going to be the bell of the ball for quite some time.
- [51:09]
B
So do you expect a lot of these large track owners to be sitting or you expect a lot of large tracks to start moving through this recession? Like is. Is there a lot of leverage on a lot of these big tracks or.
- [51:22]
A
I think you see, you're going to see some trades that will happen because of the economic strain of continuing to pay notes on leverage that are out there. And it always happens. And this cycle will be, in my opinion, won't be any different. I mean, I mean, I think there's a lot of money on the sidelines waiting for a little blood in the street. Yeah. And they don't want to capture it.
- [51:54]
B
You think the blood's finally here. I mean, rates started going up in early 22, so we're four years into rate hike.
- [52:03]
A
Yeah. But I don't know that the market really felt it in 22 because there was still activity and still utter buyers to come behind another buyer in. Well, in 2022, summer of 22, rates went from three and a half, 3.75 to eight and a half, nine and a half percent, which is obviously a double or more. And it caused a huge stymie to the multifamily industry and the. In an industrial component too. And then all the builders and the developers got together in January, about ended end of 22, early 23, call it January of 23, and said, look, we're making more money we ever made in our lives. Our margins are better than we've ever had in our entire career. We need to reload the gun here and buy some more lots and buy some more land. And so the sector of the market that kept the market going was a single family component all the way through 23 and 24. That's what drove the market. And then we overbuilt, put too many lots on the ground, and now that deal stymied. And I think, of course, in conjunction with that, construction costs went up 40 to 50% in tandem with interest rates going up. And so I do think, I think it's a little early in this cycle. We haven't seen, we've seen a few capillaries and maybe smaller veins cut. But the, the big money's waiting on an artery to pop. And in every cycle there's always a deal that was either a group, either paid too much for and over leveraged and I think there are some of those out there and I think that those. That shoe will fall. It's a little early. If you have to make an interest payment for about a year, year and a half, everybody looks at each other and goes, you know, maybe we do need to sell or maybe we do have to sell here, something like that. But it's a little early in the game. I don't know when you're in, I kind of use an analogy that's not a very good one. I don't think it's like in war. The generals are all sitting back sipping coffee and smoking cigars about five miles from the front and they're going, gosh, things are going swimmingly well. And then they flash forward to the front and bullets are whizzing by everybody's heads and everybody's going, ammunition back up, help. And the generals haven't really gotten the memo yet that we got some issues up there and I don't think it's going to be catastrophic. It's not like the, anything near the problem that occurred during the savings and loan deregulation in the Resolution Trust Corporation days. That was an anomaly that was created basically here through the savings and loan deregulation. And if you really want to look at it, the last cycle, when everybody called the Great Recession in 2008 and 2009, it wasn't the real estate industry that drove the market down. It was all the shenanigans on Wall Street. The home loans basically packaging junk bonds into a rated and double a rated bonds. And in that, in that caused our real estate market to go down by virtue of the entire stock market going down and Lehman Brothers going bankrupt and that type of thing. But it was really, it wasn't the real estate industry that drove the, that caused that market setback. It was Wall Street. And if you really want to look at it, I mean, today we're looking at the issues of war, high interest rates, cost of living is going up because gases and oil prices are going up. And there's always something other than the real estate market that causes the market to fluctuate.
- [56:22]
B
I don't know if it's an inning thing. You said something like an artery popping. Is that going to happen in 26, 27?
- [56:30]
A
I think you're going to see some pain at the pump, so to speak, that might start early this fall and maybe transcend to where it maybe gets a little bit rougher next year. And then I think by maybe the fall, late 26 and all of 27 are going to be a kind of a rough time and then I don't have a crystal ball. But I think in 28 we may start kind of crawling out of the hole and the market begins to heal itself and mend and go down. But I think we got a year or two in front of us. It's going to be dicey.
- [57:11]
B
So let me just take us back to that Gainesville site you bought. You obviously have a long time horizon on that and you mentioned those two sites beneath it, the Walmart, the HEB as your. How are you planning for that site? Is that like maybe in 10 years something will happen? Like, what do you do in the meantime besides sit in it and look at it and think about it? What's the stuff that goes on now that you've seen momentum happening just to the south? Do you immediately start hiring civils and architects and saying we got to get something going? Like, how does that land move its way down your pipe?
- [57:52]
A
Well, I wish it was that fast. I don't think it's that fast. Okay. But I went and met with the government, with the city officials and the leadership in Gainesville EDC and the city manager and the city staff and development coordinator and they want growth. They want to see growth. They want it to happen. And they're open to public private partnerships and want to do a public private partnership on that property and want to see it overlaid with the ters in a tax increment refinance zone and some other. And give it in. Give the zoning grant, the zoning necessary to activate what I guess you would call a true mixed use development. In my vision, the southern part of it would be more logistics, industrial. Whether that be. It's more what you've done in your career. I mean Blue Star's done down the road and HEB is building about a. It'll be a billion dollars spent there for their fulfillment center and distribution center. And I see the southern end of this. If you can have, if you can have the city as a partner to have the right type of economic incentives and or zoning in place, then dragging a user, one of these bigger users up five miles, up the five miles north is a lot easier to do. If you have more, if you have something to offer that might be financially beneficial to the user as well as a developer. So I liked it because i35 has been redone, revamped and reconstructed all the way up there to through Gainesville and the improvements they've made to the exit ramps and on ramps and then to see the, the Industrial logistics market moved from Denton up to Sanger, up to Valley View. My thoughts were why not Gainesville? If you can give the economic overlay, do it right, plan it right. And then as you get closer to Gainesville, there'll be more of a single family, urban residential retail component to it. But that's a, that's a 10 year venue, probably longer for build out. It may take 20, 15 to 20 years, but, but I plan on starting the southern end of it, the southern part of it in 18 months to two years. Okay. And kind of working my way through it every time.
- [60:26]
B
Well then let me just ask it. Why are again, you can brag on yourself a little or you can brag on one of your agents. Why are you worth 6%? What are you capable of doing that your competition is not? And maybe some of that is just time in the game. You, you've got 40 years of relationships. There's a reason why you become the largest land broker in dfw. And so you can call it the secret sauce or whatever. Why. What is the difference between a 6% agent and a 1 1/2% agent? Like what are the six, what are the Sixes doing?
- [61:03]
A
Well, I think inherent knowledge of not only the market but also the deal and how to put the deal together and how to deliver it. And a lot of the deals we do are off market. They're not necessarily on costar or on LoopNet or everybody says what are you on LoopNet? I'm going to. Most of the stuff that's on there is stuff that couldn't be. You couldn't sell it anywhere else. And so you got it on the Internet. It's kind of like everybody thought that single family real estate brokers are going to go out of business because of kind of the robots or in office in a house or something. The real estate business is still a very personal business and it's. It. There's a lot to be said about not only inherent knowledge but experience and how to handle that business and how to, how to be the winner on a. If there's a 1200 acre track in Frisco or Prosper or Salina that it needs to be delivered and who's going to deliver it, who's going to bring it home and who's going to bring that deal to fruition and put it and get it delivered to the. Whether it be Blue Star Land or Centurion Development or Hillwood or. And if you send the guy in with the 1 1/2% guy, he's probably going to get his ass handed to him on a platter and he's going to say, man, I got close but no cigar. And most of my clients, they want to make sure that, that you deliver. And.
- [62:39]
B
Well then how do you deliver when you say I delivered a deal?
- [62:42]
A
What? What? Well, I mean, I just did a 2,000 acre deal in Gunner. The name Platinum Ranch, it's up for the deal of the year award. Okay, two weeks from now. And we closed that in September of 2020. Let's go. And we went and got help that bought that purchaser, get an overlay of a tax increment refinance zone. I did most of the work to get that document, to get that deal done with the city, to deliver it to him. When he closed it, he had it all. He had the public private partnership done, he had his development agreement done with the city. And I simultaneously when he closed it, sold 200 acres of the mixed use development off of it to lower his need for additional cash if he was paying two bucks a foot. I sold the mixed use off simultaneously at 350 to 4 bucks a foot. And instead of having to come up with $185 million, yet he come up with $100 million. Yeah, and then he added tax increment refinance zone overlay that might allow him to float TIRS bonds up front for the rest of his money.
- [63:48]
B
All right, now we're dancing a little bit. So did, is. Are you coming to him saying you need to do all this stuff, or is he coming to you saying I want to do all this stuff, or is it both of you going, all right, we got this thing, here's the site, we like it. How do we put all the pieces together before closing?
- [64:06]
A
Little of both. Yeah, little of both.
- [64:08]
B
How long does a deal like that take? A year, six months, two years?
- [64:13]
A
Most people would tell you a year. You can, if you have kind of the art of the deal, so to speak, you can make that maybe transform into six or seven months. There's an art to that and time value. Time is money. So if you're able to get it done in six to seven months instead of a year, save that developer four months or five months of interest or time pursuit cost.
- [64:37]
B
What about on the seller side? Did you have to build a, like, was that a ranch? We're picking on that one because you mentioned it. Did you already have a relationship with that landowner going back a long time, or was that just picking up the phone saying, would you be interested in selling?
- [64:52]
A
I've actually sold that ranch seven times. So yes, I did have some inherent knowledge of the backdrop of it, but that's over 40 years. I sold it seven times over 40 years. But this is the last time because now it's under development. Yeah. So I don't get my records. 13.
- [65:10]
B
13.
- [65:11]
A
My records. 13.
- [65:13]
B
In Salina or somewhere else.
- [65:14]
A
Frisco. Dang.
- [65:17]
B
How do you sell something 13 times? Did the 11th and the 12th person just not like. Was everybody speculating up until 13?
- [65:25]
A
That's right.
- [65:25]
B
Really?
- [65:26]
A
That's right. And everybody made big money climbing the ladder over time.
- [65:31]
B
How far north can we go? Like, are we going to go all the way up to the Red River? Are we going to be in Oklahoma?
- [65:36]
A
We're going to be up there. I mean, David Craig just put 3,000 acres together up on the Red river in what would be Denison and he's got Margaritaville Resort, the Margaritaville Resort going up there. And Choctaw Casinos partnered and put a third of the money up and they're starting development on that 3,000 acres right now. So that I guess we kind of got up there. Now we're probably 25 miles from where development currently is today up to say Gunner and you might say Sherman. And then there's another stretch of 20 miles or so, 20, 25 miles from there to the Red River. But yes, it'll go all the way to the Red River. In my opinion, it's just going to take a few decades in order for all that to fill in.
- [66:32]
B
Is there like a. Like for every two miles it takes a couple years. So if it's like 25 miles, you could do back of the napkin math. Like it should take us 10 years. Because if for every two years we can. Or every year we can go about two miles. Do you even think about it that way or.
- [66:50]
A
Yeah, you kind of look at it about how far that. Where are the roads now and when are the roads going to be extended? And so the roads right now, as I mentioned earlier, all the main lanes stop will stop at 428 Glendinning Parkway. And now that area will be full on development from mixed use to retail, commercial, office, et cetera. And then you shift to the service roads going up the toll road in it. And more than likely most of that growth will be just single family until the main lanes hit. And then you'll infill with the users the true mixed use retail component of it. You know, the office, retail, commercial follows when the main lanes come through. So a lot of it has to do with the timing of the infrastructure. And how far is sewer away, how far is water away?
- [67:50]
B
And when you say how far is sewer water away, who's controlling that timeline? The city or the pace of private development or both?
- [67:59]
A
Well, the city normally, but not just in the area of north Dallas, except in north Fort Worth as well. These cities that are growing so fast so quick are trying to figure out a way to resolve these infrastructure issues. And so they've now been tutored into. You can use these tools of these public private partnerships to get that developer to extend that sanitary sewer line 3 miles to that site or 4 miles to that site and on his onus with maybe a public improvement district. So that's what helps some of these cities remedy their issues and problems, is working together with the developer to try to. It has to be a kind of a win win deal for the city and the developer. They don't do it. They don't just give the developer the public private partnership unless they think they're going to get something out of it. I mean, it has to be you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours type venue. But it's been key to extending and expanding infrastructure in most of these cities. Some cities just say we're not going to do that. And their growth stymies. And they say some, I won't name any names, but some of us. You just said we don't care. Yeah, we don't care if it takes another 25 years, but. Or 20 years. But those are the cities I don't usually run to. Yeah,
- [69:53]
B
well, they can also change. And to be fair, they can change as quickly as their city council changes. Right?
- [69:59]
A
That's right.
- [69:59]
B
Which is what, every two or three years?
- [70:01]
A
Yeah.
- [70:02]
B
I want to go back real quick to that 2000 acre ranch you mentioned. By the time you're delivering that deal, do you already have a pretty good idea of what the public, the government's willing to do on that or are you kind of finding out in real time? Because again, a lot developers spend a lot of money up front before they ever even know they have a deal. I would assume on a deal like that. But we could pick any deal, whether it's you, whether it's them, whether it's some consultant, there's some idea of this perfect deal has a good chance of making. Or is it really. We're starting from square one and hopefully we can get where we get to.
- [70:46]
A
You certainly have a gut level feel that that municipality, that town, city or municipality wants to play ball and wants to see it Happen and is willing to initiate in discussions and talk about if it's a hell no, we're not going to do anything. Those tracks don't go under contract usually.
- [71:08]
B
Yeah, you find out quick.
- [71:10]
A
Find out quick. But yes, I think there's some. It may evolve as to what that public private partnership might look like and what it might look like on paper as you have it under contract and as you're spending pursuit costs and money, as you're saying developers spend a lot of money. I mean, you can easily drop several hundred thousand dollars just in attorney's fees and engineering fees and earnest money, et cetera, before you even have the deal, before you own it.
- [71:41]
B
Yeah.
- [71:43]
A
And those pursuit costs are real. And I'm maybe preaching to the choir with you, but I mean, it's Easy to get $500,000 in arrears spending that money, not even owning the property yet. And that's what a good broker can sell to an owner saying your property's unentitled, it's only worth what you want if I can get it entitled and if it's worth 25 million today. But if you'll give me eight months to entitle it, we can pay you $40 million in the validity of that is one of the. I don't know, it's part of why you want a good broker representing you and somebody that kind of has your back that's kind of fighting for the. And, and for me, when I sell property, I pay a six because I'm going to look pretty bad if I'm out here preaching about it and then I don't do it. But if I want $10 million, I just tell I want 10. Six. Yeah. Give me 10. Six, I'll pay you six. Yeah. And so I don't know, it's just full service, meaning you're not just taking an order and dropping it in a, In a.
- [73:11]
B
You're not just writing a contract and gets.
- [73:12]
A
You have to be fully engaged and do everything, soup to nuts from keeping the property and ag exemption year to year. I do that for all my clients. Look at what's happening with the, with zoning and, or entitlements and what might change and what roads may be going through the property and making sure that that property gets. If the road's going through it, it gets a corner here or a corner there. Just trying to be a kind of a. I don't know, for lack of a better term, that's what I deem to be full service, not just buying and selling it. It's helping entitle, helping keeping an ag exemption, helping with any zoning changes or regulation changes in the market you kind of become addicted to. I mean, I have become. I mean it's then paint drying but, but I like it. I like it when people, when clients, they want you to handle their business because they've, they know you're going to do it, right? They know you're going to come back if you go and hunt and you're going to come back with a pelt and you're not going to come in back and cry baby and saying you came in second place. Nobody wants a second place guy. You want somebody that's going to deliver in, delivering it and delivering it on time, then that guy should get paid. And some of these big brokerage houses, I won't mention the name of you, they said, we'll do it for 2%. Well then you go bring them an offer and they say, well, you got to get your buyer to pay your purchaser to pay your commission.
- [75:00]
B
Because I don't want to say it's already been enough.
- [75:03]
A
And I'm going, wait a minute, don't you remember last year you came out to my. And we did three deals together and you got half of my 6%, you got 3% on those. That's $38 million worth of deals. And now I'm coming to you with an offer, will I? Well, that's just the way our company operates. I'm going, no, it's not. I mean, so I don't know. It's not an order. Taking business now you. There's too many nuances and too many intangibles that you need to have. In my opinion, a savvy, experienced broker that has taken a few licks and been knocked out a couple of times.
- [75:50]
B
Does it change if you're working on behalf of the seller or the buyer? Not change the level of service, but change. Like what are the biggest differences in working for a seller versus a buyer? Obviously the seller owns a property, et cetera, et cetera. But how does your game plan change?
- [76:09]
A
The service is still the same.
- [76:11]
B
Like, you sold veal ranch on behalf of the seller, correct? The buyer of that, did they meet you through the sale of that or
- [76:20]
A
okay, yes, yes, yeah.
- [76:21]
B
Did they have their own. Do most buyers of. Okay, so here's a question then. If I'm gonna go buy a 4,000 acre ranch, am I usually represented at that point or do most developers. There's Only so many 4000 acre ranches in DFW, it's not like they were window shopping 15 options. It's kind of there.
- [76:40]
A
You mean the buyer?
- [76:41]
B
Yeah. Does the buyer take it?
- [76:42]
A
The buyer probably had his eye on that site before I got the listing.
- [76:47]
B
But they don't bring their own buyer's broker to the party. It's usually you're the only one in a deal like that.
- [76:52]
A
Sometimes they try, I try to persuade them otherwise. I mean now if they're doing, if they're exclusively representing that buyer, then they get it. I'm going to split the commission with them and split the fee with them and I think that's the proper thing to do. And that's what we trick in our real estate world. I mean we co broker a lot and it's just, and there's nothing wrong with that but I think, I think we work just as hard selling a property for someone as we do representing someone on acquisition. Right. It's different. It's the same type of service level.
- [77:42]
B
Are there a lot of international buyers right now or it's mainly domestic.
- [77:46]
A
I'd say mostly domestic. I mean I would think that the, that what we would call a cultural buyer, that there may have been some of the investors may have been India residents that may be putting money into a deal that's maybe the United States. But for the most part over the last in my career the Japanese came through here in the late 80s and made a strong push for about three to five years and left. Then the Asian market, the Chinese and Asians came in the mid-90s to early 2000s and then this last cycle we've had a strong push from the cultural and or the Indian based investors have been probably the most prominent component cultural group that have been buying in this market since maybe 2016, 17. But it's over time each cycle there's been a different international buyers. Previously this market has been more locally based and I think culturally based.
- [79:02]
B
So if I had to ask you just one final question which is like what is something you're thinking about in this market that the average like you're so in it. If I was just to say what is top your mind when you're laying in bed at night thinking about this market as somebody who knows it better than anybody, what are you actually thinking about right now?
- [79:23]
A
Well, I mean you could say how lucky we are with regard to where we are in the world and, and how lucky we've been to take this. We've been on a phenomenal what hot streak for about several years anyway. Five, six years and but I think that if you're lying awake at night, I mean, I think that, that I'm seeing a correction occur that I've seen before in several cycles before. And it's no different. I mean our market's built in a free enterprise society to have cyclical markets, whether it's stock market or real estate market. I mean there's, it's an element of cyclical markets. And we're in my opinion, have taken a rocket ship ride in this last cycle and I think we've kind of leveling off now and I think we hit the glass ceiling about a year ago and we kind of bounced down whether that's 15% and we're kind of going to have to kind of float in that space here for a year, 18 months, two years in order to let the market catch up and for us, for the builders to eat through their inventory and to reassess the lot count and the lot absorption over the next coming two, three, four, five years. You don't ever want to. Nobody in the business, it's on a, it's kind of like a junkie on the, on the side of the road. He wants another hit or wants another. I think that it's kind of hard when our business to kind of. When you slow down, you don't have to act. Yeah, yeah. And so we've slowed down a little bit but. And we're not in the trash can. I just think that we've run so hard so fast that we've reached kind of an apex for a minute and we're going to have to kind of take an 18 month to 2 year period for the market to adjust and then I think we're off to the races again for a long period of time. And I love where we are in the market and I love our location. I love. I couldn't again, redundantly, I believe that we're in the best position certainly in the continental United States or the world. And that's a big statement to make. Yeah, big statement to make.
- [82:04]
B
Rex, thanks for joining me today.
- [82:05]
A
Thank you, sir. Appreciate it.
- [82:06]
B
This was awesome.
- [82:07]
A
Thank you, sir.