Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign hi, I'm John Ko and welcome to icons of D.C. area real estate.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: A one on one interview show featuring the backgrounds, career trajectories and insights of the top luminaries in the Washington D.C. area Real estate market. The purpose of the show was to explore their journeys, how they got started, the pivotal moments that shaped their careers, and the lessons they've learned along the way. We also dive into their current work, industry trends, and some fascinating behind the scenes stories that bring unique perspective to our industry. Commercial Real Estate before we dive into today's conversation, I'd like to share some exciting news. The icons of D.C. area Real estate Podcast is now part of the Iconic Journey in cre, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting professionals at every stage of their real estate careers.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: With our new website www.ijcre.org, we're expanding.
[00:01:16] Speaker B: Opportunities for everyone in the industry. If you're a student or new to the industry, I encourage you to join the Iconic Journey and CRE community, an exclusive space for learning, mentorship and networking.
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[00:02:34] Speaker A: New website, www.ij cre.org.
[00:02:40] Speaker B: Thank you for being part of this journey and now let's get started with today's guest.
[00:02:47] Speaker C: Welcome to another episode of icons of.
[00:02:50] Speaker A: D.C. area real estate.
[00:02:51] Speaker C: I'm so pleased to feature for today's show Owen Billman, who is the President of Blake Real Estate and the Chairman of the Golden Triangle Business Improvement District.
In this wide ranging conversation, Owen shares his journey from his early career at COSTAR to leading one of the Washington DC's prominent real estate firms. Blake Real Estate listeners will gain valuable perspectives on his adaptability in a changing market. Owen discusses how Blake Real Estate has navigated the challenges and opportunities presented by the Pandemic and shifts in the D.C. commercial real estate landscape. He highlights the importance of flexibility in leasing strategies and a long term ownership mentality. 2. Leadership and Vision as chairman of the Golden Triangle bid, Billman outlines his vision for a future of downtown Washington, emphasizing the need for innovation, attracting diverse industries and creating a vibrant mixed use environment. His insights into collaborative efforts to revitalize the city offer a roadmap for the future growth.
His unique business strategies discovered Blake Real Estate's distinctive cash flow oriented approach and its impact on their leasing practices and long held lease structure, offering an alternative perspective on real estate operations Gain the Importance of Community and Giving Back Owen reflects on Blake's deep roots in the D.C. community and his personal commitment to giving back through his leadership roles with the American Heart Association.
His experiences underscore the value of community involvement for professional growth and personal fulfillment.
Finally, his insights into the Future of Washington D.C. owen provides an optimistic outlook on the potential for the transformative change in downtown Washington, emphasizing the current unique opportunity for reshaping the city's economic fabric. Whether you are a real estate professional, a business leader or simply interested in a future of urban development, this interview with Owen offers valuable insights in leadership, adaptability and strategic thinking in a dynamic environment.
So without further ado, please enjoy this wide ranging conversation with Owen Billman.
[00:05:32] Speaker A: Owen Billman, welcome to icons of D.C. area real estate. Thank you for joining me today.
[00:05:37] Speaker D: Thanks so much for having me.
[00:05:39] Speaker A: So at a high level Owen, as President of Blake Real Estate, what is your role on a day to day basis today?
[00:05:46] Speaker D: So we have a few things we focus on here. We have the real estate portfolio, the owned portfolio. So first and foremost is always the performance of the owned portfolio. And beyond that we have all of our operating businesses. So our leasing platform, property management, construction management, commercial cleaning. So really it's a juggling act of performance of the owned real estate and all of the other things we do while trying to find areas for growth in dc.
[00:06:23] Speaker A: So a lot of that those side businesses are for third parties as well, not just for the blink portfolio. Correct?
[00:06:30] Speaker D: We try, yeah. So some areas we are able to more successfully take out to market to third party owners and clients. We do a fair amount of third party leasing in town. Property management is something we'd like to do a bit more. On the third party side. Our commercial cleaning business has been probably our most active business growing third party in the last few years.
So we are always looking to grow in those ways. But really it starts with the core portfolio and we work our way out from there.
[00:07:06] Speaker A: Well, we'll get into it later about the core and the basis and behind Blake Real Estate and Blake Construction Prior to that along little bit just for the listeners, I did interview Steve Lustgarten, who is Owen's predecessor here in episode two of the podcast. So I encourage you to listen to that and I'll put it in the show notes. So, Owen, where did you grow up and how did your parents influence you?
[00:07:32] Speaker D: I grew up in Southern Maryland, and anybody who starts with that wide of a region, you know, it's pretty rural. So I grew up in a town called Dunkirk, which is in Calvert County.
[00:07:43] Speaker A: Right.
[00:07:43] Speaker D: It was a pretty quiet place to grow up relative to where I live now and spend my time. So grew up down there. Great parents. I have an older sister. And you know, when you ask how did my parents influence me, they're good people, and I think that's a great place to start. You learn a lot about how to treat other people, how to work hard. I feel very fortunate to have them. I'm hoping that what I've learned from them and maybe even things I can improve on as a, as being a father myself. I have two young kids. I have a great wife who's a terrific mother. And so my, my biggest, hopefully the biggest thing I learned from them is how to just be a good parent because other than my time spent here, my biggest job is really being a husband and being a dad.
[00:08:34] Speaker A: That's great.
[00:08:35] Speaker D: And frankly, I really enjoy it.
[00:08:37] Speaker A: That's awesome. So what did your parents do?
[00:08:42] Speaker D: So my father owned and operated a hardware store in Prince George's county in Clinton.
[00:08:50] Speaker A: Okay, sure.
[00:08:52] Speaker D: And that was something he inherited from his father. And then with his younger. Yeah. And so he owned and ran that for years. For decades, really.
[00:09:03] Speaker A: A retailer, basically.
[00:09:04] Speaker D: Yeah. And kind of akin to. For your listeners are probably more familiar with what's around the D.C. metro. And it's kind of like a Stroh Snyder's type of operation, right? Similar.
[00:09:17] Speaker A: Yeah, sure.
[00:09:17] Speaker D: And I worked there in high school.
[00:09:21] Speaker B: Right.
[00:09:21] Speaker D: So loading mulch into.
[00:09:24] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:09:25] Speaker D: Crumps of cars, cutting keys. I mean, it's some of the little things you learn along the way, like how to change a flapper in a toilet. I grew up in, believe it or not, it was a somebody, you know. Well, Jay Epstein.
[00:09:41] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:09:41] Speaker D: He also grew up working in a hardware store. So he and I have laughed about that before and all the little things you learn. But, you know, I hate to make everything, you know, some, some big picture thing because not everything is. But customer service is important in what we do.
[00:10:00] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:10:01] Speaker D: And I'm sure my dad would kind of laugh a little bit because when you're a teenager and you go to work at your dad's hardware store, you're not always super into it, but I did learn a lot doing that. So that's what he did. My mom stayed home with my sister and I and we had a great childhood.
[00:10:23] Speaker A: So you went to high school down there?
[00:10:25] Speaker D: I did Northern High School in Calvert County. Another thing, another place that no one probably heard of.
[00:10:31] Speaker A: Right, right. And then where'd you go to college?
[00:10:34] Speaker D: I went to University of Maryland. So I was fortunate to get there in 2001 where they went to the Orange bowl in football and won the national championship in hoops. So that was my freshman year.
[00:10:46] Speaker A: What a good start.
[00:10:47] Speaker D: It was a good start. You can only go downhill from there. But yeah, so I went to University of Maryland. It was terrific. I loved every second of being there and growing up in a quieter part of the world and then going to a big state school.
[00:11:10] Speaker A: Eye opening.
[00:11:11] Speaker D: Yeah, it is. It's a bit of a shock to the system. And I had my adjustment period. I think we all do when you. You go away.
But I wouldn't trade it for anything. Those were some of the best years of my life. And a lot of the relationships I made. There are still people very close to me. And it's interesting to see. Now I've done a few speaking engagements at colleges and universities in the last bunch of years to see how different.
I'm not that old. I don't feel that removed from my college experience, but I see what it's like now and it feels a little bit different. I don't know if it's perspective has changed, but.
[00:11:52] Speaker A: So were you in school when 911 hit?
[00:11:54] Speaker D: Yeah. So that was September, my freshman year. We had a really interesting start.
[00:12:00] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:12:00] Speaker D: That's not what everybody's tuning in for. But I'll tell you very quickly, that first month of my freshman year, we had a tornado hit campus, like hit campus. And then 9 11, and I was 17 and in college and living in a dorm with a random roommate. And it was a very odd start. I'll never forget turning on the TV that morning and seeing what was happening. But now, John, we. We hire people, right? There's people in our business who don't remember.
So for my generation, that was very formative.
[00:12:38] Speaker A: They weren't even born right.
[00:12:40] Speaker D: It was very formative. And so for the next generation, it'll be something else. So that was the start to school. Sure.
[00:12:48] Speaker A: Yeah.
So you come to your senior year and what are you thinking about?
[00:12:55] Speaker D: I'm just thinking about graduating okay. Beyond that, you know, I didn't really know. And. And I know this kind of lead us into kind of the start I got, but I didn't really know what I wanted to do. My recollection of that time in my life was. It was a lot of.
It was as much about, where do you want to be as what you want to do. We're getting out of school and lots of friends of mine who are from the Northeast who were going to go live in New York. And so it kind of started with, where do I want to be? Do I want to stay down in this area? I've been here my whole life. Do I want to go somewhere else?
[00:13:31] Speaker A: So taking over your dad's hardware store was not in the cards?
[00:13:34] Speaker D: No, it wasn't in the cards, but they didn't want that. For me, I suppose it could have happened. It's been a great business, and my uncle now owns and runs my dad's younger brother.
So it started with I wanted to stick around the area. I love the D.C. maryland, Virginia area.
And when I got out of school, I really was kind of eyes wide open.
I took an interview at CoStar, not even having an inclination necessarily, that, hey, I really want to be in commercial real estate. It seemed interesting enough. I had interviewed a few other places, and from there I know we'll talk a bit about my early career. But I liked what I heard in the interview and decided I wanted to give it a shot. And being in Bethesda helped. It was a familiar place for me. I had some friends that were going to live there. But thinking again back to. I mentioned earlier the perspective of coming out of college and the seniors in college. The people I meet with now when I spoke at GW or Maryland or AU are so focused. They know freshman, sophomore year exactly what they want to do.
I don't really recall that for a lot of my group coming out, but I think things have changed a bit.
[00:14:57] Speaker A: It's funny, a lot of people think they know what they want to do, but things happen and it pivots.
[00:15:06] Speaker D: I always start with, when I talk to young people, what matters to you, what motivates you? And they got the perfect answer one time for somebody who said, I really love the outdoors and I would love to, like, live in Colorado and, okay, timeout. Start there.
Start there with what matters to you, and build out the rest of it around that idea. Sure. Because it doesn't always have to be about, you know, I studied a certain thing in college, so that's what I'm Committed to for the rest of my life.
[00:15:39] Speaker A: No, no.
So many people I've talked to pivoted beyond their expectations. Almost everyone, I don't know if anybody has had everything mapped out completely from college on. So it's interesting to hear. One of the reasons I ask these questions is to see how the journey unfolds, basically. And that's what my listeners want to hear. So.
So, costar, what did you learn? Costar? Everything about the real estate business, I learned.
[00:16:15] Speaker D: I have to tell you, I think the best thing I had going for me is going into that.
That entry level job with no expectation.
[00:16:25] Speaker A: Right.
[00:16:25] Speaker D: A lot of people I work with, and I remember these moments, saw it as, I want to be in commercial real estate, I want to be a broker, I want to go do this, that, and I have. I have to go here first to work for a year before I can go do what I really want to do. And I think those are the people that probably didn't have as good of experiences as I did because I went in with no expectation, saying, all right, let's learn about this. And I did. I had the benefit of having some really terrific people I worked for there, some of whom I'm still very close with, Dean biologists, who, who is one of the heads of research, is still a very good friend of mine all these years later. But when I got to Costar, we hit the 1 million listing mark.
I was covering Greensboro, Winston Salem, which was a new. I forget what the terminology was.
[00:17:22] Speaker A: Pretty quiet market at that point.
[00:17:23] Speaker D: Well, but it was like, hey, this is a new territory for us we're breaking into. And a lot of the people I talked, talked to was as much about explaining who COSTAR is and what they're doing as it is. And. But now I think about it and gosh, they're so big, I can't, you know, how could there have been a world where people didn't know who COSTAR was doing?
[00:17:44] Speaker A: What we're doing now, what's fascinating about CoStar and I met Annie Florence. His mother worked at the B.F. salt Company when I started there. And so he came in as an undergraduate at Princeton with the ideas that he was going to do. Take Black's Guide, which was the written database for the real estate industry at the time, other than the brokerage firms.
So I met him and I heard his story. It was interesting and it just, you know, obviously unfolded. The Internet hadn't really gotten going and this was, you know, the mid late 80s, you know, 1980s.
But it's interesting Even before that, I started. Well, I was at Prudential when I started, but I subsequently worked at CBRE or what's known at that time as Coldwell Banker Commercial. So the first job of a broker at Coldwell Banker Commercial was a database analyst.
Exactly what you did at CoStar, basically get on the phone, call all the properties for an area, find out when the leases are coming due and write all that down and then compile it in, more or less. At that point it was all hand typed, so they had to write it out on a form, hand it to the secretary who would type it up in a database format, and then the brokers would access that through and they'd make their calls and take that information with them, going to cold call buildings, and they'd go and do it. So this is how the business started. Now, earlier than that, Steve Lusgarden, your predecessor, told me his story, which was fascinating. His first day on the job, somebody threw the phone book on his desk and said, okay, Steve, go through this and start calling, calling people on the phone for our buildings.
[00:19:30] Speaker D: Well, one of the things I learned through that, because the process you're describing is one I know very well.
And I stayed at CoStar for three and a half years, which is two and a half years longer than most people were staying, staying there.
[00:19:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:19:46] Speaker D: But I knew along the way I. I learned what I didn't want to do.
[00:19:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:19:53] Speaker D: So having talked to enough brokers and done the, you know, gathering the information, doing all those things, what I knew what I didn't want to do was go to a big brokerage firm and just make calls for a living. And so, and, and that'll kind of lead me to how I got here. But coming in house for an owner developer was a very different. That's what I wanted. I didn't know how long it would take. Unfortunately, it worked out in a timeline that kind of suited me, but I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to take the phone book and make calls because I was already kind of doing that at CoStar. So again, my time at CoStar, I feel very fortunate to have kind of come up there and I learned the business. I. When I got here, I'd never done a lease deal before, but I.
You learn the language.
[00:20:44] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:20:45] Speaker D: You learn the players, and it gives you the foundation, ideally to go do whatever's next.
And next for me was click.
[00:20:57] Speaker A: Well, as we've learned, information is critical in our industry. I mean, you can't do anything unless you understand what's going on in the marketplace, at least if you're doing transactional work, if you're doing analytical, I mean, if everyone's feeding you the information, you're doing the analysis, that's one thing. But you still need information outside of the deal you're working on to understand whether this fits into the marketplace or not. Right.
[00:21:25] Speaker D: That's exactly.
There are a lot of forces that move, and sometimes it's outside influence that we don't control, but there's a lot of forces that move and shape our market and kind of understanding how those pieces just fit together, which is, again, something I learned. Or don't fit or don't fit moments. I don't want to skip too far ahead, but, you know, 2017, 2018, 2019, you know, all the pre. Covid run up in values.
[00:21:54] Speaker A: Right.
[00:21:54] Speaker D: Business.
[00:21:55] Speaker A: Right.
[00:21:55] Speaker D: We sat back and watched and said, what's going on here? Like, we've got.
We've got vacancy going the wrong direction, and values are increasing 10, 20% per year.
How can these two. These are basic supply demand moments where you're looking and say, this doesn't make any sense. So let's hang back. A lot of it, as it turns out, was being driven by historically low interest rates and a flood of capital into our business in the absence of other worthy investments.
[00:22:31] Speaker A: The way it works usually.
[00:22:33] Speaker D: And so, yeah, just those basic supply demand things that I picked up at, you know, costar when I was 22 or whatever years old.
[00:22:40] Speaker A: Right.
[00:22:41] Speaker D: Helped me make real decisions.
[00:22:43] Speaker A: Well, you saw the global financial crisis. I don't know if you were still at COSTAR at that time or.
[00:22:48] Speaker D: I was there.
[00:22:48] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:22:49] Speaker A: So you saw what happens, you know, when the capital markets just implode.
[00:22:54] Speaker D: And I believe I was on the institutional comps team at the time, which is the team that tracks investment sales.
Yeah, it was.
I feel very fortunate that I was there. That was an insulated part of this. This commercial real estate ecosystem.
[00:23:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:23:13] Speaker D: And watching it, as opposed to living it.
[00:23:16] Speaker A: Were you stunned with what was going on? Because you're looking at data that changed overnight.
[00:23:22] Speaker D: Basically, I was stunned, but I got my own taste of it with COVID Right. So I got to live my own version of it, which, as it turns out, was far more impactful on our local market than the financial crisis, which we were. Right. That's part of the DC story, is how isolated we always were from these negative cycles, which maybe is not so much the case anymore.
[00:23:50] Speaker A: Well, what's. What's really interesting about DC and I've talked about this with others is 2013 was actually more impactful on this market than the global financial crisis because of the sequestration and how it impacted the Defense Department and all the implications of that. There were a lot of second order influences from that and maybe not as much in downtown Washington, but certainly in Northern Virginia, which is interesting.
So how did you find Blake and how'd they find you, Just out of curiosity?
[00:24:23] Speaker D: It's the classic. It's not about what you know, it's about who you know.
[00:24:27] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:24:28] Speaker D: Story. I had a very good friend who's now my co worker of mine, Mike Gordon, who's here, who was at stouteague at the time. And he was kind of an early mentor for me.
And he, he knew I kind of had the itch and was starting to look. And Neil Simon, who ran. Was running leasing for Blake at the time, who knew? Mike said, guy, I'm looking for a new junior guy. Do you know anybody? And it's as simple as that. Mike turned him on to me. I met with Neil, who I love Neil. Neil was a terrific boss, manager, mentor. Neil hired me. So we had a three man team and I learned all of the basics about leasing for Neil. So he brought me on as the junior leasing agent for both.
[00:25:14] Speaker A: Wasn't Neil at Kerry Winston before?
[00:25:16] Speaker D: Yeah, he was Kerry Winston and then Una west, right?
[00:25:20] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:25:21] Speaker D: And then came over later in his career. There was a gentleman who I didn't know who preceded Neil here, Blake, named Steve Hockman. Steve. Unfortunately, I knew Steve. Yeah. So when Steve got sick, Hawkman Steve Lusgarten had to find, Right. Somebody to step in right away. And circumstances brought Neil over to that role. So anyways, I came over as the junior leasing agent June of 2010 and learned all the basics of leasing from Neil, got licensed and did all the early stuff here, learned how to tour. But the great lesson of just being out in the world and talking to people and that's how I ended up here. A referral.
[00:26:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
So talk about your evolution as a leasing agent here at Blake and how you learned how to grow into the role you're in now.
[00:26:16] Speaker D: Yeah, sure. So being on the doing leasing work in house for a developer is very different than a traditional third party brokerage model because you understand that how's and the whys what your leases impact for an owner.
So started off, I'm touring small spaces and doing proposals, but very quickly moved on to understanding lease clauses and form changes. And again, what things matter that we can't live without and what things we can give on. I was very fortunate that I had opportunity early on and I've told this story many times, but I think for any rapid career growth like I had, it has to be a combination of you have to have the chops, the ability, but circumstances also have to go your way. So I get here and I'm working for Neil and another guy named Steve Solomon and certain things that I was comfortable doing as a 20 something or things that they weren't interested in doing or didn't have the inclination. So I spent a lot of time doing net effective rent analysis and things like that. So I was able to add value early on as opposed to just being hopefully the world's best tour guide.
So working on leases and learning from Neil and developing my network in the business because how soon were you exposed.
[00:27:48] Speaker A: To the pro formas and the understanding of the economic impact of the leases that you were negotiating?
[00:27:54] Speaker D: Oh, within the first year. I mean, at a place like Blake, we have a large presence but a small team, so you see everything.
[00:28:08] Speaker A: So you're not in a silo, you're in the big picture right away. Oh yeah, right away.
[00:28:12] Speaker D: So we would have know every Monday morning it was a meeting with Steve Lusgarten who was running Blake, and to go over all of our prospects and net effective rents and everything. And it all had to fit into the big picture. And I also learned very early on that the benefit and the challenge of having a different ownership mentality, there were cash flow oriented ownership model here and that means we're willing to approach transacting in a different way.
And things were different back 2010 to really up until probably 2017, 2018, 2019, we were able to negotiate in a way where we could lower our fixed face rate. We could give more abatement in the absence of putting out more ti, let's just say. Right, right. Because that was more cash flow accretive for us relative to an owner who was seeking a face rate so that they could hit their pro forma and.
[00:29:21] Speaker A: Then exit financing is more important to them.
[00:29:23] Speaker D: Yeah, so, so you know, if you, if you have to hit $50 a foot, then you're going to give in other areas. And for us we'd say, well, we can, we can transact at 47, 46, whatever. And as long as where we end up is accretive on a cash flow basis because our partners care more about distributions than they care about an irr.
[00:29:41] Speaker A: Because we're not selling or refinancing.
[00:29:45] Speaker D: Right. Or refinancing so that certainly worked to our advantage in some cases.
But I must, you know, by the time we got to 17, 18, 19, concession packages were so substantial that we had less flexibility because just to get their number, so many other of our competitors in town were hyper aggressive with concessions. And now it started to become the gap became so much that it was looked at as well, you guys aren't meeting the market.
So we had to change our focus a bit then. But yeah, at Blake, your in the mix day one. And you see, ideally, if your eyes are open, you're going to see the big picture about what matters here and how all the puzzle pieces fit together.
[00:30:35] Speaker A: And as I remember, and of course I've helped Steve Lustgarten finance about four of your buildings. And one of the interesting elements that maybe going back to the beginning of Blake Real Estate was that your lease form was different than the marketplace and you have a different approach to reimbursements and a few other things than the standard marketplace. It may have been more, as I remember when I began the career, the New York method, which was a different way of looking at leasing and how reimbursements were calculated and how, you know, core, core factors, everything else, these different measurement.
And it may go back to the, the foundation of the firm, which was a construction company that was looking to maximize cash flow at that point in the construction side. And the leases were structured in a way that were conforming closer to GSA format than maybe the rest of the marketplace wanted to fit into. So I'm waxing all this for you to explain to me what the differences are between your lease and what the rest of the marketplace is. If it's still this case, if you've not adapted since then, it, it is.
[00:31:49] Speaker D: Still the case for the most part.
And, and why? For a couple reasons. Okay. Part, part of our, our pitch on our kind of commodity B portfolio that caters to a thousand to five thousand foot tenants is the ease of doing business with us.
So we can typically turn around a transaction, a lease negotiation very quickly. And also we have a more straightforward approach to expense reimbursement. So we charge a higher than is typical escalation and we do not pass through OPEX over a base year. So the market is basically 2.5% escalation plus opex and taxes over a base year. We are higher than 2.5% on our escalation and we only pass through taxes over a base year. Now that works for and against you.
I feel like early in my career there was more of a willingness in the market to understand and adapt to a different ownership style and structure. The more institutional our market became, the less willing brokers were, I feel like, to bring forward something to their clients that was different than what they were seeing everywhere else. So the more niche our approach became, the more of a problem it was in explaining how we did business because everybody else had kind of moved to one model and we were different. So again, ideally on the pro side of the spectrum, the differences, ease of administration, less unknown year to year on what your expense pass throughs are going to be. But you have to have parties that are willing to understand and explain that to their client and why maybe that's good or bad. And then frankly, the other thing that, that pinches us a little bit is base rent got so high in town relative to OPEX that the delta on which you were charging the additional escalation on became bigger.
So there's been circumstances where we've had to adjust for really large transactions. But yes, we do have a different approach. It's served us well in the past. It's probably more of a challenge these days. And the reason we've stuck with it is we have so many leases. Yes. That are, are structured that way.
It's a.
[00:34:31] Speaker A: How many leases are in your portfolio? Well, have you figured that out?
[00:34:34] Speaker D: We have. From building to building. We have.
[00:34:37] Speaker A: You have over a thousand leases in your portfolio.
[00:34:38] Speaker D: I mean I think it says 70 over there, probably not a thousand because some of our larger buildings have large GSA leases which are multi street, sometimes multi agency, but still one lease. But it is a daunting thought to go through a building that may have 70 plus leases and say one by one, as these leases roll, we're going.
[00:35:01] Speaker A: To go from changing the structure.
[00:35:03] Speaker D: Yeah. Prior structure to new structure. And by the way, our accounting team or property management team and you're just going to have to do the juggling act until all of these leases fully roll. So we've stuck with it for now. I think it's more likely that as the portfolio turns over in terms of redevelopment, those are the opportunities to go to a new. A new approach.
[00:35:23] Speaker A: Interesting. Yeah, it's, it's like the sense I got from the brokerage community was that Blake speaks a different language than the rest of the marketplace. So maybe that was part of it. But you know, we've over.
[00:35:35] Speaker D: Yeah, I, I remember getting here early on with Neil teaching me, you know, hey, there's certain things that we do differently here. Not. And not everybody likes it. So you're, you're fighting an uphill battle with some broken brokers who don't want to deal with doing things differently.
[00:35:51] Speaker A: Right. It's hard for them to compare if they're shopping a lease.
[00:35:56] Speaker D: But I think we've come a long way and, and it's not, it's not a knock on how we used to do business, but growing with the times is something we've had to just adapt to. And sure, and. And maybe some of my time when I was running the leasing group helped to that. But I've got Mike Gordon, who runs our leasing group now, who does such a terrific job, and he's helped us get to where we want to go.
[00:36:18] Speaker A: So, as you know, I interviewed your present Steve Lusgarden five years ago before the COVID 19 pandemic. Steve shared his long history with the firm and its history as one of the leading construction companies in Washington D.C. and the nation.
Talk about how you transitioned from your prior role into leadership at the firm.
Detail.
[00:36:40] Speaker D: Yeah, sure. So my path was I was on the leasing team. Gosh, 2010-2014, Neil Simon was going to retire. I had an opportunity to step into the role of vice president at Blake and overseeing the leasing team, which is really the transactional side of what we do then. That was my first management experience, management of people, which was interesting, and hiring and doing things I hadn't done before. And then along the way, Steve Lusca was going to retire and I was one of the people considered for that opportunity. And I was very fortunate to have the chance to step into that role. I think in part certainly because I was qualified, but also because I understood the Blake model. Like it's not a normal circumstance to step into. We've got our third generation of family leadership here. If you come over from a merchant developer, we don't transact that often. We're not developing except leases. We're doing leases, sure. But all the things that drive the business for capital markets. Yeah, for our competitors, I mean, aren't. Aren't relevant here. Not all. They're not entirely irrelevant, but it's not what our day to day we focus on here at Blake. So I wasn't around during the Blake construction days. There were a lot of legacy Blake construction things that we had been moving away from that Steve kind of moved us into the next phase of what we're here as Blake Real Estate that I'm trying to now go to that next step since I've been in this role.
[00:38:31] Speaker A: So expanding on this perhaps recent Blake history at a high level, until Steve's retirement and then discuss what David Bender, the company ownership and you have done to the firm and portfolio since then, if you want to expand on that.
[00:38:47] Speaker D: So David Bender's our chairman. He's generation three of the family. When I stepped into this role, I got together with David and the conversation was a pretty simple one, which is ideally I can do anything you want me to do, but let's figure out what that is. We've now got an opportunity to chart the next 40 years for the company.
Does Generation 3 want to exit? Does Generation 3 want to kind of play out through towards the latter part of their generation and then look for an exit maybe in 10 or 15 years? Or do they want to get it to generations four and generations five? And of course, like most family offices, the answer was we want to keep this thing going.
So with David's leadership, myself, our cfo, we conceived of a roll up strategy which I can get into as much detail as you'd like, but the idea was a roll up would help reshape our ownership structure to allow us a better platform to utilize for growth. Because one of the first things we landed on is if we're going to get out to generations four and five, we need to grow.
There's more leaves on the tree, the branches are getting heavier. We need to grow the portfolio to support these future generations. But the way we were set up wasn't super conducive to that. We were siloed. Everything we owned was in general limited partnerships. And so a roll up would allow us to flatten that out and allow us better access to our tremendous cash reserves and the tremendous equity we had in the portfolio as opposed to cherry picking out of one prior deal to go do new deal. So that was maybe the first couple years, which took a bit longer than we had hoped only because we had Covid kind of pop up very early on which, which distracted us greatly. And then in, in the last, you know, 24 months or so since it's the roll ups been closed, we've been able to go out and start executing on our growth strategy.
[00:41:01] Speaker A: So when you say rollup, typically individual assets are have their own LLC and you know, to do a roll up structure of some sort, it could be, if it's a private one, it could be a private reit, it could be structured as a, you know, a master limited partnership structure. Whether you have the partnerships rolling up into a master partnership kind of of thing. How did you structure yours?
[00:41:29] Speaker D: Yeah, it was kind of, kind of similar to the latter as you Explained. So we have a master llc, the Holdco basically that we created where our partners contributed their interests on a relative value basis from whatever maybe they were in three or four of the deals, maybe they had an ownership stake in one of the operating businesses on a relative value basis, they contributed their interest to the holding company and now they own units, got it in the llc. So it's akin to, it's like a.
[00:41:59] Speaker A: Private reit, but we don't call it.
[00:42:02] Speaker D: That for a few reasons.
But we also put all of our operating businesses in the holding company as well. So again, that helped us flatten out the ownership structure where these days the operating businesses, every dollar we make is actually more accretive for us at the holding company because of valuations of real estate. Instead of a 20x on a 5 cap, it's changed dramatically. And so those operating business dollars are performing at equal to or better than the real estate net cash flow. So we did the Holdco structure and now the Holdco has tremendous assets that we can tap into far more easily. Easily than the siloed approach.
[00:42:51] Speaker A: And when I last spoke to Steve, your leverage for portfolio wide was sub 20% roughly. And my guess is it's even lower than that now. Unless you've done some financing since then.
[00:43:04] Speaker D: Yeah, it was, pardon me, 2019. We could say it's like 10%, but the denominator changes. When values went down, our, our leverage basically went up. Only because it's a relative discussion.
[00:43:20] Speaker A: I don't think you can do anything about it.
[00:43:22] Speaker D: Yeah. So we are very lowly levered. We actually just paid off a loan at one of our buildings. So that remains the case today. We have no interest in levering up to pull money out and do different things because we still have such tremendous access to capital. But we do now have more flexibility if we wanted to use leverage as our friend to help us go transact into debt.
[00:43:49] Speaker A: You wanted to acquire things. Yeah.
[00:43:51] Speaker D: So certainly new acquisition opportunities, we'd use debt and we did before. But when you own buildings for 50 years with a strategy towards paying down the debt, then you end up in a position like we're in. So certainly any new acquisition activity, that's our friend. Leverage returns are certainly more impactful than unlevered returns. So we would use it. But we are still in that very low levered position. Yes.
[00:44:19] Speaker A: So how do you see taking advantage of the marketplace today? We have a unique market, we have a new administration now that has a different outlook about downtown Washington.
You know, the pandemic had probably a more Dramatic effect on this marketplace than any other Circumstance in my 40 years in this market here almost. And you know, just walking here from Metro, I counted one person from on a two block walk and you know, in 2019 I would have seen 50.
So physically the streets are less traveled, the buildings are less, you know, Monday and Friday are vacant. Basically on Tuesday through Thursday they might be 50%, 60% full if that.
Even today, after five years after the pandemic took place, what impact has that had on your portfolio? How does that, how do you look at that? How does that make you feel as a company? When I think of companies in downtown Washington, Blake is one of the three or four biggest players in the downtown area. So it's had more impact on Yuru than just about anybody else, I would think, or as much. So talk about that a little bit, if you would.
[00:45:40] Speaker D: Yeah, so there's, there has been an impact, but it also, because you mentioned earlier, it leads to opportunity ideally as well. We're still 87% leased.
[00:45:49] Speaker A: That's great.
[00:45:50] Speaker D: With one building that is a kind of a near term in next five years, ish redevelopment that's, that's very vacant. So if you take that out, which is somewhat intentionally, very low leased, we're in the low 90s percent lease. So impact, impact early on and where we were able to take advantage was there was lots of indecision and this is not news to anybody who's listening to your podcast, but lots of indecision in the market around leasing from tenants. So what do we need? Where are we going to spend our time?
How much space, how long of a term are we willing to commit to? And we had tremendous flexibility in our portfolio because the demands on our returns are very different than others. So where some of our competitors in the market, 2020 through 2023, let's say, were unable or unwilling to transact. We were able and very willing and we fund a lot of our deals from reserves. So there was belief and trust in the market that we would perform as a landlord. So we didn't always love every deal, but we were able to transact and keep the buildings full through again, let's say 2020 to 2023. I think in the last year and a half there's been a bit of a shift, but so we're able to stay very well leased. Which again goes back to what matters to our owners is cash flow. The opportunity that comes along with that is as others are unable to or again unwilling to transact, there are opportunities to buy a distressed asset let's say the thought process was again 2020-2023 that the only thing you could could do with any of these distressed assets was a conversion. Again, these days there's a more entrepreneurial look at if you can do trophy office, you can be successful as well because there's such a limited supply of trophy. So we would look at a lot of the deals in town, but we had no inclination. Frankly, we don't have the expertise. Nor did were we believers in all the conversions that traded. So we weren't a conversion player. But we took a run at a few office buildings in town with an eye towards keeping it as office. We knew at the right basis we could be successful. So you're going to buy an A building at a number that allows you to compete with B buildings. It's a pretty simple approach. Capitalizing those deals is very tricky. There's not a really terrific alignment.
[00:48:45] Speaker A: How many lenders are willing to do that?
[00:48:46] Speaker D: Well, there's not a terrific alignment of debt and equity. So there are some more entrepreneurial equity out there, but there's not any entrepreneurial debt. You can find debt on stabilized.
[00:49:04] Speaker A: There are the debt funds. You can go to the debt funds.
[00:49:07] Speaker D: Well, so okay, so if you're willing to pay mid to high teens.
[00:49:11] Speaker A: That's never been Blake's strategy.
[00:49:12] Speaker D: Yeah, right. So it goes back to our approach. So we took a run at one building that we weren't successful in getting. But our approach was we wanted to raise the capital and buy at 100% equity because it had a lease up component, some other things. And then when we had stabilization, we would go out and recast the deal. So we've, we've had that. So when you talk about the impact Covid has had and people downtown, our retailers have been hit hard. Our attitude is we as much as is reasonable, we'd like to work with our retailers, keep them in the buildings. If we need to recut leases, we've done that because our business is really upstairs.
And retail these days is more of an amenity to the buildings that makes it attractive to lease space upstairs. As far as you mentioned people being downtown, we've really gone through fits and starts of people coming back to D.C. and days where I see lots of traffic and I wonder, well, where's everybody going? Because I don't see them all downtown these days. With some of the changes the new administration is, has brought with the federal government, we have seen more activity in very specific locations when the agencies are coming back. But you're five years out from COVID now and I think whatever. Right. Sizing for the most part has happened. So now it's the new world that we're living in. And sitting at 87% leased at the end of that story feels pretty good.
[00:50:54] Speaker A: So a significant part of Blake's buildings, or at least a gsa, or at least they were. I don't know if that's still the case or other federal government agencies.
Are you facing forced terminations among some of your leases and how are you managing that process?
[00:51:10] Speaker D: We are not. We do have quite a.
A large GSA presence in our portfolio.
None of it is what you call soft term. A 15 year lease with only 10 years firm. We don't have any soft term leases, we don't have any termination options. So we feel pretty good about our leases.
We also have some agencies that are maybe some of the stronger agencies.
[00:51:42] Speaker A: National security.
[00:51:43] Speaker D: Yeah, national security, right. So their presence is probably a bit stronger these days.
But I don't think any of us feel great about what's happening with some of these people that do GSA leasing. We don't feel terrific about what's happening with these leases.
I think everybody recognizes that there was some waste with government leasing, but how it's being addressed is more of the concern for people that do what I do, of course. So, yeah, we feel fine about our leases we've got. Fortunately, we also did a fair amount of leasing probably the five years leading up to what changed everything with COVID So we do have some long term leases in place, we've got some near term expirations and we're working with the agencies now to figure out what their needs are. And we're hoping to the extent there is interest in being with us, we're trying to capture 100% of that interest.
I think more broadly, one of the things we just went through recently was we had a loan maturity at one of these buildings that has GSA leasing.
And we learned, which wasn't totally surprising to us, how GSA leasing and turnover is viewed in the capital markets, which of course is negative. We had a lot of flexibility in how we handled that loan maturity. So we dealt with it and moved on. But I imagine for people in a more highly levered position who often relied on the credit of the federal government GSA leases, I mean, this is more your world than even mine. It's going to be a challenge to finance those buildings even if you have long term GSA leases.
[00:53:45] Speaker A: So one of the buildings I financed for Blake was 1800 G Street, which I think is your largest building in your portfolio.
[00:53:52] Speaker D: That's right.
[00:53:53] Speaker A: And I believe that 100%, not including the retail, but 100% of that building was GSA or related federal government tenants. Virginia, I think, doesn't come under GSA. It has its own administration, which I think VA was a big tenant there. They may still be. But you had the White House. You had a lot of interesting tenants in that building.
That building, if you had a lease maturity and you had a refinancing, that would be an interesting challenge to me because it's all gsa, but they were all long term leases at the time. But that was when I financed that building. It was in the 1990s. So we're talking almost 30 years ago. Not quite. I think 25 years ago maybe. So a lot of those leases I'm sure have rolled over and turned. But I'm guessing that building particularly is still pretty dominant by GSA.
[00:54:47] Speaker D: It is our largest building, over 600,000 square feet, 50,000 square foot floor plate. Yeah, it's not the way you design buildings today. So it is and will continue to be for as long as agencies want to be there. It will be a predominantly GSA leased building.
That is still the case.
We do have.
So you mentioned va.
We do have some long term leases and we do have some near term expirations.
And that was a great example of a recent financing exercise where we had to be more entrepreneurial in our approach to financing simply because it's too much exposure to A, against near term expirations, but B, your largest tenant, it's harder to bank on those leases than it used to be.
[00:55:48] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:55:49] Speaker D: So we've managed through over there fine, fortunately. But you're exactly right in how you portrayed the situation. Again, you've lived it and you know the lenders better than I do. You know they're not.
Office is not their highest priority.
[00:56:08] Speaker A: It's probably the bottom.
[00:56:10] Speaker D: DC is not a favorable office market and GSA leasing is not a favorable tenancy. So you've got a lot working against you.
[00:56:18] Speaker A: Yeah, it's the polar opposite of where it was when we didn't do.
[00:56:24] Speaker D: That's about as good as you can do.
[00:56:25] Speaker A: It was. It was the golden standard. In fact, the spread of that loan was the lowest spread spread that this.
[00:56:31] Speaker B: Lender had ever done.
[00:56:32] Speaker A: When I did it, that's what we.
[00:56:33] Speaker D: Were just coming off of.
[00:56:35] Speaker A: Steve said it was incredible. You know, he was so pleased at the time and it's a little different today.
So let's see, he recently took the lead for the Golden Triangle Bid, and it is exploring new ways to evolve following changes in the office environment. How is the bid addressing these challenges?
[00:57:01] Speaker D: The Golden Triangle Bids are really terrific organization. I think the roles of bids has changed dramatically in the last 10 years, from activations and keeping the streets clean and safe to really being an advocate for neighborhoods within the city's broader structure.
So I joined the BID a couple years ago. I took over chairing the board last year. We are very fortunate to have a strong board. We're very well represented with owners in the bid. So a representation from acreage and car and others.
The bid is working very closely with city leadership to make sure that the city understands what commercial landlords need to ideally reshape our downtown. Right. So there's the downtown bid, there's Golden Triangle bid, and there's others. But to reshape our commercial district downtown. So I've been a part of many conversations with, with other board members and with the city around what is most impactful and how can the city help with redevelopment. So I don't weigh in a ton on conversion discussions, but I know that's an area that the city is really intent on supporting. They want to bring more residents downtown into the Golden Triangle. I, along with others, have been more vocal about what's most impactful to an office owner who wants to maybe put up a new office building to do new trophy office development. It's very.
There are certain things that are a bit more prohibitive in the planning process and other things that I won't spend a ton of time on. But it's also really expensive to build a new building. Construction costs are way up. So how can the city. Maybe it's a tax abatement program or what other ways can. And they help in getting us to what's next in the Golden Triangle and other parts of downtown. Because we need transformative change.
And it's very hard to put those kinds of opportunities together when access to capital is really difficult.
There's a lacking tenant base in town, and you have owners that don't have the wherewithal. Blake has a tremendous cash reserve and a basis that allows us probably a lot more flexibility than our competitors. But we want to see other people in town do new development. Of course, we're not going to lead every new development just because maybe we're able to. And the city's been really terrific in engaging in that way. And so Leona, who runs the Golden Triangle Bid, is out there every day engaged with me and Albert and Brooke Pinto and Mayor Bowser to say, here's what these owners need.
[01:00:16] Speaker A: So my question to everybody that owns real estate today in the commercial sector is why be here?
So that's my question. So tell me, you know, when you have this work from home offset right now.
So the question is, why do people get in a car in the morning and come down to the office when they could do everything they want and need at their home desk, office?
So there's got to be a reason to come.
So the reasons I've been told are collaboration with your colleagues, the incidental bumping into somebody in the office physically. Oh, you remind me, I need to catch up with you about something. You know, that and then the human need to physically be together. So those are the three things that I've, that I've gleaned from all my conversations here. And I don't know if anybody, I mean, there are firms out there doing studies on this. The architectural firms are doing it. I mean, it's eroding value of real estate work nationally, worldwide, because of, you know, the social trend. So the question is, how would you answer that question? Why are your tenants willing to continue paying rent and using the space and. Or saying we're going to downsize or we're not going to renew our lease because nobody wants to come down here anymore. So why answer that question for me?
[01:01:40] Speaker D: Sure. So I think there's two parts. There's why D.C. and there's why come to the office? So starting with the mic, why come to the office? And I'll sprinkle in a couple, a couple of anecdotes here. So I remember early Covid having lunch with Jay Epstein and talking about what are the big law firms?
[01:02:00] Speaker A: Let me stop for a second. Jay Epstein. I've interviewed with Fred Klein of DLA Piper, who was one of the leading real estate attorneys in the city.
[01:02:09] Speaker D: Yeah. And Jay and Fred, I'm very fortunate, are two of my closest mentors and advocates. And so Jay said this was, I mean, this was early Covid. Well, our, our thought is we're going to have people come back, whatever it was, two days or three days a week and. But everybody's going to be there on the same day because that way we get, hey, we get the collaboration, whatever. And I remember saying, well, how does that change your space needs?
Even if it's just one day, if everybody's going to be there on the same day, don't you still need the same amount of space? So we've evolved from that very kind of basic Conversation on like, what does all this mean to now where I think there's more of a. First of all, I think in D.C. a lot of the right sizing has already taken place.
So where firms are today and you're even seeing it now with growth, the firms, not just law firms, but plenty of other tenants in town, are now starting to grow again because maybe the pendulum took swing.
[01:03:16] Speaker A: Except for gsa.
[01:03:18] Speaker D: Well, gsa.
So in the private sector, and I remember for our office, we came back five days a week full time July of 2021.
And my message to our senior leadership was each.
You all run your departments. You have to determine what the market is for people that do the things that you do. Very easy in construction, property management, other things that are high touch on site disciplines. Okay, so we can't do construction remotely, so we'll just go ahead and do it in person.
But accounting, we have flexibility with our accounting stuff that we didn't have. Because if you wanted to keep your good people, you had to. Okay, so fine. So I think the way people use space is largely back to how it was utilized before. I think the right sizing has already taken place.
I can tell you that my interactions with other leaders of companies in town really align with the things you mentioned earlier. I don't think there's any expectation in running a company that everybody who works at the company has 40 hours of work on the nose every week of the year. However, our ask is that you're around the business, you're around your coworkers, and so we talk about collaboration. Collaboration, to me, actually is your second point. Collaboration is. I've been meaning to talk to you about something and I'm not going to interrupt the Zoom meeting or call you after. That's almost never happened. I don't think in the history of Zoom meetings, however, that's the kind of thing where you grab. Grab, you know. Hey, John, I've been meaning to talk to you. Okay. That is real. I'll never forget my. Our first. I do a lot fair amount of charity work in a first in person charitable board meeting we had whenever it was 2022 or 2023, we went 30 minutes over because everybody had so many things to say to one another and it's like, well, why didn't that happen over the last two or three years?
So that to me is the collaboration we're missing. I agree with you.
But the more interesting discussion, as you kind of posed it, is around why dc?
Like, why be here? Because.
And part of the COVID impact Was why don't we just locate in a suburban office that's near, let's say a lot of our people live in Montgomery County, Bethesda. Why not be in Bethesda? Why come down? Because hey, we get the collaboration, we get all those things.
Does a DC address matter anymore? I had many, my early experience doing leasing here was I would have conversations, people say, well, we need a DC address or more specifically we need a.
[01:06:16] Speaker A: K Street address and we'll pay up for it.
[01:06:18] Speaker D: Or a Pennsylvania Avenue address and we'll pay up for it. Okay, one of the things to go back to the Golden Triangle question is one of the things that we've tried to make very clear is we need a new brand or a pitch for YDC that we haven't. We don't. I know there is lots of data and reasons to say it's the caliber of the workforce and the highly educated population, all these things.
But we haven't had to compete for new industry in this town the way other markets have. Okay, so Amazon's a great example when they were coming to town.
And look, Blake doesn't have these kinds of large format opportunities where we go after an Amazon, Amazon. But I don't believe we had a great pitch for why to look at in D.C. proper.
[01:07:20] Speaker B: Right?
[01:07:20] Speaker D: Because when we talk about D.C. commercial real estate, that is D.C. and the surrounding inner metros, right. Tysons, inner Montgomery county and so Arlington, we are a downtown D.C. organization. So to us it's the YDC question and we have been actively working on what that message is and why you should want to be here. So there's an initiative that's being led by the Golden Triangle on an innovation district in Penn west which is start from the White House, go west out of Pennsylvania Avenue over towards gw. You've got highly educated workforce, you've got all the monetary agencies with imf, World bank, ifc and can we create a node where there's an attraction for tech or finance? New York, Boston, everybody has their thing in terms of industry. Our thing was government and government adjacent. And now that is not as impactful as it once was. So we have to grow and adapt now.
[01:08:21] Speaker A: Dramatically so.
[01:08:22] Speaker D: Dramatically so look, that's not just downtown dc, right that Tyson's in Northern Virginia has the government contractors where they're going to be impacted as well. So great financial crisis would have had the impact on New York, for example, that we're facing now with what's happening, we're really having to change our attitude. And that's why, hey, let's get people living downtown. Let's make it more of a 24 7. This was a 9 to 5 Monday through Friday town and everybody thought that was terrific. Now it's changed and we have to change with it.
[01:08:59] Speaker A: Yeah. So the question is how?
And since you're the head of the Golden Tranquil bid, to me, that entity and Georgetown and all the other bids in town have to figure out a way to bring people back into the city, get the streets vibrant again. What do you do to animate what's going on in the city on the streets? Retail does that and people living here do that. So the question is, how do you facilitate that activity? The capital markets are not your friend right now for that. So it's going to take to me, philanthropic investment to some extent, believe it or not, in which a David Rubenstein might say, I'm going to invest in the city. And he has.
But I look at your family office here at this firm. It's a good place to invest because it means something for you. So looking at your company investing in, let's say, Farragut Square, do something at Farragut Square that's exceptional. Just do something that, wow, I want to be there. I mean, in 2019, there were food trucks up and down L Street. I don't see them anymore. Why not? People aren't on the streets. So that kind of environment. And you go to New York, you go to. What's the name of the park? 40th street, starts with a B, big park there. Food trucks literally all the way around. And that's because there's a vibrant pedestrian traffic there. So how do you, how do you, how do you inspire people to be here?
[01:10:37] Speaker D: So this goes back to the broad question, which is who's here and how do they spend their time?
[01:10:42] Speaker B: Right.
[01:10:43] Speaker D: And so if.
Look, I sidetracked us for a moment. I remember negotiating retail leases back and again, pre. Covid.
[01:10:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:10:52] Speaker D: Where they would say, well, we're going to be here in your building, open from 7am to 4pm Monday through Friday. And that's it. And that that level of business, just those hours could, could sustain $100 triple net retail lease. Okay. So that was the volume and the density of people that were here just to work.
[01:11:14] Speaker A: It's sales volume.
[01:11:15] Speaker D: Yeah. And so where with the Golden Triangle bid and other owners and other well meaning organizations in town, Federal, city council and others that I'm a part of, sure are trying to position ourselves for is how do we make this more of a 247 city because then the food trucks don't care if less people are downtown because lots of people live here. And so they're still going to wander out and grab a burrito, whatever it is. So it's a combination of things. Number one, we need new industries in town that would bring different workers and different hours and things that can complement our city, but in a different way than the federal government has. And then ideally also that brings people who want to live nearby downtown residents would change dramatically.
The vibrancy, when you talk about vibrancy and activation and the city having a spirit, it's really getting people down. So it's the residential. It also can be tourism.
It also can be the activation of, you know, we have Nap Geo. Yeah, A couple blocks out my window, National Geographic to the east. National Geographic. And they're, I don't know how much longer they have to go, but they've been working for years now on a massive renovation. Okay, so when that's done, what kind of people is that going to draw downtown? How about this? How many higher ed, how many universities have located?
[01:12:55] Speaker A: Indiana University just signed a lease.
[01:12:56] Speaker D: Indiana University, you've got usc, who bought the old NAB building, that Stream redeveloped Pepperdine.
[01:13:03] Speaker A: I mean, you can go down the list.
[01:13:04] Speaker D: There's a lot of, okay, so it's another initiative of the Golden Triangle. It's how do you try to wrangle that interest from higher ed and position ourselves as a destination for every higher ed should want to be here. And here's why. Because that brings in a young, vibrant base of people. People who are going to go to the coffee shops, they're going to ride the metro and they're going to spend their time, they're spend their time on the weekends here.
So beyond that, I think there are opportunities for larger transformational projects like this where we sit today, which is at 1150 Connecticut Avenue, it's a triangular block that has six buildings on it of which we own three.
If you could, and we've bandied about with how to do this, it's not so simple.
If you could, whether it's through a consortium of all the owners on the block or you could acquire all the building, you could assemble it, you could do a million square foot mixed use project. And that's the kind of thing the city wants to get behind, where you could bring in mixed use and other interesting ideas to. The Golden Triangle has been doing a study on, well, what are transformational uses beyond just, hey, we want to have the best retail.
[01:14:22] Speaker A: Well, you could take one of your Buildings like the Bender building, which is the oldest building I think in your portfolio, if I'm not mistaken, it is and it is at the prime corner. So in essence you could take that building and redevelop it completely into a mixed use facility. And if the Height act changed in Washington, that building would be a candidate to go up 30 stories potentially. If you could get that done now that won't happen, at least in our lifetime, I don't think. But someday that might happen. And because it's right across from Metro, so you have a TOD perfect mixed use development site. It's about as good a site as anywhere in downtown Washington.
[01:15:04] Speaker D: The Height act is an interesting. We've had that conversation many times. I think it would really support new development in terms of attraction. Maybe you bring some of the Tysons or Rosin centric groups downtown, maybe you can get another buck a square foot on resi.
It also adds more density, conceivably more supply, where right now we're in a know we're on a negative supply cycle which is appropriate and needed.
So.
Yes, I agree, but you're right. There are lots of locations like, like the Bender building that it just, we need to understand, you know, we, we. That building was completed in 1959.
[01:15:54] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:15:55] Speaker D: And we're, we're going to redevelop it at some point, but we want to get it right. So we have the benefit of patience there. We just don't know what's next. If we did, we might just go tomorrow.
[01:16:07] Speaker A: So I was just in New York. Was it last weekend? Weekend, yeah. Not last, the weekend before. So I toured Hudson Yards. Have you seen Hudson Yards?
[01:16:17] Speaker D: I haven't been there, but I've seen all.
[01:16:20] Speaker A: You have to see it. Yeah, you have to see it. I mean it was, it's built similar to what Akridge has here in Union Station where they have that, the air rights over all the tracks. It's in directly analogous to that. There's probably. It's a city in itself. There must be 8 million square feet there. I mean it's massive.
They have a center courtyard area. Then they have this building in the center that has arts in it called the Shed. So you have to see that. I mean to me downtown Washington could do that. Potentially you may not be able to get that kind of density and you know, at that concentrated a level. But it would make the city, it would be, it would change, it would transform the city overnight.
[01:17:05] Speaker D: So that's exactly what we've been talking about, the Golden Triangle to say. Well what are some versions of that that are applicable to our city? You remember far better than I will the transformational impact that at the time MCI Center.
[01:17:20] Speaker A: Yes.
[01:17:20] Speaker D: Had on the East End.
[01:17:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:17:22] Speaker D: Right. And so when A Poland came in and did that project and then Douglas.
[01:17:27] Speaker A: Development did all their buildings.
[01:17:29] Speaker D: So I give that as my bad example all the time in our meetings to say what could be our Capital One arena. We don't need another arena. Right. And wherever the commanders.
[01:17:40] Speaker A: I'll look at Nance Park.
[01:17:41] Speaker D: Sure. Exactly. The wharf. So that the place making idea. Now what's hard about that though is you have such a disparate group of owners and motivations. So going back to my example of our block, six buildings, one, two, three, four different owners and everybody's motivations are different. So how do you bring together everyone to act together or how do you assemble and go and do.
[01:18:11] Speaker A: Well, you sit down with them, which we've.
[01:18:13] Speaker D: Yeah. And so we've done that. But it is especially in today's environment where people are really working with one arm behind their back because of the demands on their capital and their returns.
So we recognize that and we've got, and I don't want to overshare because we haven't made it public yet, but we've got one or two uses that we believe could be.
You give the Hudson Yards example, what could you drop into D.C. and have be transformational. We've worked extensively on that programming and we think we have a couple options. It's just a matter of how do.
[01:18:56] Speaker A: You execute what you have. Now you're in a unique. You personally are in a unique position because you're the president of one of the largest development companies in 10 and have one of the largest landlord 10 and you're the head of the bid and you're on the Federal City Council, so you have some influence. You could sit down with somebody like Ray Ritchie and Oliver Carr and a few other people that own other buildings of analogous space and come up with a master plan for downtown Washington that could be really cool. And Gensler's headquarters at 2020 KK street as well. I mean I interviewed Jordan Goldstein. I said, Jordan, look out this window and tell me what you would do here on K Street. He said, I obviously I would tear down buildings and not replace them and put parks and it's place. Some of it's. That's one idea there just. He had a whole slew of ideas. I said, then sit down with the landlords in the city and figure it out.
[01:19:51] Speaker D: So. So that is actually what's happening right now. So when you. What I mentioned earlier, that planning and some of the parties that you mentioned. Yes, okay. So. Yes. So.
[01:20:03] Speaker A: And I've interviewed all of them.
[01:20:04] Speaker D: Right. So we are working on that. And I gotta tell you, it's nice to be. I feel very fortunate to be a part of that, in part, because the things that when people ask me, hey, how are you doing with all this and Covid and now the new stuff with the administration, the short answer is we're fine. At Blake, we're fine. But on a personal level, the things that excite you about doing what we do are growth and opportunity. And we are having to recreate the wheel, so to speak, here. And collaborating with the people you mentioned, because that's what's happening right now, has been a motivator in a world of almost every move is defensive. So it's fun to be on the upswing, at least in your mind, to say, what can we do next? And that's a motivator.
[01:21:09] Speaker A: Yeah. So you as a group could go sit down with Donald Trump, literally, and say, okay, Mr. Trump, you're a developer, too. You understand real estate. Let's take a walk down K Street. You can just. And then walk the area with us. And let me tell you, this city would be special and you could leave a nice legacy as President of the United States if you allowed us to do what we think would be best. And you agree, because you would think the same way. I mean, to me, it's a tremendous opportunity.
[01:21:39] Speaker D: It is. And I think. And so the. Which I'm not part of the developer roundtable, I think has a bit more access at that level. But I think some of the things that we do have on the near term, coming with the renovations to Capital One arena, with Monumental Sports staying in town. That's a part of it.
[01:21:58] Speaker A: Bob Murphy's buying a gallery place, which is an interesting play.
[01:22:02] Speaker D: Well, they, you know, some, you know, lucky and good are great things. They're really good at what they do. And the fact that Monumental then turned and came back their way.
[01:22:14] Speaker A: Right.
[01:22:14] Speaker D: It's terrific for the city and I'm really happy for Bob and the team. The possibility of the commanders coming back downtown. Andy Van Horn, who's over there now, is a good friend of mine who's going to do a terrific job on their behalf. Those are.
[01:22:28] Speaker A: That's brand new, too. Yeah, he just started there.
[01:22:32] Speaker D: He did. Those are some early good wins.
Now it's what's next. And ideally, I can be part of that. That's certainly what we're trying for.
[01:22:45] Speaker A: Okay, well, I've got goosebumps talking about this. I'm just getting really jazzed because I talk to all these people and I say it's there and the city wants to do it, too. So the question is, what catalyzes that? And the catalyst, as you suggested, is a new employer or employers that say, I want D.C. because of this.
And so what is this enough? The federal government right now is not looked at as a favorable thing.
So we have the brain power in this Washington reed. This is the.
What's interesting is the universities haven't come together and created the powerhouse they have here.
You could put the presidents of all the universities together in one room and say, guys, look around you here. This is an incredible place.
New York has done that. This city needs to do that along with the business and bring everybody together along with the government, the federal and the city, and make it happen, because there's no place else like it in the world.
[01:23:52] Speaker D: It's a shame it hadn't happened before, but it's because we didn't have to, because it all kind of just. The trains all ran on time in this town. It was, say, it's easy. None of what we do is easy. But we had the biggest safety net you could have, and now we don't have that anymore. And it's forcing people together. And again, that is happening. It's just a matter of how does it all.
What's the catalyst for what's next? There's gotta be one project that starts hopefully that's sooner than later. We're working on it.
[01:24:31] Speaker A: Well, it sounds like you have some ideas working.
[01:24:33] Speaker D: We do.
[01:24:34] Speaker A: We do do, which is exciting. So is that part of the Downtown Action Plan that the city that the mayor is implementing?
[01:24:41] Speaker D: Yeah, the Downtown Action Plan and Golden Triangle, Leona's team, as well as the Downtown bid, gave a lot, contributed a lot to that, which was based on, again, all of our internal work. Downtown Action Plan, I think, is great with. Aimed at getting people living and working in downtown down D.C. again. So that is exactly aligned with what we've been talking about. That's correct.
[01:25:09] Speaker A: So you've kind of answered this, but I'll just restate it again. As a leader in the commercial real estate market, what are your broader perspectives on the economic development of Washington, D.C. downtown Washington. What strategies do you believe will be the most effective in fostering growth and vibrancy? So we talked about it a little bit.
[01:25:27] Speaker D: Yeah, it's figuring out the pitch. What Makes us special. So. So when a big corporate HQ relocation is out in the market and this isn't competing one building across the street from another, this is cities. Austin, Texas and Boston, Massachusetts and Nashville and Charlotte. How do we compete in that space?
Northern Virginia has actually done it quite well.
[01:25:51] Speaker A: Well, Amazon.
[01:25:52] Speaker D: So Amazon. But they also got Hilton out there.
[01:25:55] Speaker A: Sure.
[01:25:56] Speaker D: They got Nestle in Roslyn.
[01:26:00] Speaker A: Boeing.
[01:26:00] Speaker D: Yeah, sure. So I think that is the next step. And look, Washington D.C. economic Partnership, the leadership from Mayor Bowser, Nina Albert, Brooke Pinto, everybody is focused on it and working on the pitch for why dc. And again, not the DC Metro, DC proper. That's. That's exactly right.
[01:26:25] Speaker A: The city. So you have to look at your assets and see what shines above everything else. Looking ahead, what are you most optimistic about regarding the future of the Golden Triangle in downtown Washington? What role do you see the Golden Crown and Blake playing in that future, specifically?
[01:26:44] Speaker D: The optimism is specifically around.
There are not many opportunities to make material change to the fabric of a city's economy. This is that moment. So that's where the optimism comes in.
[01:27:01] Speaker A: Probably the first time ever.
[01:27:02] Speaker D: Yeah. So I wouldn't have been around for.
[01:27:05] Speaker A: We had the financial control board was an issue and when Mayor Anthony Williams came in and brought it.
[01:27:13] Speaker D: But even financial crisis, in a way, the savings and loan crisis, and then none of that led to any material change in how we did business in dc. This is the first time. So my optimism is around the collaboration with all these very bright people to say what's next and how do we get there?
[01:27:37] Speaker A: Cool.
So I like to think that I'm kind of weaving a story here for the city and for the area in what I'm doing.
So to those listening, I'm open ears and I'm open to help collaborate to make things happen.
I guess I could call myself the voice of Washington Real Estate right now because not many other people have stepped up to do what I do.
So I open the door to anyone that wants to collaborate and allow me to collaborate. Collaborate. And I'll say one more thing about what I'm doing. I also have a community of young people called the Iconic Journey and cre. And I'll give a quick advertisement for that as that's a group of young people from 22 to 40 years old that I'm collaborating with and trying to help foster their careers. And what we're talking about is the future of their careers if they stay in Washington dc. So we want to try and build a base for the young people, the millennials and Gen Z to grow this city in some way. Not just, you know, you talked and emphasizing this city. So people listening that are in the city, stay positive, stay engaged and get involved in what's going on with downtown Washington. Anything you'd like to add to that, Owen?
[01:28:56] Speaker D: Well, I think it's a great, it's great for the city. We need more, more involvement from young professionals who are going to be the future of what we're doing. I just barely eked out away from the 22 to 40 year old crowd here or else I'd be part of that cohort instead of sitting here with John. But moreover, I think, and I've done a lot of things in this town, saying yes to every opportunity is my words of wisdom here. You have an opportunity to participate on a bid board, any kind of young professionals group, say yes and just do it. You're going to meet other interesting people who are similarly motivated. And who knows where it may lead you to having a transformative conversation about a project that we're talking about that could be the next big catalyst for the city.
[01:29:44] Speaker A: One more thing I will bring up, and it hasn't. I'm having my board meeting next. To have a nonprofit board next Friday is, I'm putting together a large event for the fall for the, not only for my community, but for all of my podcast guests. I want to invite all of them there to this event.
And I want this event to be, you know, a hopefully inspiring event for the city and for the region to kind of bring this, you know, vibrancy back that we need to kind of inspire people to think and also the generational transfer that I want to talk about as well. So I'm looking at probably stepping down from running my community by the end of 2026. And I haven't said that publicly yet, so this is the first time I've said it. But I want to find the next generation of leaders and I think you're one of them. Oh, and.
[01:30:45] Speaker D: Well, I appreciate that. Thank you.
[01:30:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, you're in your early 40s, so you're, you know, at the cutting edge of the, you're, you're still a millennial. You're probably one of the oldest millennials, I'm guessing.
[01:30:56] Speaker D: I just turned 41, so I think I am. I don't even know what I am.
[01:31:00] Speaker A: You're probably one of the oldest millennials. The millennials are the next generation that are going to lead. I think Gen X is still there, but I think it's. You're a much larger cohort. So I believe that there should be a transfer of power and influence in the city and that's what's coming and that's what I'm trying to build for and hopefully we'll see that. And that's what I want to celebrate this fall.
[01:31:24] Speaker D: It's important. I'm already seeing it a lot more people are getting, my age are getting opportunities to have an influence and it's exciting. And these are the people that are motivated to make a change.
[01:31:35] Speaker A: Yeah, it is exciting. So now I'm going to shift to your corporate culture if I can. How has your team evolved since the pandemic? Do you maintain the same level of service as before or are you working on to enhance your tenants experiences in your buildings?
[01:31:50] Speaker D: I think so. Our, our team, our team is largely the same. How we work certainly is, is different than before. I mean we're again, we've been back full time since July 21st, but coming up I was 7am at my desk and stayed till the bitter end because the way people worked kind of aligned with that. These days everything's more flexible in terms of how people connect.
So we're a little more flexible in that way with our team in terms of how that translates into service for the tenants.
I think we've had more of a.
We always prided ourselves as a long term owner as having first class property management and we get that feedback from our tenants, which is great. But for example, we've brought in capital concierge to all of our buildings to provide concierge level service. But trying to anticipate our tenants needs to say what, in what ways can we provide a service that allows them the proper platform to have their folks in the office more so making sure the parking experience is good because if the commute experience isn't good, let's make sure the parking experience is good. Colonial does an amazing job. Capital concierge being a partner of ours in all of our buildings.
Everybody uses prop tech now to interact with their tenants. So our building engines platform where all of their service requests can be processed online and tracked and things like that. So I don't think we're doing anything unique necessarily. I think a lot of people are taking this approach, but we just want to make it as easy as possible for our tenants to, if this is their desire to get their people into the office every day, because we've got the fitness centers and we've got the conference centers and we've got these things, but it's the ease of administration around those Things is that hopefully sets us apart and also having a long term ownership profile, we know how to make sure these buildings are running properly and a bunch of long term property managers who do a great job job.
[01:34:18] Speaker A: So I don't, I don't have a specific question here but I'm just going to throw it out there. What about technology? I mean, how has technology affected, you know, the, all the changes you'd mentioned, you know, some of the technological things that you're working on. But what are you, what are you doing? You know, is there an initiative to, to kind of bring you to the state of the art and has AI come into any of your business planning?
[01:34:41] Speaker D: I think we're probably, and I know this is going to sound negative, but I certainly don't mean it to be. We're probably a bit behind others in that space. The really large institutionals, a Brookfield, a Boston Properties, a Tishman Speyer, they have their own apps and they have things that they could apply more broadly across their portfolios and they invest a lot of capital into those programs. Now granted a lot of their product type is a bit different. They might say, hey law firm X, you should be with us in every major city. And when your lawyers kind of go from New York to LA for meetings, they can use the app to where our offerings a bit different.
So I think a lot of that is happening in our industry.
We are probably in the middle of the pack in that regard in terms of how technology has changed how we've done business.
Frankly we've, we've even had a hard time adopting from hard copy leases to DocuSign. You know, just the idea that we, and John, we have to fill our file room with something, right? We still need those hard copies.
But you know, we've, we're, we're, we're a bit slow to adopt. I must say though, this won't surprise anybody who does business in our market that we've been slow to adopt as a large platform locally, but not nationally.
The impact that some of those things will have for us is different, I think than others. So we've been a bit slow to adopt there, but we have anything our tenants want we try to be open minded towards.
[01:36:30] Speaker A: Before we started this interview, I showed you some technology that I'm picking up with AI and what's amazing now is what you can create as an individual that companies had to do in the past.
One person can do what five people used to do in some aspects of administrative activity and running a small business.
And to me that Leverage is a tremendous opportunity going forward and I think we're just scratching the surface of the opportunity here.
[01:37:02] Speaker D: I totally agree. I learn new things all the time. I remember when I was a kid and I knew how to turn on the vcr and my parents, he really knows technology now. And John, I see with my kids how they can pick up working an iPad or a PC. I don't even know if they'll use PCs when they're my age. But it's terrific. We try not to be intimidated by the technological advancement. We would try to stay up with it as best we can and learn from what others are doing. It's a very collaborative industry these days too, where there's a lot of sharing of process and procedure between firms. So I think we're all kind of growing together.
[01:37:49] Speaker A: Yeah.
So you took over the mantle of Blake's relationship with the American Heart association and are now the regional leader. Talk about that experience. I know that Steve Lutzgarten relished that role and experience.
[01:38:04] Speaker D: Yeah. The Bender family, who's some of the most generous people that have ever been in this town, are longtime supporters of the American Arm Association. So there's always been a connection there. I joined the board, oh golly, probably 2018, as I was Steve and I went through a couple year transition period. So it was acknowledged that I was stepping into this role, but I hadn't stepped into it yet. So on. So I was on the board of the American Heart association for the Greater Washington region for six years. I chaired Heart Walk in 2019 and 2024, which each raised a couple million dollars, which I'm very proud of. I chaired the board for two years and more recently I rolled off the board. I did my six years and that's the term limit. And they asked me to be on the board for the Eastern states. So now I'm on a board that covers from Virginia all the way up to Maine. It's been a really rewarding experience. They have great leadership there. The board is full of great Washington region board. And now the Eastern States board is full of really well intentioned, successful people. And I very much value, as much as I'm proud of the impact, I value as much all the relationships I've made with really terrific people that are change makers. So when we talk about, hey, how do you make change in Washington D.C. real estate?
You're not necessarily going to learn that from other people doing what you're doing. I'm going to learn it from people from other industries, other leaders. Other leaders.
When I took over chairing the board for the Greater Washington region. I succeeded Barbara Humpton, who's the CEO of Siemens usa.
Here I am president of Blake and I think to myself, do I even belong here? But she's a person who I've met, who I have a relationship with now, who's done so many wonderful things. Things. I've been succeeded as the board chair by Armory Juna Dean, who runs Deloitte for the region.
So those are relationships. They don't work in commercial real estate, but they're business leaders and those you learn a lot from just being around.
And I don't even consider myself a peer of theirs, but being around people like that who are change makers.
[01:40:24] Speaker A: Well, the other thing you've learned obviously is the healthcare piece of what the American Heart association does and there are real estate implications to that as well. But what's interesting to me, and I'm going to divert a little bit from real estate for a moment, my sons and both of my children are in health care.
So the federal government is cutting back obviously their investment in NIH research and other research aspects. And that's the mandate is to cut back budget things. And NIH is taking a big hit. So my guess is that has an impact on where the American Heart association is investing some of their money for the donations. So are you seeing more pressure on the private sector, the philanthropic side of the business, to raise more money to offset those loss of federal cap, federal money and research?
[01:41:17] Speaker D: It's an interesting perspective that you have with children in health care because they're going to feel that impact.
The American Heart association is a billion dollar top line annual budget organization. So they're big.
We absolutely appreciate that their, let's say research investment into research is going to be more impactful now if there's less investment from nih. So that is understood across the board, I think. And I certainly wouldn't attempt to or can't speak for AHA headquarters at a Dallas. I'm a volunteer, but they have a really terrific leadership team and my guess is that they've considered how their allocation of their budget would be impacted by making sure that enough is invested in research if it's having to offset what's not going to be coming from.
[01:42:24] Speaker A: So where else do they invest money other than research?
[01:42:28] Speaker D: Well, so I can tell you from my time on the local board here, our areas of impact are first of all fundraising, so that was priority number one, but community impact.
So there's everything from advocacy work around working with the city to make sure. That schools have healthy food options to laws against vaping and so anything relating to cardiac health. Correct. So there's advocacy work, there's community impact. We're getting more people trained in CPR.
[01:43:06] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:43:06] Speaker D: Getting schools to have cardiac health AEDs at their sports fields.
[01:43:13] Speaker A: Sure.
[01:43:13] Speaker D: You know, there are big stories like Demar Hamlin. So Demar Hamlin, who's the. The safety for the Buffalo Bills who went into cardiac arrest.
That was a very public example of how proper training and CPR can save someone's life.
[01:43:30] Speaker A: How about the tackle at the University of Maryland, Jordan? I forgot his name. Yeah.
[01:43:34] Speaker D: McNair, I think, was his name.
So it's very, very important, and it's not lost on me that my time spent with the heart association is impactful. But you raise an interesting point, which is all of the change this administration has brought forth, a lot of changes. Whether people agree with them or not, the changes are real. And how we all adapt around them.
[01:43:59] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:44:00] Speaker D: Whether it's from the heart association to what we do in commercial real estate, you have to be more adaptable. And we're all learning that.
[01:44:07] Speaker A: Yeah.
So what other initiatives have you started that approve the company esprit de corps in this environment?
[01:44:15] Speaker D: I think we've just tried to be more flexible with how we run the business.
We moved to this space, not that anyone talk about bad radio is trying to describe something like our new space to people that can't see it. But we moved to this space early Covid. But we had designed it around more collaboration, a big kitchen, lounge area, and things like that. So we've tried to just provide an environment where it's easier for people to be together, work together. We have company events every year. I mean, a lot of those things we'd already been doing, but I think it's just an attitude around flexibility towards. Our expectation is you're here and working together.
But I was laughing about it with my wife, election day this past fall. She said, are you off to go vote?
And I said, you know, what's funny is I remember years ago talking about, you know, you know, do we have to take an hour of PTO right to go vote? Because then we're going to be to the office late. And I said to my wife, I said, I don't. You know, I have no idea, because I don't think that's our attitude anymore. People are living their lives, and provided they're delivering a product that meets our expectations, we don't care.
You know, take your time to go do whatever you need to do. And then when you get here, you know, be focused, perform to the level we expect.
[01:45:55] Speaker A: Right, right. So just more flexibility is what you're basically. That's exactly right, yeah. So what would you advise your 25 year old self to consider today other.
[01:46:08] Speaker D: Than picking some interesting stocks about your life?
I think some of my early lessons learned in management were I think you have to try and fail at things to learn the lessons you need to learn. But one of the things I learned early on in management was appreciating more what everybody has going on in their lives and how it impacts, how it impacts what they're bringing to the office every, you know. So when I took over running the leasing group, I was 29 or 30 and I think maybe I was married but didn't have kids. And now my perspective, perspective on life is so different because what matters to me about seeing my kids and being at soccer practice and doing all these things has shaped who I am. And I took over in a management role at such a young age. I don't think I appreciate that. So what I'd say to my 25 year old self is relax.
Just because somebody's got some issue, can or can't do one thing or another will be fine. But you don't have the benefit of understanding that until you've gone through it. So I wish I didn't drive myself so crazy some of those early days.
I'm a big believer in having a healthy edge.
You have to have a bit of an edge to be motivated to move yourself forward, move groups of people forward, move a whole company forward. Right. That doesn't just happen by going along for the ride.
[01:48:00] Speaker A: Well, you had one of the, one of the biggest examples of that that preceded you that I've ever met.
[01:48:10] Speaker D: You know, Steve and I, he was.
[01:48:12] Speaker A: An edge, that's for sure.
[01:48:14] Speaker D: Yeah, we had different styles, but we both were drivers.
[01:48:21] Speaker A: Oh yeah.
[01:48:23] Speaker D: And frankly some of our different styles served us well and we worked on things together.
[01:48:27] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:48:28] Speaker D: Having two different kinds of styles or approaches would allow us to, I don't say good cop, bad cop, but have, you know, have a balance. I think I tell my 25 year old self to just relax a bit because not every little thing that happens is going to upset, upset the apple cart.
[01:48:49] Speaker A: So you mentioned a little bit this earlier, but talk about your priorities among family, work and giving back.
[01:48:54] Speaker D: Yeah, my family is priority one. The good thing is I think they know that. I think my wife would acknowledge that. I think my kids, which they don't have a real understanding of the pressure of this kind of job, but they know daddy works a lot kind of thing. It's. I feel very fortunate to have such a wonderful family. And that's. That's priority number one. And I know you're not asking me to list these in priorities, but I find myself inclined to do that.
Giving back has been. Been something I've grown into and I really enjoy, but it's really a product of the work.
So because of what we've done here, I've had an opportunity to give back.
Largely, my time is spent with my family and on Blake things, of course, whatever those things are, because a lot of those are tied to giving back. But I just tell people this all the time, young people. And I got some great advice from my pal Alan Meltzer. You never go broke giving back.
And it's a clever saying, but the point is the time, since not even giving up money, but it's giving you time. It's actually very accretive for you. You meet a lot of interesting, wonderful people.
And that feeling of doing good, I think balances out a lot of the pressure and the negativity that can come with a high stakes job. So giving back has been terrific for me. Heart association, I do a few other things as well. And all things I'm very proud of.
[01:50:37] Speaker A: Well, you know, being here at this company and with the opportunity you have, as young as you are, you've had a chance to give back earlier than a lot of people do at your age. So you've had tremendous opportunity to do that and you've learned a lot from it, which is great. It took me a lot longer to be in that position, but for the last 10 years, that's basically what I've dedicated my time to, is giving back, at least to our community in real estate, which has been very rewarding. Obviously. If you could place a billboard on the Capitol Beltway for millions to see, what would it say? Owen.
[01:51:16] Speaker D: You know, a lot of our conversation, this won't surprise you, has been around what makes D.C. d.C. Proper, what makes it special. I don't have a marketing bone in my body. We're a leasing agent. I know, but, John, I can talk about window line all day long. What makes D.C. special, but anything, because knowing we might talk about something like this, it would be aimed at what makes D.C. a special place to spend your time for. For me, what I love about this town is I like to walk. I walk down the street, I walk past the White House. I can see the Washington Monument. I've got Dupont Circle. This is one of the most unique cities in the world and to anyone that is looking for a place to live and work I think there's no better time because it's an opportunity. I really believe that it's an opportunity to be in D.C. now to be part of what's next and if you can be part of what's next in this town, you'll be way ahead. So you know, again I'm not, I'm not a marketing genius but maybe welcome home is is is the message because this can be as a person who spent, you know, my whole life in and around the Washington D.C. area this is home and I'm proud of that.
[01:52:49] Speaker A: That's great. So Owen, thank you very much for this wide ranging conversation. It's been very interesting and you're the future and I'm excited about it.
[01:53:00] Speaker D: Thanks very much for having me.
[01:53:02] Speaker A: Thank you sir. Take care.
