From Dennis in Keene, NH

Q: We have financing and are looking to make profit managing a 6-10 store strip mall. How can we get help in finding anchor stores for our project? thank you…

A. Dennis, if any of us had the definitive answer there would be no one to compete against us, right?

It’s a great question, and I will try to make the response somewhat specific to you and your vicinity. First, you used the word “anchor,” and we typically don’t have anchor tenants in strip malls. An anchor is a larger tenant like a grocery store, a discount box store, or a deparment store that activates the gravity model of a critical mass of on site shoppers. We don’t achieve that critical mass in strip malls, and as such we have to cater to the convenience tenants who are often essential services, not luxury or discretionary-based shopping goods.

In your case, your town is about 25,000 which is a small market but viable. In addition, I see arterials meeting in Keene from every direction, so your trade area is expanded, and that’s always a good thing!

Tenants come to you usually in one of five ways:

• Sign call
• Broker
• Referral
• Walk and Talk
• Direct Marketing

Signing: Brokers may tell you of their intense marketing plans, and if they do it that’s great. The fact remains that your prospects are usually not obvious, and about 65% will initially inquire from a leasing sign on site. That sign should look good, and the biggest line on it should be the contact phone number. And I mean BIG.

Broker/Agent: It’s unlikely there are any large firms in the vicinity like CBRE or Grubb and Ellis, so if you go with a listing leasing agent, and in your case as you’re not experienced I would, you will have to select an experienced commercial agent, not a house broker. They not only need to know WHO to talk to, but HOW to talk to them.

Referral: You seemed like a nice, talkative guy in your email, and as long as you’ve been in your particular business, I’ll bet you’ve met most people in Keene! Pick out some key local business people, get a good looking plan and duplicate it, and show it to them. Ask them if they have any ideas of someone who could benefit from that location. They will talk it up, I promise. Be sure to “remember them” with a nice bottle of wine or even a check if they have an idea that works out for you.

Walk and Talk: The difference between Referral and Walk and Talk is that you pick the prospects and go talk to them. If you’re not a salesman this can be intimidating, but once you make your third call you’ll get in the rhythm and will probably enjoy it.

One of the most exciting things about strip mall leasing is that everyone loves to talk about shopping and retailers. Even after 30 years in the business and owning a number of strip malls, I still “cold call” because there is an exponential progression of local knowledge to be gained by doing so. Don’t assume that the person you call on must say yes; but expect many to be your referrers to real prospects!

Direct Marketing: It used to be mailing to a prospect list, but we use email now. It’s effective if you think out the right prospect categories, and you can find most business emails on the internet. While we’re very careful about spamming the general public, most businesses are pleased that you thought of them, and they like to know about new projects too.

Hope this helps, Dennis. We will be publishing several articles in much more detail about each of these methods soon. Thanks for writing, and good luck being a developer!

John

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The conundrum with taxation and real estate is that the demand for much of US commercial property is inversely proportional to the reduction of tax rates.

As such, Fair Tax advocates such as Ron Paul would not do our industry many favors over the mid term. Over 50% of all income producing properties purchased in the US are wrapped in an IRS 1031 Deferred Exchange agreement, wherein the purchaser elects to defer the payment of capital gain income taxes until the property, or its successor, is sold.

One may argue that the buyers of such property would have more after-tax capital in the event of a substitution of a national consumption tax for the current income tax, and thus more liquidity to purchase income producing properties. There is no argument there, however if there were not tax advantages for many income producing properties, and especially smaller properties like our strip malls, one could arguably postulate that those investors would demand a higher return rate (Cap Rate) than the 7% or so we are seeing today.

The worst possible scenario would be raising taxes and eliminating capital gains. Currently a 1031 exchange is predicated on a holding period equal to the capital gain qualification period. With higher taxes and virtually no tax incentives, cap rates could easily become double digit once again as we experienced in the late 70s and early 80s. With a chasm-like positive leverage gap created between the cap rate and the current mortgage loan constants, one of the two would have to normalize over time. I’d bet on the mortgage bankers, and you really don’t want to be on the wrong side of that bet.

The most significant Congressional act of my career was Tax Reform Act 1986. Prior to that reform, there were so many loopholes and incentives for purchasing investor real estate that there were actually promoters guaranteeing negative cash flow to unsophisticated investors. TRA 1986 jettisoned most of these tax advantages and shortly thereafter real estate was once again valued on…..cash flow! And that is as it should be.

Ron Paul is not a contender, but we’re still on the sidelines as buyers until we get a little clarity of what the new administration and the Congress might bring us in 2009.

This was pitch night for the Rich Dad Poor Dad three day seminar, and I decided to take my 17 year old daughter to the free “basic training class.”

Of all the wealth building schemes, I think Robert Kiyosaki’s Rich Dad Poor Dad makes the most sense. Speaking as one who has done several “no money down” deals, one of which has yielded me value of over $20,000,000 in less than 10 years, I believe his simple principles are generally valid.

I counted 100 attendees. The pitchman was friendly, and the presentation was relatively low key. I believe he had at least two shills that I could identify but that’s expected for the Get Rich Quick business. The overriding principles of achieving cash flow in Kiyosaki’s world are:

• Opportunity
• Knowledge
• Action

The seminar, known as the “Rich Dad Poor Dad Academy” is a 3-day affair, and the price (discounted 50% of course for tonight) was $495. He compared it to Robert Allen’s $1,500 and Trump’s $3000. The Academy is purported to 1) present methods of discovering opportunity with reference books and guides, and 2) teach some procedures for buying properties for no money down. Nothing unique here. Carleton Sheets is yawning.

He showed a video example of a young couple who bought a house for no money down, and re-sold it 6 weeks later for a gross profit of about $26,800. Here are the numbers, by memory:

• Asking Price $240,000
• Purchase Price $210,00
• Flip Sales Price $258,000
• Gross Profit $48,000

The couple reportedly obtained a hard money loan (individual investor loan) for $210,000. Now, let’s look at the cost of goods sold beyond the purchase price:

-$ 4,200 loan fees (2 pts)

-$9,800Upgrades/remodel

-$1,200 closing costs

Reported net profit $26,800

So, this previously pennyless, young couple living off the husband’s pizza delivery income put $26,800 in their pocket in 6 weeks?

I don’t think so

The fallacy is the hard money loan. NO ONE is going to loan her essentially 95%-100% market value for 2 pts, and I guess that was an interest free loan for 6 weeks? I am always in the private loan business for good circumstances, and for that deal I probably would have nailed her for 5-10 pts. and half the deal. She had to have a partner, being inexperienced and with no cash or collateral. My guess is they got thrown $5,000, maybe even $10,000, which is fine for them, but not $26,000 to them.

I had a little problem with the Rich Dad pitchman’s next topic, himself. Probably LDS like so many of the no money down guru crowd, he said he worked for Robert G. Allen in college, then started flipping houses. That makes sense. But then, he told of us his latest “coup,” an area development agreement for “the ENTIRE states of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont” for a Mexican QSR franchise! His reasoning was that the cost was $450,000 per store, and that Qboda and Chipotle both do about $1,450,000 in volume, and that at 1xgross he would be making$1,000,000 per store and that was a “no brainer.”

My ass it’s a no-brainer! I have been a strip mall developer for 30 years and trust me, NO restaurant is a NO BRAINER! 1x gross valuation is accurate, but only on stabilized volumes and it’s highly unlikely that those stores will do those volumes in those areas, even if they are run perfectly. So, the limited credibility he had went out the casa with that one!

Finally, I was watching for conversions. I would guess it was pretty strong, possibly 25%. Do the math. 25 x $500 = $12,500 x 4 seminars = $50,000 gross for our area and that’s a very generous estimate.

For the past three days, you could not turn on the radio or TV without hearing a spot for these seminars, nor could you find a local website without RICH DAD plastered all over it. They used affiliate marketing on the net, and I’m speculating that the deal with Kiyosaki was licensing, not a vertically owned enterprise. It looks like Russ Whitney is involved as well, and he’s got quite a history. If interested in this no money down, get rich quick real estate seminar topic, here’s some recommended reading. I’m guessing there was an easy $25,000 in promotion. That leaves $25,000 left to pay the bills.

$25,000 less

• License fees
• Pitchman’s cut
• Support staff
• Hotel meeting room; 4 seminars, 2 hours each, plus a 3 day meeting (includes a lunch)
• Materials

My guess is that if the promoters netted $10,000 from this deal they’d be lucky. As repetition is the engine of creating an annuity, one could argue that repeated twenty times a year there’s $200,000 in profit, and that’s probably the case, BUT….wouldn’t it be less risky and much less work to flip eight or ten houses, at $25,000 profit each??

You make the call. Is the Rich Dad Poor Dad 3 day seminar worth $500? Maybe, for some, it could be. I’m a huge proponent of education and training, and have spent that sum and more many times for legitimate seminars and conferences and have never felt like I was ripped. As a frequent speaker at regional and national shopping center seminars and conventions, I want to offer supreme value for the attendees’ time and money and I think we do. If you have no background whatsoever in real estate dealings, it’s probably not a bad deal, and at least Kiyosaki hasn’t gone bankrupt (to my knowledge) like so many of the “mega successful” gurus.

In reality, the “secret” to making money in real estate is no secret at all.

It’s exactly what Kiyosaki says in his original book, Rich Dad, Poor Dad: Opportunity, Knowledge, and Action. Where most people fail is not implementing the 3rd step–not taking action.

Subscribe to LocalCenters.com ,consider attending quality real estate seminars and conferences, and you’ll learn everything you need to know, and then some. Read the articles, ask your questions, even request articles on specific topics, and soon your ability to move forward with your retail or development goals will become greater than 95% of those who don’t invest their time as you are. While we don’t address residential properties to a great degree, the principles are the same as in commercial real estate.

Restaurants and Institutions Magazine has published a study on quick service restaurants, comparing the dining out habits of the baby boomers to those of the younger Gen Y. While about 15% of the boomers visit a casual dining store at least once a week, less than 12% of the Gen Y’ers have the same patterns.

Dinners edge out lunches for the dine out meal of choice, but breakfasts are gaining some ground too.

As to the choices, it’s obviously not going to be the same fast food restaurants for this health-conscious crowd. Right??

Maybe we aging folks just have too many memories, or maybe too many of us worked there! Read the full article from Restaurants and Institutions

Some of our merchants are membership-based and funds are either withdrawn from checking or a credit card automatically.

This afternoon I received a call from one of my best tenants, requesting a split rent payment schedule in January; the reason for his request is pretty clear with the headline above. Thinking there was a processing error, he called the company who processes the payments, only to find that they’ve been flooded with similar calls since January 1 from all over the nation.

Obviously the payors are contractually obligated to make good their commitment, however this is an alarming percentage of defaults.

While the major credit card issuers’ mid-December estimate of a 4% default rate falls far short of the reported 30% declines which could be simply over-limit in some cases, it’s still up 26% from the previous period according to a recent CNN Money article. We’re all familiar with home equity defaults and foreclosures; so what’s next? Auto loans, and debt on those toys like Waverunners is my best guess.

What do you think?

Oh, and of course I agreed to half the January rent now and half on the 15th. When you’ve got a great tenant who has a plan and gets blindsided you go to the wall for them.

NEWS FLASH - MORTGAGE RATES ARE DROPPING!

Hope you had a wonderful New Year celebration!

Just wanted to give you some great news and a hot tip to start off the year with.

Mortgage interest rates have dropped significantly in the past couple of weeks, especially for so called “conforming” loans ($417,000 and under for single family homes, $533,850 and less for duplexes, $645,300 and less for triplexes, $801,950 and less for fourplexes).

The only time rates have been lower than this in the past 40 years was during a short time in 2003 and 2004.

Why is this happening now? A combination of 1) concerns that a recession is ahead, and 2) the political unease resulting from the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. The assassination and its repercussions have weighed particularly heavily on the bond and mortgage backed securities markets.

If you’d like us to take a look to see if you can save some money, give me a call at (415) 406-2330 or send an email to ed@smithcraine.com.

Here’s hoping we can save you a boatload of money to start the New Year off right!

Ed Craine is a principal in Smith-Craine Mortgage, and is a good friend and business associate. Ed is the promoter of The Strip Mall Conference, for which I have been a speaker on several occasions. He specializes in small commercial deals andis extremely customer-friendly and knowledgeable.

CB Richard Ellis is the largest real estate services company in the world, and each year about this time they hold a market outlook in various locations worldwide. The Northern California outlook was held on the evening of December 11, in Sacramento. Here are some of the highlights, with some comments:

Office: The State of California continues to support the downtown office market, with continuing expansion even in face of the budget deficit. The biggest deal of the year was the Department of Corrections expansion and relo. Read More→

Read More→