Category: Ray’s Buzz

CCIM November Luncheon

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BY RAY HANKAMER
rhankamer@gmail.com

Speaker: Dan Niemeyer, REALTY SHARES – “Crowdfunding” (“CF”)

Takeway: Crowdfunding started about twenty years ago as an online method funding ‘starving artists and musicians’, and today it is being used to raise both capital and equity from investors small and large for residential and commercial real estate deals.

  • There are several sizeable CF organizations now in the residential and commercial real estate industries, following relaxing of federal regulations pertaining to protecting smaller investors, ‘accredited’ and not
  •  In 2012 CF organizations were given more latitude in raising money through small investors- Go Fund Me is one of the earliest groups to raise small sums
  • By 2013 CF was further opened up to a diverse range of investing possibilities
  • Residential bridge loans were the first vehicles to be offered to small investors, and since then loans and equity pieces have become more varied and more numerous
  • The sweet spot in the market for CF funds seems to be for developers doing deals in the $2-20 million range- CF funds often allow the developer to retain more ownership in deals while at the same time gaining leverage through blending interest rates between CF investor-lenders and commercial banks
  • CF funding takes away the need for developers to go to ‘friends and family’ for equity, and allows the developer to do more deals in a shorter period of time equity pieces can often be raised  through CF in thirty days as opposed to much longer through previous ‘traditional’ methods
  • CF companies are becoming diverse and more segmented in the different kinds of deals they do
  • CF shops stress-test developer deals before offering them to their investors
  • Some commercial banks are still not fully comfortable coming in behind equity supplied via CF

My Tribute To George Kirksey: The Father of Major League Baseball in Houston

Posted on by ginger

BY RAY HANKAMER
rhankamer@gmail.com

When I was in my early 20s I met George, who was then in his early 60s. We became friends quickly, soulmates,
despite the vast age difference.

George had grown up in Hillsboro, and after graduating from the U. of Texas as a journalism major, worked his way up the ladder until he became National SportsEditor for United Press. He covered sports from drafty press boxes long ago, when reporters dashed to be the first in a single phone booth to call in their story to their paper.

In World War II, George enlisted and due to his experience was given the management of the office in London which reported on the bomber raids over Germany, and on the boys who flew them, and on the ones who did not return.

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A Young Texan Goes To Moscow

Posted on by ginger

Christopher Van Riet: A 25 year-old Houstonian who went to Moscow in 1995 in the middle of the chaos resulting from the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and is now owner / developer of a logistics park including the two largest retail distribution centers in Russian history.

After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School with an economics degree, Chris Van Riet went straight to Wall Street. After two years, in 1995 he took his two-week summer vacation to Moscow, where he interviewed businessmen seeking opportunity in the chaos, as a communist society began its rocky transition toward a free enterprise system.

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Houston Land And Housing Forecast – 2017

Posted on by ginger

Speakers: Patrick Jankowski- Economist, Greater Houston Partnership; Kirk Laguarta and Duane Heckmann- Land Advisors; Jeff Lindner-Harris County Flood Control

Takeaway: Houston’s economy continues to steadily grow, and Harvey will only be a momentary setback in different sectors. A positive from Harvey that was recognized and recorded worldwide was the community solidarity evident here as everyone helped everyone else during this catastrophe.

Our Economy

  • Rig count fell from 1931 at peak to 1050 now, BUT many rigs are twice as efficient, so drilling rebound is stronger than it looks from this one statistic
  • Oil should continue to adjust to supply and demand but should stay bracketed in the $50-60 range going forward; this will entail some re-hiring in the Oil Patch but reaching nowhere near the last peak

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Ray Talks With Dennis Murphree

Posted on by ginger

By Ray Hankamer

RN: Dennis, you come from a prominent commercial construction family and you served on the Board of your father’s company at a young age. How did this educate you as a young man and get you started in developing real estate?

DM: I am a Houston native. I went to work during the summer at age 12 doing construction labor for my dad’s company and it taught me the value of hard work and how buildings actually come together. Ten summers in the hot sun taught me about manual labor and trying to use my brain, rather than my back, to earn money in the future. I got into commercial real estate at age 24 and went on Dad’s company board two years later. That was a real learning experience. All the other directors were at least 30 years older than I was, so all I had to do was shut up, listen and learn.

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Roundabouts: Why we don’t see them yet in Houston and Texas?

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(The case for more traffic roundabouts)

From Priceonomics: “The roughly 3,700 circular traffic intersections in the U.S. are feared, avoided, and even loathed…Australia has more than 10,000. France features 32,000. The U.K. boasts 25,000, the most in the world as a proportion of total road space.

In every single metric, roundabouts outperformed intersections in terms of efficiency. Average delays were cut by 65%; no more than one-third of vehicles were not in motion at any given time, and the circle never went over 22% of its full capacity.”

From Discover: “The roundabout is the single most important device ever created to help control traffic safely and smoothly.”

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