I’ve been asked a few times why my family picked self-storage as an investment thesis. It’s a combination of a few factors – platform, plan, and partners. Platform: My family currently has 27 on balance sheet properties (aka properties we own with our own capital). After spending the better part of the decade institutionalizing our…
I’ve spoken to several real estate investors who have zero allocation for development in 2024. Like most real estate decisions, the devil lies in the details, and there are still cases where development is exciting for us. Let’s take self-storage as an example. We are only looking at markets where existing properties are trading at…
I’m a big proponent of being a specialist and not a generalist. It all has to do with the concept of return on hassle. Sure there’s trying to maximize your return on investment and that’s pretty self explanatory but do you ever stop and think about return on hassle? It’s one of the main reasons…
The year is heating up and we are starting to look at more acquisition opportunities in self storage. Our target markets are secondary and tertiary markets in California, Utah, and New Mexico. For value add, our business plans are focused on ways to add revenue and reduce expenses. I thought it might be helpful this…
Westlake’s core portfolio is filled with properties of all asset classes and various sizes due to the portfolio being acquired decades ago. Over time, many of these assets have reached the end of their useful life and upgrading them to highest and best use has created institutionally sized deals. However, when we acquire new assets…
January 29, 2024 With NMHC in San Diego this week, we thought it would be fun to share some of the criteria we consider when evaluating multi-family markets and investments. We are very bullish on multifamily going into 2024. As investors (both on the GP and LP side), we have the following criteria: 1. Sponsor:…
I am often reminded that 90% of third generation family businesses fail. However, when we take a closer look, many of these common reasons for failure can be mitigated. Applying the discipline of a third generation family office to your individual investing is also a great way to avoid future pitfalls and set yourself up…
Being based in Silicon Valley, we have a number of investors who invest in early stage tech companies. I’m often asked to compare real estate and venture capital investment philosophies. The primary difference is we expect all of our investments to be successful (1.7x+ equity multiple), we don’t bank on one home run to carry…
