What a week! Some are calling it the Super Bowl of Multifamily—the Old Capital Multifamily Conference. And like Tom Brady, we are already preparing for next year! Multifamily investors flew in from all over the country to attend the conference this year. Everyone is saying the same thing after attending – it-was-Amazing!
Happy Hour
The first night set the tone for the conference with a jammed packed evening at Side Car Social in Addison, TX. We rented out the main bar area and the vibe was incredible. Watch the replay:
Old Capital Multifamily Conference
Day 2, the Super Bowl. The venue has stadium seating with a jumbo screen to watch all the content. The presentations were also on every TV screen in the building, so you did not have to miss any of the action.
Video Recap
Pensford
JP Conklin, the founder of Pensford, started the conference by giving a presentation of what is on every investor’s mind: interest rates. It looks like the Fed will continue to hike interest rates for the foreseeable future.
One slide that caught my attention was the slide about the 1970’s and 1980’s inflation. The Fed then thought they had won against inflation only to see it come rearing back after rate cuts. It took over 20% increase in interest rates to stomp it out.
JP believes that Powell does not want to cut too soon and see the same thing happen. We may be in a long fight with inflation and interest rates may be heading higher.
Broker Panel
The first panel of the day was the broker panel moderated by Michael Becker. Michael is the host of the Old Capital Podcast with Paul Peebles and founder of SPI Advisory. The panelists included some of the top brokers in Dallas:
Rowan Burch – Rowan Multifamily Advisors
Paul Yazbeck – Multifamily Group
The brokers shared some insight of how deals are getting done today. Active listings on the websites are down, but deals are still being made. The focus right now is certainty of close. If you can prove you have the equity and can close the deal your chances are higher. This is where they look to mortgage brokers like us at Old Capital to vouch for a potential buyer.
Lender Panel
Paul Peebles nicknamed “The Godfather” moderated the lender panel. He had lenders that covered the main aspects of lending in Multifamily:
Ronen Abergel – Arbor
Robert Cannaday – Great Plains Bank
Rickey Mirabito – Sabal
Fritz Waldvogel – Colliers
The focus of the lending panel was to see where the popular bridge loans are sizing at and what the agencies look like. Ronen said that bridge lenders are now sizing to a 7% debt yield to make sure they cash flow enough for a year 3 takeout. This means leverage will continue to go down and it might be time for a Return of the Agencies. Here is the video from the conference that everyone really enjoyed:
GP Panel
James Eng nicknamed “The Professor” moderated the GP panel and discussed the hot topics that General Partners are facing. That topic is equity. A lot of deals struggled this summer with the lack of equity, and it continues to be an issue. This year’s panelists:
Jack Langenberg – Sapient Capital Group
Pratima Sharma – SevenSeas Holdings
Meredith Sifford — 1791 Capital
Ken Yue – TwinkleStar Asset
This year’s panel had strong operators and equity raisers. Pratima Sharma told her story of how she started with Paul Peebles and has worked her way to over 8,000 units. Using Old Capital as an advisor and partner in transactions pays off! Meredith Sifford agreed by echoing that same sentiment. She raised $18MM in a day after developing a strong track record. She advised to start small and grow organically.
Jack Langenberg had great insights as well and said if you want to get into this business, get ready to work. It is a lot of work! Ken Yue told his story about how he got his first deal – The numbers worked! And since then, he has been off to the races. He raises the money before the deal which gives him an edge.
Property & Asset Management Panel
This important panel was moderated by Ricardo Hinojosa. Ricardo is a Senior Director at Old Capital. This year’s panelists included:
Kim Bruggeman – Lighthouse Management Solutions
JC Castillo – Velo Residential
Brett Luskey – Fairmont Management
Robert Tinning – MRT Realty Group
With the uncertainty around interest rates and asset prices being down, management has never been more important. The panelists this year gave their insights and strategies around what they are seeing. They also shared and compared software that is working. If you want to be successful in Multifamily during this period, property & asset management is critical.
Emmy Award Winning Comedian: Paul Mecurio
Paul Mecurio started out in Wall Street as a Lawyer and began writing jokes for Jay Leno on the Tonight Show. He tells a funny joke about how Jay Leno called him after he gave him some jokes at an event and wanted him to start writing for him. Paul did not believe him on the phone and thought it was a friend pranking him. He said, “you do a lousy Jay Leno” to Jay Leno, ha-ha.
From there Paul went on to write jokes at the beginning of the Daily Show and now he appears regularly on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
He had the audience rolling and his aggressive style of bringing people on stage had a lot of people nervous. We later had dinner with Paul, and he said he usually looks for the ones that are trying to avoid him. Everyone who endured did a good job though. He ended the show with bad apartment reviews and had the audience rolling.
Following the show Paul made the rounds at happy hour and got to talk to people at the conference in a more relaxed setting.
Conclusion
The 2022 Old Capital Multifamily Conference was a huge success. We would like to thank all our sponsors, business partners, panelists, and clients. Also, a big shoutout to all the new people we met at the conference and are looking to join the Old Capital community. As you can see from the conference, we are growing stronger. Till next year!
