Team Lally Show with Sean Tadaki
Announcer: It’s time to enter the world of real estate in Oahu with Hawaii’s only true real estate radio show, the Team Lally real estate show. Grab a pen and get ready to take notes! For the next full hour, Hawaii’s premier real estate leader, Adrienne Lally and Attilio Leonardi will bring you the latest in real estate news and real world strategies on how they can guarantee to sell your home at a price and deadline you agree to! Or they’ll buy it! Now, here are your hosts, Adrienne and Attilio!
Adrienne: Welcome to the Team Lally real estate show, home of the guaranteed sold program or we’ll buy it. If you have any questions you can reach us at 799-9596 or check us out on the web at www.teamlally.com.
Attilio: Well hey everybody, this is Attilio! I was uh, again, doing it again! Knitting a sweater for my pet pig. Yes, you heard it right! Knitting a sweater for my pet pig and this lady—
Adrienne: Wait, wait, what’s your pet pig’s name?
Attilio: His name is ___.
Adrienne: ___?
Attilio: Yeah, that’s Hawaiian for pig.
Adrienne: Oh, okay.
Attilio: You know what, I, I originally called him Pork Sandwich but he, that didn’t’ go over too well with him. Anyway! Uh, you know, I’m knitting this sweater, this lady comes up and taps me on the shoulder, starts asking me a bunch of tax and legal questions and I say, hey, those are great questions! Highly recommend you seek the appropriate licensed professional and then I said, but Mom! What other questions do you have? So, if you hear anything on the show that sounds like legal advice, who’s the, who should they run that by, Adrienne?
Adrienne: Well they should call our friends over at uh, Kamihara Law.
Attilio: What’s the number?
Adrienne: Myron. Uh, you can reach them over at 352-6417. That’s either Myron or Vlad. And they’ll be calling in too with a legal tip.
Attilio: With a legal tip. Hey, we highly recommend them. If you own any kind of assets, you should have a trust! You don’t want to go through probate! Prince just passed away recently, lost, I think half of his estate, $250 million.
Adrienne: Millions of dollars!
Attilio: Couple $350 million is going all over the place because he died actually without a trust in place. So, call those guys. You hear anything on the show that sounds like tax advice, it’s not! It’s like just, it’s just anecdotal.
Adrienne: We don’t, yeah, we don’t talk taxes.
Attilio: Yeah, tax or legal advice.
Adrienne: Okay. So, I’ve got some pearls of wisdom. Courtesy of Hawaii Pacific Property Management.
Attilio: Those guys are so sharp!
Adrienne: They are! I love these quotes that we get! Alright, so the first one is an Italian proverb.
Attilio: You’ve got to say it with an Italian accent!
Adrienne: Okay, you could say it with an Italian accent.
Attilio: No, go ahead
Adrienne: I’m going to say the proverb. “It is not enough to aim; you must hit.”
Attilio: That’s what I tell my son, my 10-year-old, every time he goes to the restroom!
Adrienne: (laughing) Alright this next one’s from Calvin Lloyd. “Nobody rises to low expectations.”
Attilio: Yup, whatever the expectations are that you set, that’s what people will go to or rise to.
Adrienne: Okay, and this last one is from Arthur Ransom. “Grab a chance and you won’t be sorry from might have been.”
Attilio: That would be a bummer if any of his kids were kidnapped. Arthur Ransom.
Adrienne: Uh, yeah, that would be. Okay, so speaking of Hawaii Pacific Property Management, we’ve got Evan on the line.
Attilio: Evan!
Adrienne: To talk about property management tip of the week!
Attilio: Hi, welcome, Evan, what’s your, what’s your PM tip of the week?
Evan: This week we’re going to talk a little bit about service animals and emotional support animals. So, when, as property managers, when we, we rent a property, we cannot uh, prevent anyone who has a service animal or an emotional support animal from occupying our units. So, the difference we have between a service animal and an emotional support animal would be that a service animal performs specific service. So, these are highly-trained animals, for example seeing-eye dogs that have gone through expensive training and therefore serve a specific duty for its owner. When we speak about emotional support animals, we’re speaking about animals that uh, fulfill a different function for their owners. We see a lot of uh, emotional support animals; basically, these animals give emotional support to their owners. And um that’s basically the difference between the two. In both instances, as property managers, we require documentation stating that these animals are either a service animal or serve a, as an emotional support animal so for an emotional support animal we do require a medical doctor’s note specifying that this is the case for each tenant.
Attilio: Now what if I didn’t have any of that paperwork and I told you, you known this is my, my pit bull. He keeps me out of trouble. Every time I go for the third beer, he bites my leg?
All: (laughing)
Attilio: Do I still have to have the paperwork, right?
Evan: You still, we, we require that we have these, this specific paperwork uh documenting that it has been reviewed by a doctor and that, yes, that this animal serves as an emotional support animal.
Adrienne: Now, Evan, how frequently are you guys coming across these uh, service animals and emotional support animals?
Evan: We see a rise in emotional support animals throughout our industry, so the, there is uh, there are many people out there that uh, have emotional support animals. And just an uh, FYI to our owners or potential owners that we work for, we are not allowed to discriminate against these animals even though we advertise and the owners state that they do not want animals occupying their units. We are still obligated under federal law to provide uh, housing for these—
Adrienne: Now, Evan, now like in your, in your guys’ experience, have you seen, uh, any kind of trouble with the service animals, I mean, generally they’re, they’re highly trained so I couldn’t expect, you know, an animal of this caliber to be chewing up someone’s home.
Evan: Yeah, well uh, there’s a big differential between a service animal, which is a highly trained animal and emotional support animal. Basically, nay animal can become an emotional support animal so um, as far as what we’ve seen, we’ve had no problems as far as the animals being out of control. But there, there is a difference between the two.
Attilio: Yeah, I think the good news is, is that uh, you as a homeowner, you’re trying to navigate through all of this and not get in hot water. It’s the reason why Adrienne and I never personally got involved in property management. The majority of the litigation that occurs in the real estate industry is through property management so, we highly recommend you, you know, at least give the professionals a call and find out what they’re all about. Check them out on Yelp, they’ve got great reviews, and thanks, Evan!
Adrienne: Thank you, Evan!
Attilio: Thank you, Evan!
Evan: Thanks, guys! Appreciate it!
Attilio: Alright so if you have any questions uh, you want to stay out of hot, getting out of hot water with emotional pets, service animals, uh, you know there’s even things you need to be aware of if you’re going to accept pets! And things that they—
Adrienne: Let them, let them help navigate you through all of that because there’s a lot of rules.
Attilio: Yeah, so remember this quote, uh, “A wise man has uh, a wise, a fool, a wise man has many counselors and a fool has none.” So, uh, get professional advice, especially in property management, it’s not worth it.
Adrienne: So, so you can reach them at 445-9223, that’s 445-9223 or check them out online at www.hipacificpm.com.
Attilio: One last reason to give them a call! They’ve got a rent guarantee. If they don’t get your property rented within an agreed upon time, for an agreed upon amount, they’ll pay the rent.
Adrienne: That’s pretty crazy!
Attilio: Yeah, either they’re crazy or they’re good. Give them a call, maybe they’re both! They’re crazy good.
Adrienne: Okay, so speaking of uh, some other people that are crazy good, we’ve got Jody.
Attilio: She’s the Mortgage Genius!
Adrienne: The Mortgage Genius! From Pacific Rim Mortgage joining us with her mortgage tip of the week!
Attilio: Jody, are you there?
Jody: Hey there guys!
Adrienne: Hello!
Attilio: Hi, we’re so excited, we’re kind of nervous because we’ve got the Mortgage Genius on the line.
Jody: Well don’t be nervous, you have nothing to be nervous about.
Attilio: So, what kind of, what kind of tip of the, mortgage tip of the week do you have for us?
Jody: So, for today, I wanted to discuss, I usually like to discuss topics that are top of mind, things that have actually occurred by current buyers. Um, because I feel like if we’re, you know, if, if, one buyer did it, another buyer might do it so let’s talk about it so it doesn’t happen.
Attilio: So, it’s like, buyers do the darndest things! Share.
Jody: Buyers do the darndest things, yes! So, one of our clients we had been working for about half a year now uh, went and we’ve been building credit and went and closed 2 credit cards. And so, you know, he didn’t think anything of it you know, and just assumed it would be helping him, he had finally gotten them paid off and he closed them.
Attilio: D’oh!
Jody: Yeah and so—
Attilio: Homer Simpson moment!
Jody: It is! And you know, it might be common knowledge to people like you and I because we’re in the industry, we live it, we breathe it. Um, but you know, it really wasn’t common knowledge to him and so I would you know, want to emphasize your credit FICO score is, is built off of an algorithm that takes your payment history on all of your liabilities. So, car loans, student loans, credit card loans um, and if you uh, close a credit card, that beautiful payment history that you’ve had will no longer positively impact your credit score.
Attilio: Bummer. So, don’t do that! When in doubt, check it out! Just give the Mortgage Genius a call!
Jody: Yeah, so don’t do that! And uh, any, any active balances that you’re going to have and also another thing that, that one may not know is on those cards that you, that do have zero balances, it’s going to be good for you to at least utilize them at least $25-50 and then pay it off in full. Um, every 90 days. Because once it’s inactive, it’s also much great, it, it decreases the amount of impact that it has on your credit score.
Adrienne: Those, those are some really great strategies to help build your credit!
Attilio: You know, it’s like Monopoly, you just, you’ve got to know what the rules of the game are and uh, Jody can help you with that. Credit scores are important, kind of makes a difference, right, on the cost of your financing, uh, interest rates, things like that, points, so, that little score!
Jody: Yup, it’ll save you thousands, tens of thousands of dollars over the life of a loan. It could be a difference of 5 points on your credit score.
Attilio: So, unless you live on the beach or you’re a multibillionaire and you pay cash for everything, you want to pay attention to that credit score.
Jody: Yes.
Adrienne: Alright, thank you so much, Jody. Excellent tip.
Attilio: Thank you.
Jody: Have a great day! Thank you!
Attilio: Alright, hey so first step in the five-step process for homebuying is get approved.
Adrienne: Get pre-approved.
Attilio: And who do we recommend?
Adrienne: We recommend Jody Tonga of Pacific Rim Mortgage. You can reach her at 488-5510 or check them out online at www.pacrimmtg.com.
Attilio: Now I know people are saying, hey, what’s the other four steps? If they want to know, what’s the, what’s the line? What’s the number they’ve got to call to get to know what the other four steps are?
Adrienne: Oh, they can call our buyer hotline at 234-4421. We’re happy to take them through that! We also have a homebuyer seminar coming up at the end of the month. I think it’s’ on the 28th. It’s the last Tuesday of March, from 5-6. You can uh—
Attilio: Learn about the other 4 steps.
Adrienne: At that seminar!
Attilio: Yup! So, if you want to RSVP for that event, do RSVP! We get so many people RSVP and then we’ve got to like turn them away at the door or we’ve got to make them look through the door you know, and uh, so do, do go to our website, www.teamlally.com. Go to the ‘Events’ dropdown, you’ll see the uh, homebuyer seminar and uh, RSVP! Okay! Speaking of RSVP, Myron!
Adrienne: We’ve got Myron on the line with his legal tip of the week!
Attilio: Hey, Myron!
Myron: Hey, how’s it going guys?
Attilio: Good! What’ve you got for us?
Myron: So today I want to talk about power of attorney. Uh, we all hear about them but what they actually do and what they actually cover uh, so today are, one ___ the power of attorney in combination with a trust covers two points in time. The trust obviously covers the point after death. But a power of attorney covers the time before the body has died but the mind is gone. So, um, I’ve had a few clients who suffer from dementia um, and who have uh, signed a power of attorney to a point as their agent, their adult children, that they can handle their financials. Then nothing would be affected while uh, my clients were still alive. And so, kind of my advice is to get with your estate planning attorney to ___ the power of attorney if you don’t have one um, in order to take care of those uh—
Attilio: Situations.
Myron: Take care of the financial affairs, you know, should uh, something happen to your mind uh, and in our trust package uh, for Vlad and I um, what we feel is that we do a trust and also within that package, under one charge, we provide a power of attorney to our clients.
Attilio: And then do you uh, do you give multiple copies because I know sometimes when you’re going business with certain entities, they want the original. And then—
Myron: Sure, sure.
Attilio: You go wait, you don’t have it, so should have multiple copies, right?
Myron: We do have, we do provide multiple copies but in order to get over that we draft a power of attorney uh, with what’s called a copy clause, and in the copy clause it says that uh, a copy, a photocopy is just as good as the original. And so, but you know, I, I understand people want their own copies so we do provide multiple copies for our clients.
Attilio: Okay, and then you can do uh, special power of attorneys right, so you’re not giving them everything. Maybe it’s just, because I know we’ve had those done for like some, just for the sale of a house.
Myron: Sure, sure and, and that’s called a limited power of attorney. I am talking about a durable, uninhibited power of attorney but you’re talking a limited power of attorney. And that is for special circumstances, uh, I have a case now where you know, one of my clients needed to uh, to get an authority to uh, conduct business for his partner, who’s actually in the Philippines and so they had a special power of attorney just encompassing uh, the authority to undertake the business that she had to do. And uh, yeah, it was fine. She was able to provide the documentation uh, on the, you know, clearly complying with the law and uh, the person who needed to see that documentation, or the company who needed to see the documentation was fine by it and uh, they were able to uh, you know uh, obtain the objective that they wanted to.
Attilio: Alright. Thanks, Myron!
Adrienne: Alright, thank you, Myron!
Myron: No problem.
Attilio: Alright so if you have more questions for Myron um, and you want to give him a call, what’s a good number?
Adrienne: They can uh, reach him at 352-6417 or check them out online at www.kamiharalaw.com. Now uh, we, we actually have a special press release that we want to—
Attilio: Oh, yeah you want to read it?
Adrienne: No, we want to talk about it because—
Attilio: Like now?
Adrienne: Yeah, right now! Go for it, go for it!
Attilio: That’s what Tony Robbins says, now is a good time. So, we’re proud to announce, we’re proud to announce that oh, I’ve got to get my glasses. Oh, I don’t wear glasses. We’re proud to announce that you know what, you read that
Adrienne: You could just talk about it!
Attilio: I can’t, you—
Adrienne: Okay, so (laughing), alright so our team now is exclusively endorsed by the lead singer of Rascal Flatts, Gary LeVox. Alright so, this market exclusive radio endorsement also incorporates the music of Rascal Flatts featuring “I’m Moving On,” which was awarded Song of the Year at the 38th Annual Academy of Country Music Awards in 2002. So, you’re going to hear that uh, endorsement here on the first break!
Attilio: Yeah! What do you mean they’re going to hear the endorsement?
Adrienne: Oh, it’s, it’s loaded on!
Attilio: Yup, so anyway, uh, that’s uh, something awesome, new and exciting but stay with us, when we come back to the, from the break. We’re going to have Sean and he’s going to be talking about commercial real estate and what else?
Adrienne: And all sorts of other fun things! So, stay with us!
Attilio: Yes!
[Music fades to commercials]
Announcer: The Team Lally real estate show continues.
Adrienne: Welcome back and thanks for listening to the Team Lally real estate show, home of the guaranteed sold program, or we’ll buy it! I’m Adrienne
Attilio: And I’m worth it!
Adrienne: And if you have any questions you can reach us at 799-9596 or check us out on the web at www.teamlally.com.
Attilio: Well hey everybody we want to welcome our in-studio guest. Uh, our guest today has built deep roots in the business community and the non-profit sectors here uh with his efforts to better Hawaii.
Adrienne: He volunteers and serves on the Board of Directors of several organizations, including Mental Health ___, Institute for Human Services, The Giff Foundation, amongst others
Attilio: Yeah, he’s also a designee and served seven years on the Board of Directors for CCIM, which stands for Certified Commercial Investment Member, which is recognized as the Ph. D of commercial real estate.
Adrienne: Over the past decade he’s been a top producer in the commercial real estate market in Hawaii. Please welcome our guest, the managing partner of Commercial Asset Advisors, Sean Tadaki!
Attilio: Welcome to the show!
Adrienne: Welcome, Sean!
Sean: Thank you very much guys!
Adrienne: Thank you for joining us!
Attilio: So, local style, we like to always get to know the person a little bit before we talk, start getting down to uh talk business. So, um, if you’re not from Hawaii or uh, if you are, tell us you know, what high school you went to. If not, how did you get to Hawaii?
Sean: So as much of a local boy as I look, I’m actually from the east coast! So, I grew up, I was born in D.C.
Adrienne: Oh, me too!
Sean: Grew up in Tokyo. And uh, finished up high school back in D.C., Baltimore area.
Attilio: Where did you go, Adrienne?
Adrienne: I went to Spring Brook High school, but that was in like Silver Springs.
Sean: So, I’m’ from Columbia.
Adrienne: Oh, okay! We’re very close!
Sean: So, we um, my, my father worked for the American Embassy in Tokyo, so I grew up in Tokyo, finishing up high school back in D.C. area, and then uh, I ended up at Boston, Boston University. And uh, it was interesting. I fell in love with real estate uh, in ’93 when I was in Boston. And all the way through college I, I did real estate and uh, became a partner with the firm in Boston in ’96 and then my parents started tapping me on the shoulder, in ’97 and said would you consider moving back to Hawaii and I said, be back? I’ve never been here before, I’ve barely visited. But uh, by ’99 I got burned out. I got burned out in the industry so I sold everything, cashed in all my chips and uh, moved out here hoping to live here for one year without working, do nothing, and uh, regrouping and I fell in love with Hawaii, literally in 3 months. I fell in love with Hawaii and I said oh, boy, I better figure out what I’m going to do here because I’m going to be, have to grow roots here, so that’s when I got back into the industry.
Attilio: What year was that?
Sean: That was in uh, late ’99, November of ’99.
Adrienne: So, Sean, have you always done commercial real estate or did you do residential and move into commercial or how did that, did you make that choice?
Sean: One year of residential. And, in ’93, it didn’t’ work well for me, uh, I, you, there’s two different skill sets, two different uh, product types and uh, two different types of clients, so it’s a, it didn’t quite resonate with me, but the commercial side has always resonated with me. Very well.
Attilio: Now let’s talk about, you know, on the East Coast, what’s the, the negotiation styles, the pace of business, I mean is it, is it different than in Hawaii? More aggressive? Less aggressive? Same?
Sean: A lot more aggressive; the pace is just faster. But I think we do pace here strategically slower, because to, to keep maybe the outsiders out. And the pace of business is really tough for me to, for me to adjust to, um so it took me about a year, took me about a year just heavy, cold-calling and getting back into the business to really start uh, creating my foundation.
Adrienne: So, with the, with the commercial real estate, I know that you guys have your, your specialties and so what, what is your main specialty?
Sean: So, for me personally, I’ve always done, I eat, sleep and breathe office and healthcare. That’s what I’ve done for the past 17 years and that’s what I’m really kind of known for in the industry. Um, my firm itself, well let me back up a little bit, I started with, so I went back to, in 2000, I started with a national firm uh, and it was a wonderful experience. I ran the office division for that firm for 12 years. Here Locally and it was, it was, it was a greet experience. I learned a lot about the corporate style of, of doing commercial real estate. Uh, and then about 5 years ago I opened my own firm, which was Commercial Asset Advisors. Um, at my firm, it’s my partner and I, and he’s solely uh, specializes in apartment and multi-family and I solely specialize in office and healthcare.
Attilio: Office and healthcare. So, uh, there’s a lot of things out there like Adrienne mentioned and the, the, are you finding that the specialization has helped you become more successful and profitable than trying to do everything?
Sean: It truly has, it truly has. Um, when I, the more specialized I get, the more people seek me out versus me having to create and then, and seek more, more of my clients out.
Adrienne: So, you’re more like in the attracting mode versus the, in the early days, the cold-calling.
Sean: Exactly, attracting and retention. Retention. Very key.
Adrienne: So, a lot of repeat customers and referrals?
Attilio: You know we like have our entrepreneurs on the show because what we found, you know, Adrienne and I, we have our big residential company here and we started just, just like you, ground zero, nothing. You know, getting the license and, and, and starting from nowhere. So, we know we have a lot of people that, maybe they’ve got that job they hate, and they’re what we call, what s a want-repreneur?
Adrienne: Someone that’s like, they’re just trying to make it. They want to be the entrepreneur. They’re not there yet.
Attilio: They’re not an entrepreneur just yet. So, what made you, what made you um, um, you know, you went from, with this company for 12 years and then what made you decide to make that break?
Sean: You know I was, it was looking at doing a better mousetrap, so I was able to down-size while I was at the company, I downsized my, my client list. I really became engrained with my clients that, my, my truly, true clients that are really, backed me up and I got engrained with them, not just transactionally but more on advisory roles. And so, I dropped my client list by about a third, and I was number 2 in the company the last 3 years I was at the company. And 2 out of all the division. And uh, and I showed them that they, that model can work, and unfortunately it was, it’s a large company and so it’s hard to turn the ship. And uh, yeah, so I figured out that, you know, if it doesn’t, if it could work for me here, I could take the show on the road and do it myself. And then thankfully, thankfully um, I had about 85-90% of my clients come with me. Yeah, so I was, that was humbling and very fortunate.
Attilio: Yeah, we’re reading a book called uh, John Maxwell’s 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership. And that, they, they, uh, that law that you just, the example that you just provided is what they call the law of influence. And it doesn’t matter, clients have the relationship with you and it doesn’t matter who you hang your license with or, or what, what title is above your, your nameplate.
Adrienne: They trust you.
Attilio: It’s the relationship and that’s called the law of influence. And they gave examples of big time uh, CEOs that left companies and all the clients went with them and, nothing skipped a beat for the person because they had the influence with their client base.
Adrienne: So, so speaking of clients, who, like who are those ideal clients that you’re looking to build those relationships with?
Sean: For me it’s, it’s, my bread and butter is downtown, so CBD, Class A properties. Central Business District (CBD). Um, downtown Class A properties is where my real stomping grounds are. Although my business allows me to go into a lot of the different submarkets, so where I, my business plan is actually to control the, the top of, top of market in, in each of the business, in each submarket. So, for example in the airport area, I oversee um, Airport Industrial Park, which is a 1.3 million square foot property. Uh, mixed use office and industrial. And uh, downtown, one of my properties is ___ Place, and so, and so on and so forth. In each of the markets I try to get the, the Class A properties in those markets, and everything trickles down from there. So, from, answering your question, Adrienne, looking at who is the best candidate for, for a client of mine, it’s those who actually have a little bit of term left on their lease to be able to understand what is needed in their future for this, office properties are, office users are changing very dramatically right now. So, that’s where I can come in and help, in an advisory role, figure out what their needs are and how that meshes in with the market moving forward.
Attilio: Now how we met, we were doing the uh, the—
Adrienne: The panel.
Attilio: The panel discussion which was the 2017 forecast for the CCIM meeting. That they had and you were, you did your presentation. I, I told you when we got off stage, I liked your presentation the best! Probably better than ours too! Because it was very, you know, and this is key for people, entrepreneurs, any, whatever you’re doing! It was very visual. How did you, had you, had you done that presentation before with this group?
Sean: No, that was the first time, yeah.
Attilio: Yeah! So—
Adrienne: Well good, good job!
Attilio: Tell us about your, yeah, tell us about the, how you went, yeah how did you come up with that presentation? What were you hoping, what was the message you were hoping to communicate?
Sean: So, that all came from me wanting to be different. So, I’m always trying to be distinctive and, and not go with the masses. And in those presentations, historically, which are great by the way, historically it’s always been stats and graphs and so forth, and I think uh, I, I had maybe one stat in my entire, one, one percentage of occupancy in my entire presentation and it was more so the gist of the presentation was you can’t control the market, the market is a dynamic beast. It just goes and flows however it may. And as a user in the marketplace, you can then affect change within your own company and to take advantage of the market. So, it’s, it’s knowing how to control your company, knowing what you can control. Knowing how to control your company, how to, how to change the culture, how to change the, the technology, moving forward to be able to best capture what the market is going to offer you at the time when you’re ready.
Adrienne: Now, Sean you had some interesting stats about the occupancy uh, of, for the, for office. So, could you talk to that a little bit for our listeners?
Sean: Sure. The office market, in general has been very stagnant here in Hawaii and primary markets such as New York, L.A., Chicago, office space is still, the nice office, Class A office space is still at a premium and, and they’re considering new construction in some of those markets. In Hawaiian and some of the other secondary and tertiary markets across the country, it’s a little stagnant. I think that’s because the use of office space is changing very quickly and that’s because of technology, because of millennials, not necessarily needing a roof over their head for the technology and wanting to be mobile and so the, there’s a paradigm shift that’s happening right now that we’re trying to get ahead of.
Attilio: Yeah!
Adrienne: We actually had the uh, one of the owners of the MyGoCenter on our show, a couple weeks ago and that was something that he talked about. The, the concept of the shared office space.
Sean: That’s the co-working space, isn’t it for them? I mean We Works, which is the largest in the, in the world at the moment, is the largest single tenant in New York City right now.
Attilio: And is that what they do? They just—
Sean: They, they either buy or lease office, the entire building in some cases and they create this culture and then, and, the co-working spaces, from what I can see, only work when you create a culture. Um, people will pay a premium to be a part of something else. Whereas if you’re just leasing a space and leasing a, a room or leasing an office space in a building, you don’t have that necessary culture built in with it.
Adrienne: That experience? Yes, you have to be very careful about the experience of the user.
Attilio: Yeah, no and I think what it, you know I was talking with them, we were at a networking event. It creates a bearable expense for their conference room because it, instead of owning one that doesn’t get used, they can use it when they need it and pay for it when they need it.
Sean: Exactly.
Attilio: So, what uh, so talk to us more about this getting ahead of the curve. What are you seeing as far as the entrepreneurs today, as far as office space? What kind of, you know, what technology are they using? What’s not, not having them buy these big huge office spaces and be there for 20 years?
Sean: So, those who are understanding that telecommunications and how they’re, how they’re utilizing their own systems in terms of Cloud computing and so forth, they’re getting, those, those companies are getting rid of a lot of the square footage that they need. They’re cutting their fixed overhead costs. That’s really important moving forward. Um, in terms of technology it really depends on each of the different, different firms though so um, a law firm, which is, which most of them are a little behind the curve in terms of technology, and they still have a lot of, lot of redundancy and bookshelves and so forth, or they’re keeping um, those who are getting ahead of it are, are getting everything online and getting rid of those kinds of square footages. Uh, from a law firm to like a PR firm, it’s very different in terms of what they’re using in technology so it’s hard to just kind of pinpoint one, but it’s mostly getting out of hard files. Trying to go paperless and those who are trying to go paperless are getting ahead of the curve faster.
Attilio: I think a, a key example. We had, we weren’t like these super smart entrepreneurs that intentionally did this, it just happened organically but our business model, we, our marketing director works out of his home in Tennessee, our, our outside, our inside sales agent manager is working, works out of uh—
Adrienne: Washington.
Attilio: Washington. And then we have 8, 8 assistants that work out of the Philippines. And so, we get together via technology with the Google Hangouts, video conferencing and we do screen sharing, and I can imagine like what you said, if we were all under one roof, that would be a huge office!
Adrienne: We’d have to double or office space. Or maybe even triple!
Attilio: Yeah, we’d have to like, we’d have to hot rack, people would have to stand half of their shift and someone would sit and they take turns standing and sitting because nobody could sit at the same time.
Sean: And that’s a fixed cost that we’re talking about. The fixed cost is just, that’ll eat into your, your profits over time.
Attilio: So, we’re, we’re, you know we maximize, we even have somebody in the kitchen at our place that, it’s a kitchen and—
Adrienne: And an office!
Attilio: And an office!
Sean: How do they feel about that? (laughing)
Adrienne: They, they actually asked to be in that spot!
Attilio: They asked to be in that spot, it’s a stand-up station and uh, she can reach back and wash her dishes and, and open up the fridge and get a drink. No! She wanted to be in that space and she likes it and um, so anyway.
Sean: That’s funny. My assistant’s actually in Georgia.
Adrienne: So, same thing there.
Attilio: Yeah, and that’s what we’re noticing in today’s entrepreneurial market, that certain services or skill sets can be provided to you and, and it doesn’t matter geographically where that person’s located, with today’s technology. What else, so, what’s um, do you have a question?
Adrienne: What’s, oh yeah! So, so at the break we were talking about a new company that you’ve just launched, uh, Pacific Assets Strategies. Could you tell us a little bit more about this, this new endeavor?
Sean: Sure! So, Commercial Asset Advisors, we were, it’s a purely a brokerage firm. Um, we eat, sleep, and breath brokerage. But a lot of my clients over the past years have come to me and said hey, you know, Sean, you’ve been on my property for 8 years and you’ve been just a rock solid in being in there and no, no change and you know, you’re not putting uh smoke and mirrors and putting a junior agent on it or anything like that. Um, but my property management company changes their manager every 6 months or something like that and every time the property manager changes it takes the property back a few steps. And then the new company, the new manager or company has to come on board and then, and then, catch up.
Attilio: Re-establish relationships.
Sean: Exactly, exactly. So, it’s a real disruptive, it’s really disruptive. So, they’ve, they’ve, a lot of my clients have asked, can you do the property management for me. I’m not the one to do the property management. I’m a broker through and through. But what I was able to dissect and really break down property management, especially in the commercial side, um, I, I put together the right team. So, my partner uh, I have two partners actually, my partner out of, is out of Seattle and they are say, UNICO properties out of Seattle um, they’re in 5 different markets. They have roughly 15 million square feet of property that they oversee and they own uh, or partial own over half of that. So over 8 million square feet they’re, they’re uh a principal in. To put that into context, we have 8 million, 8.4 million square feet of office product on Oahu alone, I mean that’s it. So, they own almost all of Oahu in terms of, in terms of uh, the equivalent space.
Adrienne: Yeah!
Sean: And then in 5 different markets. So, that’s why, that’s why my partner out of Seattle does all of the back office, accounting, all the depth of services and, and, and the knowledge-based that we need. And then my other partner, she’s local, uh, she was running the, one of the largest portfolio, office portfolios in the state here, for about 9 years. And then she cam over as my COO and so it’s been wonderful. So, we have a, the differentiator is that we look at properties from an owner’s perspective and uh, none of the other property management companies can really say that because of the fact that we have so much under, under management and ownership that um, it’s a, it’s a different way of looking at properties. Not more of an expensive way but just looking at properties differently in terms of maximizing your NOI on the properties. At all times.
Attilio: Yeah. NOI, what does that stand for?
Sean: Net operating income.
Attilio: Okay, I still don’t know what that means. No, I’m just kidding!
All: (laughing)
Attilio: No, at the end of the day, I mean to put it in layman’s terms, I, I see some similarities because we were the same way. People were coming to us, hey, why don’t you manage this investment property we bought? We’re like we aren’t touching that—
Adrienne: Or we would refer it and then they would have kind of a—
Attilio: Not a good experience.
Adrienne: Not the same kind of experience as they had with our team.
Attilio: So, we did the same thing, we started a property management, sep—completely separate brokerage, went from 0 to 300 properties. They have a whole separate team, we’ve got a great partner, Duke. And uh, that’s been working out real well but what we learned is, and I don’t know if it’s true for these commercial owners, two things they wanted us to, cash flow and preserving the value of the property. I mean it, could you boil it down to that for your commercial clients?
Sean: It’s, it’s a little bit more in-depth than that. Because of the fact that there’s so many moving parts for a commercial property. We have entire engineering teams just on one property alone. And, and, and day porters and janitors and it’s, it’s, it’s overseeing a larger, large team so it’s not just one facet and it honestly depends on what the ownership uh, when they bought the property, what their goal was at the end of the day. Um, yes, if you look at it and you always want to try to maximize NOI, but how do you do that? By, and some landlords don’t want to expend capital, some do, some don’t, so it’s really understanding and creating, creating the, the right match for the owner and what their goals are for each of the different properties. And an office property is managed very differently than an industrial property.
Attilio: What uh, do, do you, do you guys have properties in Kapolei? I’m thinking I’m seeing your signs there.
Sean: I, I do for brokerage side. Yes, I oversee the ___ property in Kapolei.
Attilio: That’s what I thought because we, we’re, our office is in the James Campbell, we’re always walking around that area and I could have sworn, you know I think I saw their sign! So, uh, what other questions, Adrienne?
Adrienne: I was, I was going to ask, who is your ideal client for the property management? Do they go hand in hand?
Attilio: Are they coming from your brokerage clients?
Sean: It’s a little bit of both. A little bit of both um, we’re, there’s, our skill set is really geared towards office, healthcare and industrial for the management side, uh we have capabilities of doing all of it but again, I believe in focusing, I believe in really creating a special, specialized niche so those are the properties that we’re identifying or targeting first.
Attilio: You know, the, we do have a lot of realtors, lot of entrepreneurs, people wanting to get into different industries. What would you say would be your top three tips? Somebody wants uh, you know somebody wants to get into commercial real estate. What would be your advice in that?
Sean: Have a lot saved up in your nest egg, because no matter how, how great of a, of a salesperson you think you are, the deal cycle in commercial side is really long, really long. So, we always usually say have as much, enough in your nest egg for about 2-3 years’ worth of expenses. It’s a really long cycle to even just getting ahead of the curve I mean I, I had 8 years of experience on the mainland, and the first 2 years I was probably negative in terms of my, my total, my total income. Um, and that was just because you have, you have to just build up a client base and the deals are long and uh, so it’s not exactly the easiest thing to jump into I mean, there’s, I always use these stats and I’m not 100% sure about these stats but I can name probably 30 of the top commercial guys who do 95% of all the deals. It’s that small of a fraternity.
Attilio: Yeah, I think on the residential probably about, it’s probably an 80-20 role because we know that half of the relators do 0, half of the licensed, residential licensees in Oahu do 0, the other half are I think about 5-7 transactions and then the rest of us are doing like you said—
Adrienne: 90% of the deals. Yeah.
Attilio: So, here’s uh, so boy, uh so boys and girls, here you go, here’s your advice from Sean. Number one, get your license, number two, rob a bank, and number three prospect every day until you get a first payoff.
All: (laughing)
Attilio: So, um, yeah, and you know that’s, it’s not for the faint at heart or people who can’t hang in there, right? Because—
Sean: It really takes a long time.
Attilio: The life cycle of that first transaction.
Adrienne: So, so Sean, are, what do you ___ your companies, are you looking for, for new talents? Currently?
Sean: We are! Unfortunately, I’m, I’m, I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not a good trainer. And so, and again, understanding what my strengths are is probably the most eye-opening thing for me over the past 5-10 years and my strengths are not in, training, training new, new agents. I believe in, once they’re, once they’re proven, by all means, by all means I’d love to have them on the team, but it really—
Adrienne: So, any current commercial brokers with a track record that are listening now—
Attilio: Superstars!
Adrienne: You need to give Sean a call! He’s ready for you.
Sean: I think it’s, I think those who can make rain, are those who are going to have longevity in this business.
Attilio: And you know, I think what’s attractive for that person that’s listening right now, is you get to work, you don’t have, if you can work for some big company, the high up guy is like somewhere back in New York or whatever in the mainland, you’re in, right here, you can, you can talk with a local entrepreneur who started from 0. And made it and so he’s going, we call that the uh, you’re the “Show Me” leader. You’re going to be able to show them, not tell them what to do, you’re going to be able to show them because you’re in the trenches, doing it every day. You still prospect?
Sean: Exactly. No, I still love it, I still love it. Yeah.
Attilio: Okay. Alright, we’re going to get ready to take a break!
Adrienne: Stay with us!
Attilio: Probably have a few more questions for Sean.
Adrienne: And some new listings to talk about!
Attilio: Yeah, so stay with us when we come back.
[Music fades to commercials]
Announcer: It’s the Team Lally real estate show. Here’s Adrienne and Attilio!
Adrienne: Welcome back and thanks for listening to the Team Lally real estate show, home of the guaranteed sold program, or we’ll buy it! I’m Adrienne—
Attilio: And I’m Attilio!
Adrienne: And if you have any questions, just give us a call at 799-9596 or check us out online at www.teamlally.com.
Attilio: Hey, uh, real quick praises and kudos that um, the uh, the song that you heard, Team Lally jingle. We want to give a big shout out and say some warm love and aloha to our favorite—
Adrienne: Listing manager.
Attilio: Listing manager, Howard Netts. He not only is our awesome listing manager, but he’s actually a trained musician and he actually wrote and composed that jingle and produced it and everything so thank you, Howard.
Adrienne: Yes, lots of talent on our team! Alright so we’re talking with uh, Sean Tadaki of Commercial Asset Advisors. And he’s offered us some really you know, great information and we learned al to more about the office space here in, in the commercial industry. So, uh, Sean, we’re going to, I guess move on to our, our open houses and listings here in a few minutes, so—
Attilio: But before we do that—
Adrienne: Before we do that, we want to get final words of wisdom from you.
Attilio: Or anything you want to share.
Adrienne: Yes.
Sean: Sure, sure. Um, you know, I was lucky when I figured out that I really enjoyed commercial real estate, or real estate in general but with commercial real estate and uh, so I’ve been doing it for 24 years but I started early. But find your passion because people are naturally drawn to passion. So, whatever it may be, I mean, I’ve got, I know guys who’ve been, went through a lot of schooling and a lot of grad school and everything else and now they’re amazing engineers. But they dread going to work every day. I love waking up every day, I mean Mondays are like my Fridays. Because I love doing that, I love waking up and getting, getting in front of my clients and getting in front of people and really adding some value to, to major companies, locally and nationally so, um, whether it be in real estate or anything else, just find a passion for it. Find a passion early and stick with it. I think people are naturally drawn to that so money will come! But passion and patience.
Adrienne: Passion first!
Attilio: Passion and patience! So, the uh, you know what’s a, if people are listening they, you know, maybe that superstar is listening right now, and they want to give you a call and go through your gauntlet process of seeing if they can, if they warrant their spot on your team
Adrienne: Or, or a potential client might be listening.
Attilio: Or a potential client, you never know! We’ve had so many kind of different people listening to the show. What’s a good number or website or email that they should get a hold of you?
Sean: Sure! They can reach me at 564-3303. Or check out our website it’s uh, www.caahawaii.com!
Attilio: Alright, so Adrienne, the number, 564-3303, again that number is 564-3303 or check them out online—
Adrienne: Www.caahawaii.com
Attilio: Yup, that’s it.
Adrienne: Okay, thank you so much, Sean!
Attilio: Thank you, Sean!
Sean: Thank you guys!
Adrienne: Alright so we’re going to move on to our open houses that are going to be happening on uh, this weekend.
Attilio: Who’s on the line?
Adrienne: We’ve got Abby on the line! To talk about her open house! Abby—
Abby: Hi guys!
Adrienne: Hello!
Attilio: Hello, Abby!
Abby: So, um, hey, no open house today, I mean that’s today of course, but Sunday for me but uh, (laughing). I would like to share you know, a few tips and advice to our buyers out there, what not to do when you’re buying a home.
Attilio: Yes, what not to do.
Abby: Okay, just a few things. Yeah, what not to do! So, when you’re buying a home, especially when in escrow, you know, don’t apply for any credit cards, number one, of course too, don’t buy a car, don’t buy any furniture, don’t close your credit accounts. Don’t’ change your job and uh, and don’t make any late payments.
Attilio: What’re you going to do is you’re going to go into homeostasis. At home! We’re going to put you in a coma and then we’re going to revive you when it’s time to close so you don’t spend money and mess up your transaction!
Abby: Exactly! And then if you guys have questions, if you have any questions please give me a call, I would love to help you guys, you know, look for that dream home, 234-9107.
Attilio: Alright, thanks, Abby!
Adrienne: Thanks, Abby!
Abby: Awesome, thank you!
Attilio: You know what I like about Abby? When I hear her voice, I always want to say, can you put your mom on the phone? Because she sounds so young!
Adrienne: (laughing) Okay so while we’re waiting for our next agent, I wanted to talk about uh, upcoming event. In Kapolei.
Attilio: What is it?
Adrienne: It is uh, well basically it’s for investors. So, 90% of wealth was built through real estate. Attend the seminar where it’s not about selling some system but sharing real life strategies. We’re going to be hosting a wealth-building mastermind, Friday, March 24th in Kapolei. You can go to www.teamlally.com/tw to RSVP. You can also go to our “Events” section on our website and RSVP there as well.
Attilio: Yeah, so we’re bringing in uh, a broker. She’s been in the business for a long time, coming in from San Francisco. She’s going to be speaking about investing in real estate and we promise at the back door of the room, there will not be a table full of books that you’re going to have to buy to get your way out of the room! We’re actually going to be sharing with you real life strategies, things that Adrienne and I do to invest in real estate. Alright.
Adrienne: Okay, so uh, we’ve got a couple minutes left. We can, we can answer some questions, we have recently sent out a video email asking for questions from our, all of our uh, oh wait, we’ve got Brooks on the line.
Attilio: Alright, let’s get him on the line.
Adrienne: So, we’ll talk to Brooks.
Attilio: Hey, Brooks!
Adrienne: And then answer the questions.
Attilio: Hey, Brooks, are you there?
Brooks: Yes, I am! How are you guys?
Attilio: We’re always doing good. What’ve you got for us?
Brooks: I’ve got a property in ___ that’s awesome and ___ is just a super popular place that will continue to be, so as, Kapolei is ___ and this, this property is located in such an area that you, you should have this forever view. It looks out over the, the beautiful blue Pacific to Diamondhead and matter of fact, the great story that the owners like to tell is how they watched their son deploy out of Pearl Harbor on one of the navy ships and just watched it sail off into the sunset. Right from their own home! Yes! And uh, some of the nice things about this is, is very uh, it’s cooled off with ___ AC, it’s uh, it’s got a power plant on the roof in the form of 32 ___ panels and nice, nicely landscaped and it’s just a gorgeous home, uh, white oak hardwood floors that are beautifully finished and I, they’re really nice. Beautiful, to-die-for kitchen. What else does the buyer want, right
Attilio: Yeah! So, it would just be perfect if down the hill you had one of those all you can eat buffets because you have the forever view, then you can go down the hill and eat forever. So, anyway.
Brooks: (laughing). Are you hungry?
Attilio: No, so my little kids call it the buffet. They call it, oh dad, can we go to eat forever and that wasn’t the name of it but that’s what they called it. Eat forever. But um anyway, thanks, Brooks.
Adrienne: Thanks, Brooks!
Brooks: Oh, you’re welcome, thanks, you guys! Have a great day!
Adrienne: Okay, alright so here’s the questions that was coming from May. “Are you willing to negotiate creative financing between seller and buyer? Lease options, seller financing, etc.”
Attilio: Okay, and here’s our answer: we spend a lot of time and research on this one. No.
Adrienne: Okay, unfortunately—
Attilio: I’m just kidding, that’s not the answer. Go ahead.
Adrienne: Unfortunate the low inventory, seller market does not create motivations for that type of scenario. Sellers still have multiple qualified buyers for their properties. Now if it a seller wants, now if you’re a seller that wants to offer seller financing, we can help you with that!
Attilio: Yeah, alright.
Adrienne: Alright, thank you for listening and thank you to our sponsors!
Attilio: Jody Tonga and Derek Tonga of Pacific Rim Mortgage!
Adrienne: Bradley Mariame of AllState Insurance!
Attilio: Nathan Baker of Pillar to Post Home Inspections!
Adrienne: Ben and Tony Mamoon of Triple A Roofers Hawaii!
Attilio: Janice Myrland with Dream House Drafting!
Adrienne: John Speed of Kilauea Pest Control!
Attilio: Duke Kimhan with Hawaii Pacific Property Management!
Adrienne: ___ Plumbing!
Attilio: With Allen Lowe. Thomas Patterson with Patterson Land Surveying!
Adrienne: Myron Kamihara of Kamihara Law!
Attilio: If you want to get ahold of any of our sponsors, just go to www.teamlally.com.
Adrienne: We want to give a big thank you to Steven, our producer here in the studio.
Attilio: And Sean!
Adrienne: Yes!
Attilio: Chi-hoo!
Adrienne: Make sure to tune in next week, we’ll have an awesome guest talking about something that’ll change your life—
Attilio: Forever! This is the Tea Lally real estate show, home of the guaranteed—
Adrienne and Attilio: SOLD PROGRAM!
Adrienne: If we can’t sell your home at the agreed upon price and your time frame, we’ll have it bought for cash.
Adrienne and Attilio: THANKS, AND ALOHA!