HeliosCapital | CRE Debt & Equity Advisor

@seandsweeney Well said.

Everyone wants to be a real estate developer. It’s sexy. The financial upside can be enormous. Famous developers are treated like gods. Even modestly successful ones get treated way too well and get way too much credit. 😉 It’s the dream for a lot of real estate people. But the day to day reality is quite different. Can you stomach going years without getting paid? Can you sign a recourse loan knowing if the project isn’t successful you might go bankrupt? Can you do that over and over and over again? Can you spend hundreds of thousands, or millions, of dollars pursuing a project, only to see it not get off the ground? What if that happens twice in the same year? Can you face the wrath of your neighbors in meetings? Where they yell and curse at you? Where they call you the devil? Can you manage every single detail of a multiple year process, knowing that one slip up can derail the entire thing? My advice to most is not to become a developer. Buy existing assets with non recourse loans. Build a portfolio over time. Get wealthy. Sleep well. Only become a developer if you’ve tried everything else and know in your bones it is what you want to do. Then do it!

@realEstateTrent Interesting…which AI chatbot did you use? ChatGPT law version?

Yesterday I had a call with a great attorney whose rate is $975 per hour. We had a nice conversation and he gave me lots of valuable information about a topic I have little experience with, and provided sound advice. The crazy thing is, I told an AI Chatbot the same thing I told the attorney, provided it with the same documents, and asked for advice regarding next steps -- and got the same answers the lawyer gave me. I'm not saying I am going to replace talking to a lawyer with AI chatbots, but I would have to think this is coming, and that at the very least the law firms are going to use these tools -- it's a huge potential profit opportunity for them if they embrace these tools.

Thrilled to see the completion of this standalone Chipotle and TD Bank/Heartland Dental development in the Raleigh suburb of Clayton, NC. HeliosCapital, along with being a principal in this development deal, also secured the construction financing and equity placement.

@TXStrGuy Great post and spot on. Thanks for sharing your experience.

I spoke with 153 hard money lenders over 2 months trying to find acquisition debt on my latest deal. I naively thought most were actually "private" lenders, and therefore capable of getting creative and competitive. Wrong. Here's everything I wish I would've known beforehand.

@CaseyMericle 1000%! All day - everyday!

Debt is cheaper than equity Say it with me a 20% hard money loan is cheaper than an 8% pref while giving up 80% of the deal Quit crying about your rate!

HeliosCapital arranged construction financing for the development of a freestanding Chipotle w/drive-thru and a 2-tenant TD Bank - Heartland Dental in Clayton (Raleigh), NC. HeliosCapital specializes in loans $2-$20mm. #CRE #NNN #netlease #triplenet #Retail #STNL #thebrokerlist

@realEstateTrent Great post and insight! Keep em coming.

When will commercial real estate deal volume pick up? A breakdown:

@FranchiseMnA Great post and a good lesson learned in the process. You just never know where it’s going to lead. Best part is it sounds like you gained a really good friend in the process.

The best salesman I ever encountered wore a $30k Rolex and made 6 figures off a cold email to me… And I am the worst person to ever do cold outreach to…I HATE buying anything when I’m being “sold” First response is always *delete*, unsubscribe/block or nicely decline This one went differently… A business development person was coming from out of town and wanted to meet with me I had deleting his email multiple times, but now he went back channel and got a colleague to connect us so I was forced to respond this time Unfortunate for him, my response was still “thanks but I am tied up and can’t meet” aka no interest, leave me alone The next day he had a Starbucks gift card waiting on my desk with a nice note (creepy?) Good start but still not enough… Two months pass, his next email is asking if he can bring me coffee “in person this time” and meet for 15 mins I gave in and agreed. He was slick and won me over with this trick We met and he didn’t try to sell at all. I was confused on the purpose of the meeting but went with it and realized he is actually a nice guy Several months pass, I ran into him at an industry conference and he invites me to a dinner. Expensive steak dinner (paid by him) + some great networking…can’t complain (still no sales pitch!) Next I’m invited to his fantasy football league and our friendship slowly becomes real as we begin speaking regularly We are 6 months in by this point and I realize I actually need his service now… Despite my best attempt to dodge him… he offically won me over and gets my call He delivers and knocks it out of the park too! Over the next 2 years he becomes a close friend, my goto guy, and the guy I refer to everyone in my network Did some rough math and estimated this to be over $400k of revenue and I’ve never heard his sales pitch! Watching him made me a better sales person myself Lesson learned: The worlds best sales people know how to sell, without making you feel like you are being sold to

@chernobelskiy Some of these names are hilarious, but were probably considered at some point.

I am so sick of seeing LPs lose money to GPs with ridiculous firm names, so here goes nothing: If the GP's firm is sketchy as hell, THE INVESTMENT IS ALSO PROBABLY SKETCHY AS HELL Come at me lol

@brianbeers Any specific industry or franchise to look into if you’re looking for “quasi” passive income whereby the wife can oversee the business on a part time basis?

Ditch real estate if you want to build real cash flow I used to own a handful of single family homes "$200 per month per door" is a joke Buying a franchise is a much quicker path 🧵

@GuyDealership Haha. Yep. My dad was dealer - when I was younger I worked for him briefly and he would have me bid on our cars up to a certain price point. When he would touch his ear or scratch his head then I would stop bidding. I was the “coke machine”.

One reason used car dealers go broke: COKE MACHINES. confused? you should be. (not talking about the white stuff) here’s what happens: - you’re at a used car auction - you’re bidding on a car - miraculously, someone starts bidding against you - but you can’t see this person. there’s no one else in the lane. are they invisible? a ghost? nope. the auctioneer is just bumping you up. it’s a fictitious bid! or as we say in the business: “you’re bidding against the coke machine” happens everyday. all over the world. the result: inexperienced dealers “overpay” for cars. in this business, only the sharks survive 🦈

@just_in_are_not @TripleNetInvest Bingo. That’s spot on analysis right there.

I want to hear your list of a dozen qsr’s that are on par with or better than cfa ? It’s an insanely simple concept that’s very difficult to pull off but is blatantly obvious when you experience it. This one sentence makes everything else you say irrelevant because there aren’t any let alone a dozen. CFA has mastered the hiring and training of good employees, the flow of customers and the consistency of their food. All the other QSR’s have food that’s sometimes good sometimes bad, service that is usually bad but sometimes good, wait times that are usually ok but sometimes ridiculous. At CFA you know what the food will taste like because it’s always the same. You know the employees will be polite and professional and the wait times will be quick no matter how many cars in the drive thru. 10 cars at all other qsr’s =20 minutes 50 cars at CFA =10 minutes

Chick Fil A is good but lets be honest - they're not THAT great I can name a dozen QSRs that are on par with/better than Chick Fil A It's insane to me that Chick Fil A makes more than the avg of Popeyes, KFC, Taco Bell, Burger King, and Panda Express combined! Avg sales for each drive-thru location: -$8.5 million annually -$27,156 per day (opened) -$1,645 per hour (opened) -$27.43 per minute (opened) This never ceases to blow my mind - something doesn't add up at all

@shawngorham How did you use his money- what was the investment?

Finance, MBA, REPE Boi's A friend sent me $40k in 2009 In 2017 I sent him back $90k In 2023 I sent him another $350k Zero cash flow, No other distributions I dont use excel - how did my friend do? Did he make a good investment?

@Codie_Sanchez Very interesting; I’m intrigued how you applied these concepts to this business model. Tried buying a laundromat several years ago. Missed out on it and regret it. I think I over analyzed the business, asked too many questions in my diligence and took too long to make a decision

@SMB_Attorney I’m in Wrightsville Beach and there’s not a KOA on the beach here. That pic is from Hatteras/Outerbanks area.

Off-Market Listing Alert 🚨 Pool installation and maintenance in a beautiful Carolina ocean town. $1.5 million EBITDA / $5.0 million revenue Seller does not want to engage a broker. Sending to clients and friends first, but if you’re interested send me a DM and I’ll put you in touch.

@ckinds12 @SMB_Attorney I’m in Wrightsville Beach and there’s not a KOA on the beach here. That pic is from Hatteras/Outerbanks area.

@SMB_Attorney Wilmington?

@KrissBergTweets Good stuff.

🧮Tax Day Math Lesson 🧮 How To Make Literal Buckets of Money and Pay ZERO Tax With A Tax Loophole Of The Ultra-Rich 💰Step 1: Make some money doing just about anything (biz, W2, MLM, ponzi, growing tomatoes, etc.) 🔍 Step 2: Find a local car wash that needs some TLC. Look on Crexi, Loopnet, or approach owner. Preferably small operation with self-serves and touchless automatic. Many are in $800k range. 🤝🏻 Step 3: Buy the car wash with ~20% down. Banks love to finance them cuz they're backed by real estate. $160k of your money or an investor's into the deal. 📈 Step 4: Grow the business. Boost ratings customer experience, visibility, and prices = growth. Collect literal buckets of moeny. Cash on cash returns first year can easily be 35% BEFORE you... ➗ Step 5: Cost segregate the assets. Figure out how much is in the building, equipment and improvements. This is often 50-80% since the lot is often not worth much. Let's say its 60% for our little wash. That's $480k. ➖ Step 6: Take bonus deprecation. This year you can write off 80% for BD. That's .8x$480k= $384k in paper losses. ➕ Step 7: Do rough tax calc. Your car wash probably made about $80k in profits, so for the tax man $80k - $384k = -$304k PAPER loss. ➕ Step 8: Add this -$304k "loss" to your tax bill and watch taxes magically 🫥🫥🫥 Sounds fake right? Un-possible? It's not. My partner and I are doing right now and we're going to show you how too. We'll reveal everything, P&L's, underwriting, spreadsheets, cash flow analyzer, and hours and hours of video. I'll even show you MY taxes. All we ask is that you like, share this with your thoughts, and if you're REALLY interested in learning more, sign up for my newsletter at the link in the next Tweet. Easy right? Don't wait though - this LEGAL loophole is closing! Don't have car wash FOMO y'all. LFG 🔥🔥🔥

@seanpatward Curious…. If you say you didn’t know anything about real estate but made 10,000+ cold calls ….what was your pitch? If you don’t have the right pitch nobody is going to listen or buy anything from you. Seems like a waste of your time during those early years.

In my first five months in real estate I made 10,000 cold calls….and then got fired. I managed to get hired at CBRE, but when my senior broker realized he had to pay my salary he let me go. By some miracle the manager let me stay. I bounced around the company for two years…

Headed to Vegas for the ICSC - Here, We Go 2021 Conf Dec 5-7. Let’s meet to discuss our Acquisition Criteria for ‘22. Seeking Retail Investments: $10mm - $50mm+ Email gford@helioscp.com for available times. #CRE #NNN #Realestate #Retail #ICSC #STNL #thebrokerlist #netlease

@Mitch_Roschelle @tomkeene @lisaabramowicz1 @FerroTV @BloombergTV Just watched you on Bloomberg....looking good Mitch! Good report. Hope you're doing well. Greg

Looking to buy a home ? This summer with high demand & low supply it’s going to be a challenge - I’m explaining to @tomkeene @lisaabramowicz1 @FerroTV on @BloombergTV tune in