What Is The Right Family Office Real Estate Team?

How do family offices select the right team to manage their real estate portfolios and development projects?

Many family offices are adding in-house or 3rd party expertise to enable them to better manage their real estate portfolio and activities. Successful teams and partnerships are all about “fit” and aligned interests.

When family offices look for real estate operators, they should look for people that have either a broad amount of knowledge and experience to manage their portfolio for them. Or they should look for specialists that have specific knowledge about an area that complements the family office’s existing in-house expertise.

When I worked as a development manager for a large family owned development firm in Boston our day to day team consisted of a principle in charge, two development managers, and analysts that helped with financial analysis.

We would meet with our asset management team to review projected budgets, rents, and operating expenses. The project we were working on was a $1.5 billion dollar mixed-use redevelopment, so this may be overkill.