Young Gun

Young Gun

Commercial real estate CEO by Mark Gordon | Managing Editor

Andrew Greenwell started brokering commercial real estate deals while a full-time college student. Only 23, Greenwell now runs a firm projecting $200 million in deals by 2010.

In 1995, Andrew Greenwell desperately tried to get his mother to buy the empty Orange Blossom hotel in downtown Sarasota for the sale price of $800,000, figuring how to make money by turning the building into apartments and condos.

Greenwell's mom, Wendy Mack, now an executive with Sarasota-based construction firm DooleyMack, passed on the deal, wondering who would want to live in downtown Sarasota. Plenty of folks apparently, as a single condo in the converted hotel now goes for as much as four times that original sales price.

Greenwell was dead on target. And he was 12 years old.

That was just the beginning. He obsessed over all things real estate as he got older. He would ride along with friends' parents as they shopped for homes and properties, rather than hang out with other teens. Instead of skimming Sports Illustrated, he studied Homes&Land magazine.

And as an energetic and self-described "wired" sophomore at Florida State University in 2002, Greenwell started his own commercial real estate firm. He would fly or drive between Tallahassee and Sarasota to close deals and worked over the phone between - sometimes even during- classes.

Then, in 2004, Greenwell and his aunt, Debra Mack Schrock, decided one night over a sushi dinner to go into business together. Greenwell, still a year away from graduating FSU with a degree in political science, was looking to join forces with a hardened, experienced salesperson. And Schrock, a sales executive in the piano and organ industry, was looking for a career change.

The result was the Corporate Realty Group, a Sarasota-based firm Greenwell, now 23, runs with Schrock, 54.

The firm has grown steadily in an unsteady Southwest Florida commercial real estate market. In 2004, it was responsible for about $5 million in deals, while in 2005, its first full year, it closed on $10 million in deals. This year, CRG already has $11 million in closings and another $13.2 million in pending projects. What's more, Greenwell says the firm is planning a slew of projects for the next two years and is projecting to be at $100 million by 2008 and $200 million by 2010. CRG has six employees and has offices in Tallahassee and Panama City Beach.

Learning lessons

Corporate Realty Group has grown so quickly by balancing the fine line between being aggressive and patient. "We don't wait for business to walk in the door," Schrock says. "We go out and get it."

Speaking like a veteran real estate pro twice his age, Greenwell says he's learned through experience, that you don't have to take every deal or list every property that comes your way. "We find most deals are better when they are not on the open market," Greenwell says, "because those that are listed tend to be overexposed."

Greenwell learned another lesson early on - to make certain projects have options. The first big deal he worked on involved 28 parcels and 22 owners on a 40-acre golf course and subdivision in Daytona.

The $14 million deal he spent seven months on fell apart, Greenwell says, when one land-owner held the company "ransom" on a price for a parcel. "When that deal fell through, we learned about diversity," Greenwell says, "and when they are your mistakes, you tend to remember them."

Greenwell says that experience helped him focus on finding the firm's niche, which, so far, he and Schrock have determined is going to be locating the right spot, or dirt, for their clients. Greenwell does the research, finds the location and the best use for the land. Schrock closes the deals, using her background as a negotiator and saleswoman; one of her early jobs, prior to serving as vice president for Southeast Keyboards, was selling K-Cars.

The firm has recently focused on areas in southern Sarasota County, including the growing city of North Port and Venice, the latter being Greenwell's pick as the next big thing in Southwest Florida real estate. Recent projects CRG has been involved with include selling a site for the Galleria on Venice Avenue, a 100,000-square-foot office, retail and medical complex expected to begin construction in November, and a 45,000-square-foot warehouse/flex space building near the Toledo Blade exit off Interstate 75, scheduled to break ground in October.

In addition to brokering land deals, Schrock and Greenwell are growing by having other business divisions. One unit is for managing commercial property, while another is a student-housing program in Tallahassee that has yet to turn a profit, Greenwell concedes. The firm is also getting ready to launch a mortgage brokering business.

Good cop

Greenwell calls himself an efficiency freak because he's paranoid about checking and double-checking the numbers on a deal, from price to acres.

Again, belying his age, he says he's seen a lot of deals fall apart late in the process, so now he tries to thwart that by having as many details as possible. He wants to know everything about a project or plot of land, such as who owned it previously, potential wetlands problems and zoning concerns. "Bigger isn't always better," he says, "and maximizing density isn't always the right move."

The preparation and attention to detail has wowed both clients and Schrock. Greenwell's youth, however, has been an occasional stumbling block.

In the early going with CRG, especially with potential new clients, Greenwell spent the majority of business meetings being on the defense, talking really fast to make sure he got all his knowledge out. Sometimes, when he would step out of the room for a few minutes, Schrock would play 'good-cop' and explain to skeptical clients that Greenwell was legit.

Greenwell's age has been less of an issue lately, as he becomes more known in Sarasota real estate circles. He says that now, about a third into a presentation, a "light bulb goes off" and people accept him as someone who knows what he's talking about.

In his entrepreneurial FSU days, working through his youth was easier, as some of his clients had no idea they were dealing with someone shuffling from his fraternity house to class. "No one knew I was in college," Greenwell says. "I never told anyone I was 19. They thought I was 27 or 28."