How many years have you been in the commercial real estate industry?

In some way, shape, or form, about 16 years. I started out as a lawyer working primarily in litigation involving complex development issues. I left the formal practice of law to study urban design at MIT and worked for a few years in affordable housing finance, before settling at MassDevelopment’s Transformative Development Initiative for close to a decade. I was one of TDI’s first employees and eventually ran– and dramatically expanded– the program. In January, I joined Graffito SP to help start the firm’s new Neighborhood Investments + Partnerships practice, where I am building some unconventional structures to work with institutional and development partners on unique retail, food + beverage, and other active first floor opportunities.

What motivates you?

The late Scottish singer/songwriter Scott Hutchinson has a lyric where he sings “while I’m alive, I’ll make tiny changes to Earth”, which I often think about while I’m working. I have always been a person that’s very sensitive to his surroundings- I draw energy from interesting, unique places, and dull, monotonous environments drain me. I see CRE as an amazing tool to create better places, where people thrive in many different ways.

What’s one piece of advice you’d give to someone entering CRE?

I would advise them to think about the connection between CRE as an asset class and how it can be used as a tool to help with some of our most vexing problems, especially as we start to see more dramatic impacts from climate change, and income and wealth inequality continues to grow. A mentor of mine once said that the best work always accomplishes at least two important outcomes– if there’s only one reason to do it, it’s probably not worth doing. What we need from young people in the industry is the interest, not just in double, triple, quadruple bottom line deals, but in double, triple, quadruple bottom line careers.

What’s your favorite thing about real estate?

The tangibility of real estate is unique in the business/investment world, and there is a lot of opportunity to make the built environment better, both physically and socially, and at many different scales.

What’s your biggest career accomplishment?

A lot of my work is small-scale and incremental, so it’s hard to pick just one big thing, but right now I am particularly proud of a ground up affordable rent-to-own storefront deal I worked on at TDI with Main South CDC in Worcester. After years of hard work to develop the concept and make it happen, the groundbreaking is this week. I’m excited not just to see a long vacant lot become active with businesses, but for Main South businesses that have often survived as month-to-month tenants to have both stability and the opportunity to build equity in real estate.

Why do you find ULI valuable?

I have really enjoyed being part of the NEXT Product Council. It’s a great group of people with an extremely wide range of substantive experience. It’s become a great network within a network for me, and it’s exciting to see people involved in the group collaborating and informally advising each other in all sorts of interesting ways.

What are you reading, watching, or listening to now?

I am just starting Season 3 of The Bear – which besides just being a great show, is specifically fun considering how much we work with restaurants at Graffito. I am currently listening to Waxahatchee’s new album Tigers Blood and have finally gotten around to reading Isabel Wilkerson’s brilliant and devastating Caste. 

What are you looking forward to?

Six months in at Graffito, I have a good handle on my work, and we are now close to making a few of the deals we have been looking at a reality. I can’t wait to get a few of these projects moving to bring some really unique small businesses to a neighborhood near you soon!