News

It has never been more popular to be a commercial real estate tech start up.

According to a recently published report by Deloitte, from 2008 to 2017 the number of real estate start-ups has increased by nearly eight times; the capital allocated to them has gone up 15-fold. That means capital for CRE start-ups is a lot more readily available!

Real Capital Markets was launched in 1999, long before “disruption” became the new buzzword; before, according to the Deloitte report, there was $33.7 billion of venture capital funding available. 

Late last year an RCM colleague, speaking at a real estate tech conference, was asked to further describe the firm. He said, “We like to think of ourselves as an 18-year old start-up,” among other things.

His response captures our mindset.  As a company, we work very hard to think and act like an 18-year-old start-up in all areas of our business, from operations to business development to product development. It provides our clients and employees with a unique perspective and product.

Being an 18-year-old start-up is a label we’ve been able to embrace because we:

• Have an entrepreneurial mindset –this mindset allows us to be decisive when planning a course of action, be agile enough to change course quickly and easily when the situation warrants, and of course have the energy and willingness to do whatever it takes to move an idea forward and get the job done.
• Develop an expertise; leverage and master it – in the current environment, disruption is evident in almost all aspects of CRE. For 18 years we have adhered to the concept we can’t be all things to all people. Instead, over time, we’ve developed a platform that we knew filled a specific void in the market. Further, as we evaluated our experiences and deepened our perspectives, we have continued to make improvements all along the way. We don’t chase everything that’s out there unless it has been either requested by our customers or proven to deliver results.
• Hire the attitude – regardless of how old our company is, our employees are our greatest assets. The most valuable employees are those willing to go outside their comfort zones, to learn new things and to roll up their sleeves and pitch in to get things done. We have always believed that collaboration is one of the keys to our success.
• Stay close to customers – we’ve achieved a unique level of longevity in commercial real estate because we’ve stayed close to our customers. We do this by listening to them; hearing and understanding what they have to say. There is no game of telephone where key points could be lost in translation; we hear it directly from our clients, at all levels of the organization, and respond accordingly!

With those four concepts as our guideposts for the last 18 years, we provide our customers with an unparalleled history and track record. We’ve experienced myriad real estate cycles, we’ve learned to distinguish between the flash and the hype and the true solutions. We’ve established a proven and well-documented track record of solving problems and creating efficiencies, solving client issues and addressing client concerns.

Ultimately, with the depth and breadth of tools and services that make up our platform, we’ve built their trust and proven our capabilities over 18 years of thinking and like a start-up.