The AAA Storage Podcast

Welcome to the AAA storage podcast,
your integrated real estate and

development partner, exploring all
things, self storage investing to

bring you diversified success.

Let's dive in.

Brandon Giella: Hello Paul, and welcome
back to another episode of AAA Storage.

this is always a fun conversation.

I really enjoyed talking to you, so
thank you for your wisdom and experience.

As always, I'm excited to dive into
this topic because today are talking

about navigating economic cycles
in the self storage industry and

real estate broadly, of course.

But today it's a good time to
talk about because there is a

lot of, I guess, tumultuous.

Sentiment in the market today
for a variety of reasons.

Some people think about
the current administration,

what's going on with tariffs.

people are thinking about
the fed rate environment.

they have a meeting today,
you mentioned at two o'clock.

So there's, how the interest
rates will play out, how

inflation will play out over time.

some folks have mentioned,
insurance premiums are going up.

There's just a lot of interesting
dynamics in the real estate world today.

But I wanted to talk to you about
this because you guys at AAA

Storage have been doing this for a
very long time, many decades now.

You've weathered through some financial
crises and downturns Given all of the

dynamics in today's market, you are
still very hopeful, optimistic that

focusing on the fundamentals is still
gonna ride through this wave, and

that self-storage is still a very good
investment to have in your portfolio.

And so what I wanted to ask you today
is given your wisdom and experience.

what was it like going through, let's
say, the 2008 financial crisis or

going through covid or even before,
you know, there's dot com recession,

then there's the 87 crash, and you
know, there's lots of different

periods in history that have been kind
of dicey over the last few decades.

You've weathered them,
and so what was that like?

And then we'll kind of end the
show on what would you recommend

investors think about going forward
in the event of a downturn or

recession or something like that?

Paul Bennett: Yeah.

interesting stuff and timely, Brandon,
like you said, it's really interesting.

You mentioned specifically
the 2008 to 2012 13 timeframe.

and then you also mentioned Covid.

I'm going go there in just a second
because they were very interestingly.

Exact opposite environments and
reactions, particularly for the

self-storage industry, which most people
might be a little counterintuitive,

most people wouldn't realize.

But you also mentioned the.com

crash, you know, in the late
eighties, early nineties.

And, so I wanna start out by pointing
out that as an asset class, self-storage

and pretty much all of real estate,
but particularly self storage, is

not correlated to the public markets.

One of the ways people can invest in
self storage today, is through the five

publicly traded REITs that are out there.

and it's a, it's a good way to invest.

I wouldn't say, you
know, don't consider it.

And one of the reasons people love
it is because they have the liquidity

that's provided by the public markets.

If I want to get out of my investment
in self storage, if I own public

storage, shares in their reit, I
can sell 'em on the market, and

I've got my cash in five days.

The trade off for that is that they're
very correlated to the public markets.

I'll bet I haven't looked, but I'll bet.

If you went and looked at the stock price
of those five REITs over the last two

weeks, you'd see that they've declined.

I wouldn't say significantly,
but they've, they have declined.

They have lost value.

For no other reason than the general
market was going down and people

decided it was time to sell stocks.

And so there's a double-edged sword there
in any publicly traded vehicle, which

is, you do have the liquidity, which
real estate typically doesn't offer, but

you also then are directly correlated
at some level to the public markets,

which I think is one of the advantages
of investing in alternative assets is

that you get away from that correlation.

it's a reason why I strongly believe,
like I've said multiple times on

our conversations, that, you know,
most high net worth investors should

have an allocation to alternative
investments and particularly

real estate in their portfolio.

So just to sort of open and
comment, but you mentioned.

2008 and Covid, which was
2020, basically late 19.

really 20 and 21.

2008 was a very interesting
time because it was a recession

in the real estate world.

it was not just an economic
event that, was broad based.

it was broad based, but it was
very specifically a recession

in the real estate world.

There are two components, two market
dynamics that will affect self storage.

the first is the consumer
side of the equation.

the second piece of that is the
transactional side or the trading side of

that, the buying and selling of properties
or the development of properties.

And they're really different and they're
affected differently by different things.

So during the oh 8, 0 9 timeframe, people.

Lost value in their 401k
because the market crashed.

their homes became worth less than,
you know, than maybe what they owed

on 'em, or they dropped in value.

but a lot of the activity that
required self storage by the

consumer didn't change at all.

Brandon Giella: Interesting.

Paul Bennett: and so what you saw in
the oh eight to 2012, 2013 timeframe

was that while the consumer demand,
the consumer dynamics, the operating

dynamics of self storage did change,
but they didn't change as dramatically

as a lot of other things did.

So properties were cash flowing.

they were functioning just fine.

There was demand for the product.

People were leasing space.

where the problem was in the oh
eight to 12 standpoint is on the

capital side of the equation.

Nobody was buying property.

nobody could borrow money.

the banks weren't lending money, and so
what you saw is that you couldn't sell

a property at anything close to a value
that made sense or what it was, what

you knew it was intrinsically worth.

we actually sliced and
diced our portfolio.

It's in our presentation for the
fund, and looked at three different

time periods and one of them
was the 2008 to 2011 timeframe.

And what you see for projects that
were, sort of maturing in that timeframe

is on average, we held them longer.

Because we waited out that market
where there weren't enough buyers.

The values really weren't
there, cap rates were elevated.

what happened for our investors during
that period was that their capital

was tied up a little bit longer.

That's never what we want.

our average project multiple in the
other timeframe, so pre 2008 and 2011.

To today, our average equity multiple
across the whole portfolio is about

three times equity, is what we look
for in terms of return from a project.

We held the projects in that
2008 12 timeframe longer.

So average whole time across the
portfolio, little bit under four

years average, whole time in that
timeframe that we're talking about,

the oh eight recession crash,
whatever you wanna refer to it as.

Extended to multiples of that as
much as 8, 9, 10 years on average.

But we returned 4.2

times the equity to those investors so
longer, whole period, bigger equity,

multiple time valued returns were
depressed a little bit because of

the time the properties were held.

So our average return across the entire
portfolio that we've sold is about 20%.

Returns on those deals were in the 14,
15 range because of time, but we actually

returned more cash to the investors.

So, that's what the oh eight sort of to
12 2013 timeframe looked like for us.

If you compare that to Covid,
COVID was an absolute, super

Bowl event for self storage.

Brandon Giella: Okay.

Paul Bennett: If you, if you can.

So on average, on any day of the given
day of the week, occupancy and self

storage on a national average basis is
somewhere between 89 and 91% obviously

individual markets are different, but,
when Covid hit in March of 2020, I'd

bet you a, a dollar to the hole from a
donut that, CCEE was around 89 or 90%.

Nationwide within six to eight
months occupancy was between 98

and a hundred percent, the reason
was everybody was stuck at home.

They were having to clean out bedrooms
to create offices so they could work from

home where they gonna put that furniture?

So it went into a self storage facility

They were bored at home and had
nothing to do, and they were cleaning

out their garage and their attic
and you know, and had all this stuff

that they needed to put somewhere.

so occupancy soared in the self-storage
industry, and because of that, the equity

side of the equation began to chase
good quality, well located facilities.

It's one of the few times it was there
because of the popularity, the product

and sort of the professionalization
and institutionalization of stories

that we've talked about on another
episode where you had larger equity

players, the big REITs and everybody
else sort of beginning to emerge.

but

there, there's not been
many periods in storage.

Where you can sell a property
before you get it stabilized

or leased up for full value.

during that period in the pandemic
and then coming outta the pandemic,

we couldn't get a project stabilized.

We'd get to 60% occupied and
somebody would offer us full value

as if it were fully occupied.

and we were selling.

That's why our, our average hold time,
since 2000 eleven's been three years.

that's a little bit unrealistic.

And today that I don't think that
dynamic exists, and we don't forecast

that and don't plan on that in terms
of how we project returns today.

the fact of the matter is every
property we've sold since, the average

whole time of, for a property, from
the time we started construction to

the time we sold it was three years.

and the Covid Pandemic
created a lot of that.

Because the product was performing so
incredibly well and there was new equity

coming into the market that was, you
know, looking for good self storage.

And that created a perfect storm.

cap rates for self storage,
track multifamily, about 50

basis points behind multifamily,

Cap rates got down into high
threes, low fours in that same

timeframe for much the same reason.

And we saw cell storage cap rates in
the low fours, to mid fours, where

today they're high fives to low sixes.

So a hundred basis points swing
during that period of time

coming outta the pandemic.

So a lot of detail, maybe too much,
but they were two very different.

The other thing I'll point
out, 'cause we're talking about

challenging economic cycles.

So it's not, Self-storage has the
lowest default rate of any type

of real estate on the planet.

in terms of, I think it's, I, I,
I, whatever I say, I'll be wrong.

It's 1 or 2%.

and so from a senior lender standpoint,
a bank standpoint, historically

nothing has created fewer problems.

For the banks in good times
and bad than self-storage

Brandon Giella: That is so interesting.

So, okay, so I'm a novice in
these matters and I'm young.

I'm 34.

I didn't live through a lot of this.

I was, you know, 17 when the,
financial crisis 2008 was taking hold.

When you think about investing and where
I'm gonna place my money, when you think

about an economic downturn, you think,
oh, all of my net worth is going down.

And I'm hearing something like,
bill Ackman at Pershing Square

when he was on TV in March.

He was like, hell is coming.

And everybody gave him crap
because he had a lot of puts

out there and stuff like that.

I just think the hell is coming.

You know, things, things can be
really bad and you're like, no man.

It was actually great.

You know, it was different.

The dynamic was different, but during
these times it actually because of

having capital in self storage, because
of the way the asset is structured

and the way the deals are structured,
it actually can be an amazing thing

because of those dynamics, like through
covid, people putting their stuff in

self storage, having historically low.

Default rates and things like that.

I mean, it's just seems counterintuitive,
the way that you're describing

it, it's so insightful that, like,

Paul Bennett: Yeah, but we can
draw the difference there, in Covid

there was no, I guess people lost
their jobs and that's horrible.

that would force 'em to move, right?

I don't have a job, so I gotta
go where I can get a job, which

helps drive usage of self storage.

It is the economic downturns
that affect consumers directly.

That have the greatest potential
to affect self storage, right?

If people don't have money, then, you
know, but typically when you see a

recessionary environment, and maybe
employers are cutting back and people are

losing their job again, what do they do?

That's the point.

They say, well, you know what?

I didn't wanna live in New York anyway.

So I'm gonna move to Texas, or
I'm gonna move to North Carolina,

or I'm gonna move to Tennessee.

And when they move, they
need self storage often.

so it, it, it is a little
bit counterintuitive.

Storage is not completely
insulated, you know, from every

bad thing that can happen.

But the other thing that's interesting
about self storage is generally

what will happen, the, the demand
dynamics are consistent enough.

They ebb and flow.

Sometimes they're higher than others.

But they're consistent enough that what
happens to a self storage deal in a

bad economy that's directly affecting
its customers, is that it simply takes

longer to lease it up if you're well
capitalized and you know how to manage it

Here, stop me if we don't have time today,
but, one of the things a lot of people

don't understand about self storage.

Is it, the lease up process
is wholly different than any

other kind of real estate.

If you're gonna build a grocery
anchored shopping center, the bank's

not gonna let you do one thing until
you have a signed lease with Kroger

or, or, you know, whoever, they'll,
they'll let you take a, a spec risk on

the shop space, but you're gonna have
an anchor tenant or, or they're not

gonna, they're not gonna fund the loan.

The, the same thing happens
with office buildings.

You're not gonna break ground on an office
building until you're 50% leased and

most industrial buildings are similar.

There's not a lot of speculation.

when we build a self storage facility
and get it finished and get a

certificate occupancy, we have not
one customer, not one lease sign.

'cause nobody's gonna, we might in the
last week or two have a reservation or two

that represents $200 a month in revenue.

Whoop.

I mean, it's not gonna
change the game it takes.

It takes two to three years to
lease up a self storage facility.

until it's producing cash
flow and that kind of thing.

So you have to plan for that.

You have to have working capital as part
of the equity capital that you've raised.

The banks will often give us an interest
reserve to help pay the interest only

payments during the construction period
and for very beginning of lease up.

But you've got a facility that
has operating costs and has debt

service payments that have to be
made, and you have to plan for that.

when we pro perform a project,
we try to, we, we have a play.

We've run, I've gone through it before,
but, it takes us about four and a half

years to build two phases of a project
and get that all to stabilization.

And it's, one of the other benefits.

the other benefit that we have is
that we are financially strong.

So if we have a project that's a
little bit under capitalized, it gets

extended because the market slowed down.

And so the lease up wasn't as
fast as we wanted it to be.

We have the ability to support
that project, and loan it money.

instead of diluting the investors
or having them have to put in

more capital, to get that project
to buy out a little more time,

another year to get to lease up.

But my whole point of all that
was it's not a matter of whether

it's gonna lease up, it's a matter
of when it's gonna lease up.

And you, you don't see timeframes get
extended from three or four years to

eight or nine years I've never seen that.

You might see a project that
really was budgeted to be leased

up in three to four years.

That takes five years or
four and a half years.

But so typically that's the biggest
difference and that's why you don't

see the level of defaults on real
estate loans and storage that you

see in other types of property.

So.

Brandon Giella: Yeah.

No, it made me think of
a fortress balance sheet.

You know, something that Jamie
Diamond always talks about when

you're thinking about investing,
thinking about running a company.

can I have a solid capital structure?

so I'm curious, this is,
kind of a selfish question.

I'm going off script a little bit, but
I'm curious if there's anything that

you're paying attention to now that.

not makes you nervous, but you
know, something that you are

watching and paying attention to.

Thinking about, you know, heading
into what seems to be uncertain

times at least what you would
read about in the headlines.

Now, of course, economists and investors
have been saying there's been a recession

for the last three years, you know,
and we're still not quite there yet.

Maybe some correction territory,
but not quite a recession.

is there anything like that, that you're,
you're kind of paying attention to now?

Paul Bennett: Yeah, there, there are
a lot of things back to the concept.

That there are two markets
that we care about.

One is the consumer market in terms of
leasing a facility up and the ability to

raise rates and all that kind of stuff.

And the other is the capital market
side of the self storage equation.

there is has definitely been a headwind
on the consumer side for the last

28 to 30 months because of interest
rates when the fed raise rates.

and mortgage rates went north of 7%.

What it did was slow people's decision
making to buy a new home and move and

moving is 25% of demand in self storage.

So the drop in activity and home sales
has had a very noticeable effect on

self-storage.

you combine that with the fact,
if you remember when I said sort

of storage exploded during covid.

The amount of new
development that started.

And remember, it can take two years to
get a piece of land ready to build on.

So when somebody says, I'm gonna
build a self storage facility, that

means you'll probably see something
come out of the ground in a year

to a year and a half and maybe be
ready to lease it the two year mark.

So 20, late 20 really
21 development exploded.

So you've got a lot of markets that
have gotten a little overbuilt.

And the result of that, particularly
for the big REITs and the big

private equity players, is
they value occupancy over rate.

And they've gotten very sophisticated
using demand-based pricing al

algorithms, and so they have forced
rates down on a national basis.

There's been a month over month
rate decrease in the self-storage

industry for 28 months in a row.

Brandon Giella: Interesting.

Paul Bennett: some markets
are worse than others.

remember it's a hyper-local product.

if rates in Austin or have at the
National Statistics Show they've dropped,

you know, on average 3% a year for
the last two years, but you happen to

own a facility and there's not another
facility within five miles of yours,

your rates have probably gone up.

About two to 3%.

So it's very hyper-local.

But on a national average basis, there
has been price pressure on rates.

what we see happening now
is because rates are high.

So you've had a drop in demand and
you've had a little bit of overbuilding

in some markets, which all of which
has resulted in rates coming down.

And value of property is
a function of its income.

So if rates are coming down, then
theoretically values are coming down.

unless cap rates.

Are also coming down.

But what we bet on in 2023 was
that the higher interest rates have

forced the banks to look at cash flow
coverages versus loan to cost ratios.

And it has constrained a lot of projects.

And so there has been a marked decline
in the amount of new development.

While the demand dynamics have stayed
essentially the same the moving piece

has taken away some of the demand, but
that demand is just getting pinned up.

It will explode again when rates come
down so that demand hasn't gone away.

It's just been delayed.

what we're doing is we're developing
into this market when other people

are afraid to develop or can't
develop on the assumption that.

Three years down the road, four years
down the road, when our facilities are

leased up and ready to sell, there'll
be a shortage of new supply in the

market, which will help a little bit on
the operational side, but will really

make our properties more valuable
on the capital side of the equation

when there are still buyers out there
that are looking for good facilities.

And there've been fewer new facilities
developed in the last three or four years.

And you know, you're seeing
that in multifamily right now.

Multifamily got overbuilt
coming out of Covid.

It sort of lost its darling
status in the last year or two.

Development really slowed, and now
you're starting to see the bottom of

that market and demand start, I mean,
demand consistent, but new development

starting to come back a little bit
and George will have the same cycle.

Brandon Giella: No, Yeah, I've
heard that from other real estate

investors that I know just anecdotally
talking to their lenders and, you

know, kind of raising money for
different deals and things like that.

they're saying that the lending
requirements have become a

lot more stringent just over
the last few months, really.

And so it's kind of changed their,

Paul Bennett: The bank only
cares about one thing, and

that's the source of repayment.

How are you gonna pay me back?

And, loan to cost doesn't really give,
and they've always looked at cash flow

coverages, but they've become number
one, a little bit more focused on them.

And number two, where we used
to see deals go off at 1.25

times cash flow.

We're seeing lenders require 1.4

times cash flow, which then lowers
the amount of debt they'll give you

and increases the amount of equity.

And all of a sudden, that sponsor
or that investor or that developer.

can't make the deal make sense.

And so they own the land or, or
maybe they had the land under

a contract and they walk away.

there's a lot.

Right now in every market that
we are building in the pipeline

of new properties has dropped to
below 3% of the current inventory.

which tells you that
development is contracting.

And there's not gonna be as many,
nearly as many new deliveries,

two and three years down the road.

national average is about 3.1%

of current inventory.

but the markets we're in little,
even a little bit better than that.

And 3.1

is a good number on a relative basis.

tens of percentage points in
that metric make a difference.

but you know, probably, in the healthy
markets you're probably looking at 4%

pipeline at 4% of, of, current inventory.

So.

Brandon Giella: I love
how data-driven you are.

'cause you have down to the
tenths of percentage point or

you're saying five mile radius or
you know, there's just so many.

factors to consider, and you guys
do such a great job with that.

I don't know any of this.

That's fascinating.

so in the last few minutes, I want to
swing back to something I mentioned at

the top of the show talking about, you
know, long-term fundamentals mattering

more than some of these trends maybe.

If you're talking to an investor today,
given what you have experienced in

the past and the decades of doing this
many different cycles, and looking

ahead the next year or two, what
advice would you give them or what

wisdom would you encourage them with?

Paul Bennett: Buy when other people are.

selling develop when
other people are afraid.

look, Brandon, the demand dynamics in
self storage are the data's irrefutable.

You've got the boomer
generation, that's me.

that has hit an age
where the kids are gone.

We're downsizing, we're using storage.

You know, we're 40% of the market, but
you've also got the millennial and Gen

X generations that are just hitting some
household formation age, and that's the

age where college students use storage.

We've got a facility in Hillside,
Texas where Sam Houston State

University's located, and our
occupancy explodes in April every year.

Because all the kids are getting outta
school and getting the stuff outta

their apartment and you know, store
it till they come back in September.

So there's a little bit of severe
seasonality there during the summer,

but mostly it's millennials and Gen
Xs and they're all hitting household

formation age, which is when they
start to hit all the life events

that drive the uses of storage.

So if you look at all the demographic
data and you look at the fact that today

in America, 10% of people in our country.

are using or will use self
storage in the next six months.

Brandon Giella: It's a lot of people

Paul Bennett: now the other side of
that equation is people are, not very

smart in the real estate industry.

and if you look at, different
markets, the one that comes to

mind for me is Myrtle Beach, South
Carolina and the condo market.

There.

condos are doing great, and
they're selling like hotcakes.

And so the developers decide to
bill four times as much, and four

years later they're giving 'em away
because there's too many condos.

And then so the developers stop building
and four years later, you can't buy one.

And they're so expensive,
they blow your mind.

And it's just this rollercoaster.

self storage is not quite as volatile
as condos in Myrtle Beach, but

there's an element of that to it.

We're seeing a season right now
where, because of the extraordinary

performance during Covid and the
institutionalization of the industry

with lots of private capital, big dollars
coming into the industry where there

are markets that are getting overbuilt.

and so where you used to
could throw a dart at the map.

And wherever it landed, build a self
storage facility and you'd be just fine.

You better cut with a little
sharper instrument today.

and make sure it's why we focus
on, we're not in the metro markets.

We're not in downtown Austin.

We're in the bedroom communities.

We call 'em city skirt.

Markets that support Austin, we're the
suburbs where people live and they're

driving into Tesla or, ut or wherever.

same thing in Charlotte, North Carolina.

We've got a piece of property that'll
be in our next fund in Gastonia, which

is a secondary market to Charlotte,
but really driven by the growth and

the dynamics of the Charlotte market.

So we sort of insulate ourselves a little
bit from some of the boom and bust.

We can buy land cheaper, it's
easier to get entitlements.

the whole process is a little easier.

there are markets that on a market
basis show net declines in rates,

over the last number of months.

And that's partly because of a
drop in demand related to moving.

And partly because those markets have
gotten a little overbuilt, but they

recover pretty quickly in storage.

Brandon Giella: This is
all really encouraging.

I mean, if you're, a listener,
an investor reading the

headlines, I like your analogy.

use a sharper knife.

Maybe, you know, there's, some
really great places, really great

investments if you know where to look.

So that's,

Paul Bennett: And we're, I know
we're out of time, but the car wash

industry became a darling of the
financial industry about two years ago.

You know, the nice car washes with the
free vacuums and you can do a monthly

subscription for 30 bucks, and you
can wash a car as much as you want.

that industry's built on breakage, right?

It's built on people signing up for
the subscription and only coming

once every other month, or, you
know, you really don't use it.

but if you follow different things
and I follow all the segments in real

estate and try to keep up with the
data, one of the largest, operators

of those type of car washes just
filed for bankruptcy, got overbuilt.

They over levered it, which is the
private equity guys are famous for.

you know, they love to borrow money
'cause it drives extraordinary

returns, but it also can come and bite
you if things don't go as planned.

So, but yeah, that industry's starting.

It's still a good place to be.

I've got two very close friends that,
are successful wealthy individuals and

they develop car washes on their own.

and they're still developing, but you
just gotta be in the right market.

Brandon Giella: Yeah.

I like that.

Paul Bennett: 'cause it's
a hyper-local market too.

Right?

Nobody's gonna drive from, you know.

Sheboygan to Kenosha to
get their car washed.

They're gonna stop at the
place they go by every day.

And, and so it's a hyper-local
market, just like storage.

But you gotta be careful,
you gotta be smart.

You gotta study the market and, you know,
know what the demand is and know what

kind of competition you're gonna have.

So.

Brandon Giella: It makes me think of a
report I read years ago, after the Covid.

period.

There was, the big, metro markets,
people moving away from those

going to second tier cities.

So the fastest growing cities in
the country were like, instead

of Nashville, it was Chattanooga
or, Knoxville things like that.

And it sounds like even
one step removed from that.

Look at some of those
markets, can be really, really

Paul Bennett: you have to be a little
careful looking at tertiary markets

because if you get overbuilt in a tertiary
market, there's not gonna be enough growth

in the population to kind of bail you out.

Um,

Brandon Giella: Uh,

Paul Bennett: today,

we, yeah, we, we, we could, let's make
a whole nother podcast outta that,

but we, there are metrics
we use to d to kind of gauge

demand and supply balances, and.

In a high growth market, we'll tolerate
a metric that's a little bit higher,

which is in this case less attractive
because we know the growth is gonna help

absorb that additional square footage.

In a small market that hasn't shown
any, you know, significant growth,

historically, you have to be a little
more careful 'cause you can get caught.

but for example, we're building
in Georgetown, Texas, which

has been on a percentage basis.

one of the fastest growing
towns in all of America.

It's a suburb of Austin.

and we've got two facilities there
and we've also got an industrial flex

facility there that have done fantastic.

because that suburb, it's supported
by Austin, you're not dependent on

Georgetown on a standalone basis,
its growth is being driven by Austin.

Now you can go to, Clinton, North
Carolina, in southeastern North Carolina.

Clinton's been, if you could go back
in time 20 years ago, Clinton looks

today just like it did 20 years ago.

Great place to live, great quality of
life, great place to Raise a family.

But there's many people moving
out as there are moving in and

there's just not a lot of growth.

And you know, that's a market where
if the demand's there, you're good.

If the demand's not there,
you can't manufacture it.

So you kind of get caught.

So anyway.

Brandon Giella: Fascinating.

I'm in, I'm in downtown Fort
Worth, so Georgetown, so I've

been there a few times too.

given that this is so important, the
market dynamics supply and demand, the

hyperlocal nature of this investment,
maybe that'd be a good, topic for next

Paul Bennett: Yeah, that'd be

fun.

Brandon Giella: That'd be fun.

It'd be fun to kind of talk about some
markets that you guys are looking at

and what makes them interesting and just
kind of a way to analyze some deals.

we could talk maybe a little
bit about the fund and some

properties you guys are looking at

Paul Bennett: Yeah.

Super.

Brandon Giella: Okay.

Paul, thank you so much.

as a, as a young person who has not
gone through too many of these periods,

having your wisdom and experience and
expertise is always very, very helpful.

It's comforting.

I feel very comforted by this episode.

So thank you and, we'll talk next

Paul Bennett: Okay buddy.

Thanks.

Brandon Giella: Thanks.

Bye.