CrowdStreet’s Brent Hieggelke is joined by Sriram Ganesan, a CrowdStreet investor, to discuss why he is interested in medical office and data centers, especially in the current market.
Brent Hieggelke, Chief Marketing Officer
CrowdStreet
CrowdStreet
Brent is a high-growth tech marketing executive focused on start-up and early category innovators and disrupters. He is a seasoned evangelist, and public speaker across a wide-range of topics.
He is a former CMO of several leading SaaS companies such as Urban Airship (mobile), Brandlive (video), Webtrends (data and analytics) and Touch Clarity (AI, machine learning), which sold to Omniture. In 2009, Brent co-founded a real estate start-up, Second Porch, which built the first sharing vacation rental site and ultimately exited to HomeAway, now Expedia. Brent has keynoted and led panels at global events like SXSW, Mobile World Congress, Cannes Lions, Advertising Week, Adtech, and hundreds of other conferences. Brent has been featured or quoted in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Advertising Age, and hundreds of other publications.
Brent holds a BA in Economics with honors from the University of Chicago.
00:00:06 Hello everyone. I'm Brent Hieggelke, Chief Marketing Officer at CrowdStreet. Welcome back to another edition of StreetBeats, our short video series to connect the community from investors, sponsors, and capital markets experts. I'm very excited to welcome one of our active investors today, Riam gn and, uh, Riam. Go ahead and introduce yourself and talk about, uh, uh, your history with CrowdStreet.
00:00:33 Hey, thanks, Brent. Uh, I'm Shreen. I'm a technologies by profession. I've been buying and selling dental properties for the last 15 years. Um, and I, I, I always invest in the markets. I've been investing in the stock market and in the bond market as well as in the real estate markets. And then I was always intrigued and interested in the, uh, growth funding based, uh, investments. Then I came across the, came across number of sites for, uh, real estate investing through, um, growth funding and, uh, cross street, uh, sounded appealing and I started sign up for, I I signed up for it, uh, uh, 18 months ago. And, uh, it's been going very well so far.
00:01:17 Would you care to share about how many investments you've made so far
00:01:20 Across multiple cloud funding sources? I would say 18 to 20 investments and, and exclusively on the cross street. I have, I have around 15.
00:01:32 Okay.
00:01:33 Around 14 to 15 investments on
00:01:35 It, investment on cross street, excellent. Different geographies, different asset types.
00:01:40 Even within that space. I look at the, I look into divers diversification across, uh, uh, medical office, senior living, uh, multi-family, uh, office complexes, industrial wants, as well as in the hospitality investments. So I, I spread my investments across these assets and, um, I'm constantly looking for, uh, opportunistic wants.
00:02:07 That's great. So are you currently evaluating the new deals that are launching on the platform even, even right now in the, in the, I've
00:02:14 Been, I've been, yes. I've been, uh, investigating any, any new deals. Basically in the, on your, on your platform. I, I log into your site every couple of days and then I see if there is anything, anything coming up in the, uh, the marketplace. I look at multiple things. I look at the location, and then I always, uh, I always look at the what kinda asset it, it is, is it, uh, is it a, a multi-family one or is it a, uh, hospitality or office complex? And then, see, I always, I always look at the cash yield as well as equity multiple. How are they balancing the return to the investors? You know, there are some assets that they just give the equity multiple, but, uh, there is no upfront, uh, cash on an angle basis. So I look at, I try to balance those factors. I, if I, if I find something attractive, I just jump in and mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I'm, I, and, uh, most of my investments are coming from like Ira, IRA portfolio.
00:03:26 I saw that your background is in, uh, is in healthcare, so obviously, uh, very relevant to, to lots of the things going on right now. Are there, uh, current asset types, the current markets today that maybe has, it's had become more interesting to you kind of given what's happening right now?
00:03:44 So given what's happening, I would be looking at investments in the medical office portfolio. I just found one for the renal care M o b, I just jumped in. I invested into that, and I, I found that, uh, equity multiple and also the cash was, uh, interesting. So I, I jumped in, I invested into it. I would like to see similar ones on your, on your platform. I also want to see, I would like to see, because if you, if you look at the, where things are going, everything is going to go online, which means that there are gonna be, there are gonna be lot of demand for, for the data centers.
00:04:27 Data centers, yeah.
00:04:28 So, okay. So the, uh, so you may wanna consider data center as also a part of, uh, real estate portfolio. And yeah, I would like to see one, two on your platform, like, uh, digital reality is one, for example, and, uh, Cirus one.
00:04:44 Yeah. That's interesting. Yeah, certainly, certainly. Uh, with, with everybody sheltered in place and, you know, living on platforms like Zoom, uh, the digital, so the whole, the whole digital data center world is, uh, very interesting for a lot of folks. Uh, right. What are you gonna be looking for next as you think about investing overall? What are you, what are you kind of watching for?
00:05:05 I'd be watching for, uh, where the market is going, where the stock market is going, where the bond market is going, how the, how the government is supporting the markets, as well as I also be looking for supply and demand in the real estate market. Cause that's very important. If there is no demand for demand coming from the real estate market. And then I, I wouldn't be inclined to invest. But then I would like to see the demand. I would like, I would like to see the trend within the real estate market and also the interest rates. And, uh, and also as I said earlier, um, some of the things like, you know, I don't wanna be investing in the, um, expensive market. I'd be looking at ones that are, that are, that haven't, uh, that I haven't gone up, uh, too much like, uh, uh, southern states, like Alabama, Tennessee, duke, Georgia, Texas.
00:06:02 Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's certainly great to see that you're, uh, active in the market, that you're actively evaluating deals. I think you're, uh, a lot of our investors will probably feel that they're in a similar space as you. So, uh, we certainly are hearing from investors that they're, you know, very active in terms of evaluating, but obviously the criteria has evolved, uh, since, uh, in the last few months. But, uh, uh, Sree, it's great to connect with you. Thank you for taking time outta your day to jump, uh, onto this with us. And, uh, we appreciate getting to know you and we look forward to, uh, to getting to know you better in the future.
00:06:38 Okay. Thanks, Ben.
00:06:40 Okay. Take care and stay safe and stay healthy.
00:00:33 Hey, thanks, Brent. Uh, I'm Shreen. I'm a technologies by profession. I've been buying and selling dental properties for the last 15 years. Um, and I, I, I always invest in the markets. I've been investing in the stock market and in the bond market as well as in the real estate markets. And then I was always intrigued and interested in the, uh, growth funding based, uh, investments. Then I came across the, came across number of sites for, uh, real estate investing through, um, growth funding and, uh, cross street, uh, sounded appealing and I started sign up for, I I signed up for it, uh, uh, 18 months ago. And, uh, it's been going very well so far.
00:01:17 Would you care to share about how many investments you've made so far
00:01:20 Across multiple cloud funding sources? I would say 18 to 20 investments and, and exclusively on the cross street. I have, I have around 15.
00:01:32 Okay.
00:01:33 Around 14 to 15 investments on
00:01:35 It, investment on cross street, excellent. Different geographies, different asset types.
00:01:40 Even within that space. I look at the, I look into divers diversification across, uh, uh, medical office, senior living, uh, multi-family, uh, office complexes, industrial wants, as well as in the hospitality investments. So I, I spread my investments across these assets and, um, I'm constantly looking for, uh, opportunistic wants.
00:02:07 That's great. So are you currently evaluating the new deals that are launching on the platform even, even right now in the, in the, I've
00:02:14 Been, I've been, yes. I've been, uh, investigating any, any new deals. Basically in the, on your, on your platform. I, I log into your site every couple of days and then I see if there is anything, anything coming up in the, uh, the marketplace. I look at multiple things. I look at the location, and then I always, uh, I always look at the what kinda asset it, it is, is it, uh, is it a, a multi-family one or is it a, uh, hospitality or office complex? And then, see, I always, I always look at the cash yield as well as equity multiple. How are they balancing the return to the investors? You know, there are some assets that they just give the equity multiple, but, uh, there is no upfront, uh, cash on an angle basis. So I look at, I try to balance those factors. I, if I, if I find something attractive, I just jump in and mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I'm, I, and, uh, most of my investments are coming from like Ira, IRA portfolio.
00:03:26 I saw that your background is in, uh, is in healthcare, so obviously, uh, very relevant to, to lots of the things going on right now. Are there, uh, current asset types, the current markets today that maybe has, it's had become more interesting to you kind of given what's happening right now?
00:03:44 So given what's happening, I would be looking at investments in the medical office portfolio. I just found one for the renal care M o b, I just jumped in. I invested into that, and I, I found that, uh, equity multiple and also the cash was, uh, interesting. So I, I jumped in, I invested into it. I would like to see similar ones on your, on your platform. I also want to see, I would like to see, because if you, if you look at the, where things are going, everything is going to go online, which means that there are gonna be, there are gonna be lot of demand for, for the data centers.
00:04:27 Data centers, yeah.
00:04:28 So, okay. So the, uh, so you may wanna consider data center as also a part of, uh, real estate portfolio. And yeah, I would like to see one, two on your platform, like, uh, digital reality is one, for example, and, uh, Cirus one.
00:04:44 Yeah. That's interesting. Yeah, certainly, certainly. Uh, with, with everybody sheltered in place and, you know, living on platforms like Zoom, uh, the digital, so the whole, the whole digital data center world is, uh, very interesting for a lot of folks. Uh, right. What are you gonna be looking for next as you think about investing overall? What are you, what are you kind of watching for?
00:05:05 I'd be watching for, uh, where the market is going, where the stock market is going, where the bond market is going, how the, how the government is supporting the markets, as well as I also be looking for supply and demand in the real estate market. Cause that's very important. If there is no demand for demand coming from the real estate market. And then I, I wouldn't be inclined to invest. But then I would like to see the demand. I would like, I would like to see the trend within the real estate market and also the interest rates. And, uh, and also as I said earlier, um, some of the things like, you know, I don't wanna be investing in the, um, expensive market. I'd be looking at ones that are, that are, that haven't, uh, that I haven't gone up, uh, too much like, uh, uh, southern states, like Alabama, Tennessee, duke, Georgia, Texas.
00:06:02 Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's certainly great to see that you're, uh, active in the market, that you're actively evaluating deals. I think you're, uh, a lot of our investors will probably feel that they're in a similar space as you. So, uh, we certainly are hearing from investors that they're, you know, very active in terms of evaluating, but obviously the criteria has evolved, uh, since, uh, in the last few months. But, uh, uh, Sree, it's great to connect with you. Thank you for taking time outta your day to jump, uh, onto this with us. And, uh, we appreciate getting to know you and we look forward to, uh, to getting to know you better in the future.
00:06:38 Okay. Thanks, Ben.
00:06:40 Okay. Take care and stay safe and stay healthy.