The secret to success: No wallowing allowed

July 14, 2010  |  Dan Rafter  |  Print Article  |  Email this Article

Robert Brehmer

Most people tell me that the commercial real estate market won’t return to normalcy — whatever that means — until 2012. Hearing that either provides you with a bit of hope that the market will at least one day be strong again. Or it might make you really depressed that we have at least a year-and-a-half to wait before commercial real estate deals start happening in more impressive numbers.

Robert Brehmer, managing partner with NAI Daus in Cleveland, chooses the more optimistic view. It’s the only way to get through today’s challenging market, he says.

“We’ve decided at our firm to be beneficiaries of change,” Brehmer said. “We can wallow in the market’s problems. But that won’t do us any good. Many of our clients are going through some very tough times right now. We are doing what we can to help them. The real estate business is ever changing. When you’re in a challenging market, you can’t let yourself get down. You have to work through it.”

Brehmer sees plenty of hope for the commercial industry in the young commercial real estate pros working in his office. Many of these brokers have never seen a boom market. They’re doing the basics, then, to build a business: They’re making the cold calls, setting up meetings with potential clients and managing their territories. Because of this, they’re doing better than expected.

“They’re working really hard,” Brehmer said. “They know that they have to do all this to build their practices, no matter what the economy is doing. It’s been really nice to see the work that they’ve been doing, actually.”

And that there might be the secret to succeeding in today’s commercial market: Don’t wallow. Just get busy with the basics.

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2 Responses to “The secret to success: No wallowing allowed”

  1. Great article. We too are seeing the younger generation working hard and seeing some success on the Suburban Southwest Chicago Office space for rent market. We all are turtles now, you can either stay underneath your shell or start moving slowly.


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