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Every Friday, join us as we dive into the latest in real estate multifamily with David Moghavem, Head of East Coast Acquisitions at Trion Properties. David invites top experts who know the ins, outs, and trends shaping the real estate multifamily market across the nation!
Whether you’re a seasoned investor or just curious about where the next big opportunity might be, Deal Flow Friday brings you the weekly inside scoop on what’s hot, what’s not, and what to watch for in today’s ever-evolving real estate scene.
David Moghavem (00:18)
gonna start seeing the haves and you're gonna start seeing maybe the have nots. No
Quinn Edwards (00:22)
Wants to predict the crystal ball if it doesn't. Everyone's just been waiting for that huge collapse. Welcome everyone. ⁓ this is Quinn Edwards here with the AI for CRE Collective. And we are lucky to have David Movhavam on from ⁓ Tryon Properties. And and this is the first of a new series where we traditionally
David Moghavem (00:25)
Where there's pain, there's opportunity.
Quinn Edwards (00:47)
⁓ Jake or or myself, we interview a founder of an AI or Pop Tech company that's building in the commercial real estate space. But today we are launching ⁓ a little twist here where we actually talk to and and interview other commercial real estate professionals on themselves, on their story, on their business, on their strategy, and of course how they're using ⁓ AI and social media to positively impact their business. So David here, he's sitting in his ⁓ beautiful office in what is called the Pacific Design Center.
for most people watching. ⁓ most real estate professional service firms don't actually office ⁓ at this building. I don't know why. It's a great campus and three different buildings, right? Three different buildings, really different colors, great location. ⁓ but now David's live from his office. He's spent some time in in Miami and some other places, but he's born and raised in LA. We're hyped to have David on.
He's a really good guy. He has a podcast. He's at at at at Real Estate Wizard and David, welcome to the show.
David Moghavem (01:50)
Excited to talk to you. Awesome, Quinn. Thanks for having me on. ⁓ shout out to Jake as well. your partner. You guys are running a great ⁓ podcast and great system. AI for CRE has been awesome. I've I'm happy to be a part of it. And yeah, you guys are doing awesome. So I'm honored to be part of the first series of. I guess before you were interviewing all the prop tech guys with the latest and shiny tools. Now you're interviewing.
The boring old real estate guys and say, All right, how much of this shit are you actually using? So
Quinn Edwards (02:23)
No, this is this is fun, right? 'Cause we'll get to like roast you a little bit and quiz you, but to say every time like like I gotta put on my like tech and and real and ⁓ and ⁓ you know interviewer hat with like the AI guys, but with you we just get to talk shot and like we can have a fun time with it. ⁓ punks. ⁓ so Dave, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself? I know you grew up in Los Angeles, but you've been at Trion for about ten years. You also have a ⁓ a free popular podcast, Pontioplo Friday.
I don't know where you want to start, but would love just to learn more about your story and kinda where you are today and and how you got there.
David Moghavem (02:57)
Sure. So you know, joined Trial and Properties as a entry-level analyst. Max and Mitch, the founders, took a chance on me ⁓ coming out of college. And, you know, the first thing they said is like, How well are your Excel skills and how hard you're gonna work? And I said, I have pretty decent Excel skills and I'm gonna work insanely hard. I think now if you try to hire an analyst,
You'll ask the same two questions and also say how how well are your AI skills? So took a chance on me at that time, it was twenty fifteen. So we were just in California and just starting to break into Oregon. Now we're in eight different states. California, Oregon, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas in Texas. we own and operate about
over 6,000 apartment units. I think it was even a little more. We had some dispositions. ⁓ and now we even rolled out our third party property management platform. So we're owners, we're operators and we're vertically integrated and now doing third party management. We're building that out. ⁓ and we're strictly value add multifamily. ⁓ So geographically diverse but same strategy buying
Garden style, mid rises, first ring suburbs, just finding that kind of class B or upper blue collar, gray collar workforce, and ⁓ f getting creative with strategies, which we can totally dive into. But that's just a little bit about us.
Quinn Edwards (04:35)
I'm gonna I'm gonna grill you on AI for property management down down the line of this episode, but I'm curious. Grill away there. But ⁓ okay, so just just department votes. Yes. That's that's the core focus. Okay. ⁓ take me just a step back right high level, right? The market's changed a lot over the last ten years when you started to today. ⁓
Where do you see the market today? Where do you see it's going? How does your strategy play into you your overall thesis, ⁓ where the multifamily real estate market stands and the markets that you play in?
David Moghavem (05:07)
Sure. I mean, from when I first joined ⁓ the industry up until, you know, right after the rate hike in COVID, it's we've been in a long bull run. I mean, a a bull run that a a a lot of people would say is long overdue. ⁓ rates hiked, the show stopped, the s the music stopped singing, and we started feeling that capital stack distress. ⁓ operations, at least in multifamily, were still strong.
They continue to be somewhat strong relative to other assets. We'll see how long that holds up. But this is really a capital stack distress type of ⁓ recession and a CRE focused recession. I mean, one of the things we joke about is if you talk to anyone else in other industries, they're like, What recession? stocks are at an all-time high, SP's at an all-time high, ⁓ AI's ripping, people are making money.
And I think what that speaks to right now is we're truly entering a K-shaped economy where you're gonna start seeing the haves and you're gonna start seeing maybe the have nots. And I think there's a bit of opportunity on the fact that, you know, going back to the capital stack side, ⁓ the loans now from 2021, 2022 are four years in. The bridge loans that had the extend and pretend are
Now we're starting to see capitulation. We're starting to see trades. We're starting to see that the light at the end of the tunnel of getting bailed out with a rate cut is probably not happening anytime soon. So we're seeing distress on the cap stack side. But then going back to the K-shape economy with the haves and have nots, I think what you're just starting to see is a little bit of maybe short-term disruptance in the job market, a little bit of short-term disruption in just embracing this new technology.
The have nots, quite frankly, being people that can't adapt to this new wave of AI. And as a multifamily owner and operator, really taking a look in the mirror and seeing, all right, where in our portfolio is our tenant base exposed to some of these hurdles? Where is there opportunity for us to grow our portfolio where we're gonna capture some of the growth and AI ⁓ in our economy? And so I think just having that.
overall framework and lens of this is the real economy that we're entering in. It's not going to be easy for everyone, but there's where there's pain, there's opportunity. And so historically with trial and properties, we've always been, you know, our content has been finding these opportunities, finding asymmetric returns in our markets and in our strategy. And I think ⁓ just from a very high level and we could get into it as just having that framework of this is where we're entering and how are we going to capitalize.
Quinn Edwards (08:04)
Yeah. I ⁓ I wanna ask so
Everyone's looking for asymmetric returns, right? Everyone's looking for further risk adjusted return. And I don't want you to give away the secret saucer, but like what are some examples of of themes or metrics or changes in the economy or the market that you're actually looking at to then that's driving investment decisions, right? Because one thing that stood out to me, well, two things was that the two states that you mentioned originally where you invested, right? They're they're not the most realistic friendly. And I'm curious how that's impacting your your thesis. and then two.
⁓ right, I mean with with so much AI growth and and other growth and other markets, right, is as are those other aspects of the economy driving locational decisions on where you've as you're looking for for new assets to acquire?
David Moghavem (08:53)
Sure. So a little bit of ⁓ more history on us. When we were entering the hyper, you know, ZERP era 2021, we opened office in Miami. Why? To capture that Southeast's growth. And we scaled about 3,000 units between Florida, Georgia, Carolinas, and we strategically put our own boots on the ground to capture that growth in the Southeast. So we still have our headquarters in LA and we have our office in Miami. Now we're
diversified geographically between these two states. Now what you're seeing is the Bay Area has number one rent growth in the market with AI, but also with the lack of supply. And so I think there is something that
Quinn Edwards (09:36)
How recent is that?
David Moghavem (09:38)
I mean that did that change. 2025, if you go on CoStar and you look at top rent growth markets, Bay Area sub markets are going to be one, two, and three. ⁓ there's something to be said about pro ⁓ markets with low supply. And I think in the ZERP era, everyone was chasing inbound migration demand. Where are people moving? Where are people leaving? Now I think what you're seeing is with the supply wave that happened nationally and maybe a lack of supply.
That was built in some of these supply strain constrained markets. There's rent growth in some of these areas. And then you're seeing like the Bay Are completely get like double digit ⁓ rent growth with the next market maybe being a modest 3%. So we're seeing that we're we're positioned really well there because we own and operate in the East Bay. And so we're going back to that strategy that we were doing during the app boom, for instance.
⁓ another strategy we're working on is a little more history about try-on. We were buying non-performing loans and REOs collateralized by multifamily coming out of the GFC. And so we're very savvy when it comes to talking to lenders, underwriting the tapes, going on foreclosure radar, and working with lenders to find creative solutions to get these properties.
out of cap stack and operational distress, get the operations to where they need to be and coming up with some JV quasi structure with the lender to go long on it. ⁓ so we're we're actively doing that right now with lenders. ⁓ again that again one of our edges is that we're vertically integrated. And so the fact that we are not only a savvy and sophisticated sponsor, but we actually know how to get our hands dirty and get operations to where they need a beat. ⁓
There's something to be said too of just where the market's moving, where you can't just give a multifamily property to a third party manager and hope they're gonna ⁓ care about it. You need someone that's operationally that doesn't only care, but they're savvy enough to understand like what are the issues, what are the pain points in your property and look at it from an owner lens like we are and what we're doing for our own clients in getting properties actively back to where they need to be.
Quinn Edwards (12:05)
Yeah. I ⁓ I have one more question and we can dive into the to the AI stuff here. Sure. ⁓ but as it relates to source and potentially distressed opportunities, right, or or looking at not performing the loans, I mean the trend in like all things commercial real estate for the last couple of years has been blend and extend, right? Or extend and pretend. ⁓ and everyone's just been waiting for that huge collapse.
⁓ right each year more more trillions of dollars worth of loans are are in default. ⁓ what is your take on on what is actually going to happen ⁓ with all these non-performing loans? I I believe there's around like one and a half trillion of all commercial real estate non performing loans ⁓ set to set to either be in default ⁓ in in twenty twenty six or early twenty twenty seven.
What what's gonna happen with all that? And how are you guys going to make the most of whatever opportunity is about to come?
David Moghavem (13:09)
Yeah, and Quinn, by the way, like that number, I don't know what the exact number is, but it's understated because the extend and pretend what you end up finding is they're not showing the properties that have the loan mods that have not ⁓ given a notice of default or a notice of sale and are being worked out in the background. So it's under it's understated. What we're finding now is the properties that are operationally performing well.
⁓ but have a cap stack distress, those are the ones that are getting extended and pretended. But similar to what I was just saying before, we're entering this moment where you're gonna start seeing a little bit of operational distress just simply from the wave of AI coming in, the haves and have nots with this K-shaped economy that we're entering, the fact that there's gonna be maybe not l mass layoffs like what everyone's ⁓
trying to make as a doomsday. But there's probably gonna yeah, there's gonna be a little bit of a slowdown of maybe hiring or there's gonna be growth in companies without human capital being a part of it, a growth in human capital being a part of it. And so you're starting to see the cracks a bit ⁓ in the economy. And I think that's where you start seeing the extent and pretends maybe now starting to move to capitulation.
And to action and to sale. I think we're starting to see that today. This is the most I've ever seen in any other year where lenders are actually involved in all parts of the capital stack. By that I mean they're not just giving out debt, but they want to give out equity on their own deals to work out their own books and kind of be a JV partner and getting creative with ways to solve their own problems in her books.
before they were a lot more cagey. They were like, no, we don't have this stress. Like, I don't know what you're talking about. Now lenders, especially with the right operators, are very cooperative with trying to find solutions.
Quinn Edwards (15:20)
Yeah. I anticipate that's going to continue to happen too, just because no one wants to to no one wants to predict the crystal ball if it doesn't. the operational distrust is an interesting point too, right? Because I think ⁓ multifamily specifically was also one of the asset classes where a lot of syndicators entered ⁓ in the in the kind of mid two thousands up until kind of the early twenty twenties, right? And it just seemed like it just seemed like
The most beautiful asset class and opportunity for almost anyone that wanted to get into commercial real estate, right? Rates were low, rents were rising, housing is constrained, multifamily, how hard is it to operate a in apartment building, right? I'm I'm sharing that in the sense of like that's how a lot of people actually thought, right? It wasn't actually reality. But how drastically the market changed, right? And and turned on ⁓ some some perhaps miscalculated risks that were taking place. I mean it just
It's right for guys like you and Trion to take advantage of it.
David Moghavem (16:21)
Yeah, I mean, let's let's say how it is. Multifamily's not the darling anymore that it used to be. ⁓ sorry to the hero. Right. And and it's not it's not the the bell of the ball anymore. But yeah, everything you just said of why it was sexy at the time still pertain today. There's still a lot a chronic lack of housing in the nation. There's still people that need to live, especially in this
Quinn Edwards (16:29)
I'm trying to
David Moghavem (16:49)
K-shape economy we're entering, the fact that people need basic necessity, they need a place to live, they need a place that they feel proud of. These are still relevant today. So why is it not what it used to be? Because you can't get the same cash yield like that you could get from a risk-free return. ⁓ multifamily hasn't corrected in that way. Rates are high. There's so many other peripheral reasons why multifamily isn't.
The darling it used to be. But the core fundamentals of multifamily are still there. And so I really do see this as a blip. And I really see this as an opportunity for those who are who have been in the game to capitalize. this is a generational opportunity to buy really quality multifamily investments. And so I try and we're very excited.
Quinn Edwards (17:39)
How how competitive is it right now? ⁓ as it relates to just acquisitions that you guys are going after? I mean, I'm sure you, Max and Mitch are just ⁓ animals with with sourcing deals, but how how competitive is it right now? Like is is it a dog fight out there for really interesting opportunities?
David Moghavem (17:55)
It's it's like ⁓ so bifurcated. There's either the deal that checks every box, and that's getting gobbled up by the discretionary funds, core institutional capital, and those cap rates are compressed significantly. Sub-five caps. I was talking to a broker in Texas, sub-five caps in Texas, ⁓ sub-five caps in Miami, ⁓ even in Colorado, which is one of the most
Distressed operationally markets right now, you could still get quality ⁓ product at a sub-five cap. It's it's it's tough to even fathom with all the distress going on. But then the other side of that is a deal that doesn't check every box that might be older than 2000s. It might be in a class B market instead of a class A. It might be a little too small. And if so it doesn't fit every perfect scope.
That deal that once used to be institutionally ⁓ appealing is now not getting chased. And so what do you see? There's there's a lack of capital flows for that type of product. And so you're seeing yields beyond belief of what they look like. And I'm not talking about the 70s vintage that you can maybe buy at a six, seven cap, but because of all the deferred, it's like a sub five yield because you need to re-plumb the whole thing. I'm talking about nineties vintage deals, eighties vintage.
In good tier one markets, that just because it doesn't check every box, now you're seeing the yields ⁓ expand tremendously. And that's where savvy owners and operators and investors can really capitalize on this type of moment in time. because that's not housing that's gonna be obsolete. That's that's housing that's gonna be here for a long run and maybe even get institutional appetite when the market ramps back up.
Quinn Edwards (19:52)
Well, I wish you guys tremendous amounts of success as you combine and source those deals. I I have a feeling you're a little bit ahead of the curve, but ⁓ I agree with with your sentiment on all that. And I think it's a really interesting time to be to be a real estate investor in in many of the asset classes. Office being one of multifamily being obviously another ⁓ industrial retail. I mean, we could probably name every single one, right? Just an interesting time right now to be a commercial real estate investor. ⁓ let's switch to ⁓ to
putting our tech halves here because I I I'm looking at the both of us and i we're we're tech guys, I mean, come on. ⁓ where are you guys using AI right now throughout your ⁓ processes? And that could be from acquisition, it could be from pre acquisition to acquisition to post acquisition to property management. Like can you walk me through a little bit what your cap what your AI stack looks like, if anything at all.
David Moghavem (20:47)
Yeah. And I wanna I wanna preface it a little before kind of going one by one on on what we're doing in Ishway. So I was reading the a book the other day called that I that I wrapped up called like Beyond the Building. I I gotta find out who the author is. D
Quinn Edwards (21:03)
I'm lo I'm looking up right now. Yeah. Every time I hear a book recommendation recommendation, David, I just I write it down.
David Moghavem (21:08)
Beyond
the building. It was a great it was a great book. I I highly recommend. Let me look it up. Yeah, exactly. So he he said in his book, which really resonated with me and is really the mantra of what tryon's doing is that being an owner and operator today in real estate, you need to look at yourself as a tech company, not as a owner.
Quinn Edwards (21:14)
⁓ Rob Finlay?
David Moghavem (21:38)
But as a tech company, with your product being real estate and real estate investments. And so what does that mean? It means data-driven insights and data-driven analysis on decision making and a reliance on empirically backed data that even for try-on proprietary data that's specific from our company that only we have access to, not
just off-the-shelf data that you can buy ⁓ in the markets. And so we are currently entering the data-driven decision making for the company in our acquisitions, in operations, in our workflows. And we're building ourselves as a tech company almost. ⁓ So how does that look like in acquisitions?
For the past four or five years, we've been tracking all of our deals on CRM systems. Deal path is what we use. Shout out to Deal Path, great yeah, great. Great company. So and I had them on my pod and Mike, who's this a lot of
Quinn Edwards (22:46)
Capric.
Not a paid placement. Paid placement. We
like Deopath. David likes Deopath.
David Moghavem (22:58)
This is a genuine, yeah, genuine shout-out. So, but now just tracking things on CRM is one thing. But all these deals, actually, when Jake was on my pod, we talked about this. This information is all siloed. It's all in these different compartmentalized folders. AI is now being able to synthesize this data. So this years of track putting things on CRMs and tracking it is finally gonna pay off.
Totally. Because we are connecting, we already built our own ⁓ MCP system that connects to our CRM. And we're doing data-driven analysis of our own data from all the years that we've been tracking on deal path to come up with investment thesis, to come up with real sale comps, not just the deals that traded, but what the bid ask spreads are on any deal that was around the area. ⁓
The notes are getting aggregated and synthesized all together. And it's a beautiful thing. ⁓ and by the way, Claude is connected to our Outlook emails. Claude is connected to our meeting notes if we're using granola. So shout out to Claude, shout out to Granola, shout out to all these great tools that we're using to now synthesize this data and come up with investment thesis. So yeah, this is.
Just on the acquisition side of how we're using AI, ⁓ it's not just one tool. It's the idea of marrying and connecting and getting the API tools for to connect all of these and talk together and synthesize together. So that's that's acquisitions right now.
Quinn Edwards (24:38)
If I if I can just interject before you go on to some of your other processes, I think what you you mentioned about data driven is is so interesting, right? Because commercial real estate has coined itself to be a data driven industry, right? And like for the most part, like markets are incredibly efficient. ⁓ but when you think about like the amount of data that like most real estate folks make decisions based off of, like it's a minuscule amount of data compared to like
everything and they have logs just because it's impossible one to your point correlate it all to one another, but impossible prior to AI. And then two, ⁓ there's only so many things that quote unquote, for those not not watching, you know, hypothetical here, quote unquote, ⁓ that really mattered right to the general real estate investor. But to your point, you've been logging all this information, you have all this data. Now that you can connect it all and correlate it and actually make decisions off of ten thousand pieces of data versus
a hundred, ⁓ you can be so much smarter. and granted it leads to like more efficiencies in a more efficient market. So I'm I'm totally just not only bullish, but like excited to hear that you guys are using your own data, right? Because everyone talks about proprietary data being one the most important. And like it is if you know how to if you know how to use it. And it it works for you.
⁓ so that kudos to you guys for for implementing that system. I'd be curious offline to see the MCP and like to actually watch you guys work within cloud and and see that'll happen. But I I think like it's a it's a huge unlock for for groups that have large amounts of data if they can tap into it into a meaningful way. That's the computer advantage these days.
David Moghavem (26:15)
Yeah, I I agree. And I'm sure you have a lot of firms that are playing around with AI and they're tackling the low-hanging fruit. They're tackling how to be more productive. They're tackling how to have ⁓ underwritings automated, how to have deals and and ⁓ processes automated. We're doing all that. I mean that's and it's a beautiful thing, it's great. ⁓ it allows us to be to operate in a more
meaningful way to start using our time on more revenue generating work. So that we already went through. Now we're already in the next process of how are we going to actually use this data and be different. Not just be more productive, but be different, think different, ⁓ and and come up with creative ways. So I think that's really exciting for us on the acquisition side. I could get into now the different departments if you want on kind of like how we're doing
⁓ AI and those. So operations is a very interesting time because there's so many point solutions with AI out there. There's so many pain points obviously with managing. And again, we're we're in a time where there's cap stack distress. Every dollar counts. And so what we've been able to do is embrace Elise AI. That's a great tool for us.
⁓ being able to automate the and we've been in the game for a lot. Like we've used the chat bots, we use the the tools, and it was always a little bit of a push and pull between human, non-human. ⁓ now what we're working on is centralizing the platform, centralizing our portfolio to make productivity and write decision-making calls on giving the right notices out to tenants, giving the right renewals out to tenants. And
not only being more productive, but doing it correctly to minimize errors. And so that's been great for us on operations. I think I also listened to your guys' webinar with ⁓ Yarty. With Yarty. Yep. That was a great webinar. You guys, that was great. And I
Quinn Edwards (28:30)
I'm gonna give ourselves a shout out right here, David. We had a thousand spots. We matched out on all the registrants, and it was probably like the most successful webinar that like Zoom has seen in the real estate industry in years. But that's yeah.
David Moghavem (28:43)
You guys did a great job. No,
you guys did a great job. And I think this is the next step, right? Going back to what I was saying of having your own data, tryons data for making real decisions, not just looking up CoStar what the rent growth is going to and saying, I want bat market. No, this is boots on the ground. This is what we have, and the Yarty API rolling out, Yardi Virtuoso being able to now get.
the AI data synthesize in our own portfolio is gonna do wonders. So we're super excited for that. We're talking to our YARDI reps. We're working on ways to get that going. Q4, they're gonna release their own MCP. We're excited for that. And we're gonna be the first ones in line to figure out ways that we can capitalize on that. And again, data driven decision making, being able to extrapolate some of our own data and our own ⁓
portfolio and come up with conjectures from there.
Quinn Edwards (29:45)
First off, i that's incredible that you joined our webinar. We appreciate you. Secondly, it's incredible how like far along you are in this process, 'cause like I kid you not, we have ⁓ between Jake and I, we have we have multiple, multi multiple conversation today with different firms and professionals, all from like investment to development, brokers, managers, etc. And it's a mixed bag on where people stand, but like for the majority, like people still have no idea ⁓ where to start with all this.
And it's funny, like there's so many people that I reach out to to to now come on this new series of this podcast, David, you being the first one. And like majority of the answers are I'm not like prepared to come on like they are for a commercial real estate podcast. Like I don't know if I can like even speak to like what we're doing. ⁓ so just like kudos to you for for just
Not only being so up to date, but like just being so far along. And I think in today's market, no matter what industry you're at, it could be commercial real estate or it could be like Jake and I start an educational, informational, media brand around all this, like it's the data that you have and it's like who's who's first to market. Cause at the end of the day, right, like your firm and your spot is so perfectly
situated to capitalize on this because you've been around for a long time. So you have ample amounts of data and you're also the first ones utilizing all that data that you have to make strategic and data driven to data driven decisions. Excuse me. ⁓ so I just think like it it sounds like you guys are doing as much as you can to to just be smarter, be better and using this technology. And it's it's cool to to talk to someone besides Jake and myself that really does like embrace this to his fullest capacity.
David Moghavem (31:33)
Of course. You you gotta adapt in this industry. I think ⁓ real estate you got a lot of OGs in the re in the industry, you got a lot of old school. Great OG great OG.
Quinn Edwards (31:43)
I
still think cold calling is like the best thing to do to be.
David Moghavem (31:48)
And like this. And to to kind of finish my thought there, it's like people think that just because you're embracing AI and you're doing this, you're you're dismissing the art of real estate. And like for me, I mean I love I love the war stories of the OGs, ⁓ the way to do things. I think with AI, it frees you up to do that part of the business, the relationships.
The meeting with people. You know, before, like I'll give you an example. Like on a property tour, I used to have to be head down and take notes if there's not someone next to me taking notes for me. Just because, you know, I got to pitch investors. I got to talk to my team about it. Like I want to make sure every note is down. Now I have note taking apps connected to Claude. So I could go back to being the old school, hey, when that manager said that answer.
What was her facial expression? What was what was like the reaction to that? And like get a feel. Like it does this person really know what they're talking about. I think we're going back now to the the feel, the touch, the intangibles of a property that before we couldn't because we just didn't have the right tech to free us. So I think you need to have that lens with AI. I'm embracing this, that we can go back to.
Talking one-on-one, doing podcasts, building a brand, talking to people, picking up the phone, ⁓ relationship building, networking. We can do more of that now with AI, not less, not be behind a desk and crank on Excel. We can have AI underwrite that deal for us. So, what are you doing when Claude is running that's that skill of underwriting that deal? You should be talking to the broker, you should be picking up the phone, you should be.
talking to the lender, you should be networking. You can go out to breakfast, lunch, dinners, beers. That's the beauty of the industry is networking and leveraging relationships. And I think with AI you could do more of that now.
Quinn Edwards (33:54)
I love how you framed it as an art and a science. And I'll I'll kind of c I think we can close it out after that because I think it's a very kind of perfect way to wrap it. But I once ⁓ I I how do I put this? ⁓ there's an individual that I know that that runs a very famous ice cream brand and he's also a winemaker. He lives up at Santa Barbara. And back when I was at CBRE, he did like a whole
TED talk on his business and how it was applied to ours. And he basically said that making ice cream and making wine is an art and a science. ⁓ and I and I think what's interesting about that to your point is a lot of the pushback that p that we get or or or the industry gets around adopting AI is that it's it's taking away from the art, right? Like AI can't do this better than I can. AI can't do that better than I can. But to your point and and what
What we believe to be true is that there are so many things that AI can take over, right? The science part of it. So you can really go back to being a real estate professional. Yeah. And like what that means, like in in the different asset classes and the different roles of professions, right? That's different. But like I believe there is an art to making deals happen. And it's much more than just what the numbers show on a piece of paper. Granted, that is incredibly important. ⁓
And with the advancements of technology and AI, like there's gonna be ways for that AI to do it better than you ever could. Underwrite a deal, analyze a deal, understand the numbers, right? Now it's up to you to look at the property and make decisions yourself with your eyes or build a relationship with the seller or the broker or the tenants, right? Whatever that might be. and and and sometimes the old school way happens, right? You gotta underwrite a deal, but you gotta go take someone out to dinner and like sit them down and like have that in-person conversation and like build that relationship to make it happen. So I'm a huge believer of
your point, it's both. ⁓ and if you guys can do what Triad is doing as it relates to implementing AI to its fullest abilities, but not losing the art of what commercial real estate is, ⁓ a lot of people will hopefully have the success that you guys, David, are ⁓ hopefully gonna have over the coming years. I can I can feel it. I know you guys will.
David Moghavem (36:07)
From from your mouth to God's ears, hopefully ⁓ can translate and we'll be
Quinn Edwards (36:12)
From
from the West Hollywood Home Office to the West Hollywood Pdc
David Moghavem (36:15)
It just exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Very true.
Quinn Edwards (36:20)
Well, I I appreciate you you David for coming on. This is tremendous. I love your input. I love what you guys are doing. I I'm wishing you and Shyon just continued success and any way that Jake and I can continue to be helpful and support you guys, we would love to. ⁓ where where can people find you, David? I know we didn't really touch on your podcast, so maybe I can just kinda take it to you to close out on like where people can find you, where they can listen to you or watch you.
And if they want to get in touch with Tryon for whatever reason, they want to sell the property, they want you to buy it, they want you to manage it, ⁓ where where can they find you guys?
David Moghavem (36:56)
Yeah, so Deal Flow Friday is my ⁓ weekly CRE podcast. Every Friday we bring someone on, or it's sometimes me just ranting about what's going on in the market. And so you could find me on Deal Flow Friday, LinkedIn, Instagram. It's on all podcast streaming apps, X as well. and then you can find me on on those platforms and what was the second question?
It's a hard to find try on.
Quinn Edwards (37:28)
If they wanna get if they wanna get in touch with Trion because they want either sell you guys a dollar property and manage
David Moghavem (37:33)
Yep, tryon properties dot com. just reach out. Try on living is our third party management platform. ⁓ we're doing a lot of special things there too with AI. ⁓ but feel free to reach out and we'll we'd love to connect.
Quinn Edwards (37:49)
Lastly, David, how impactful has your podcast been to try ons business?
David Moghavem (37:56)
Super. I mean, a lot of ⁓ what we've been able to network with and what we've been able to do, the tech we've been able to leverage through it, the relationships we've been able to leverage, it's been incredible. I mean, beyond beyond belief, honestly. ⁓ the podcast has been very powerful. It's been so fun to to connect with people, to connect with Jake, now connecting with you. ⁓
And honestly, you know, everyone at try on right now ⁓ calls me the head of AI as like the de facto head of AI right now. I wouldn't be able to embrace AI without the pod because I needed AI to make that process efficient. And ⁓ it forced me to kind of use implement AI into the side project of the podcast. And it's
Done wonders now for the company and done wonders for personal branding. And I think in a age of AI where knowledge is so commoditized, branding and relationships is what matters. And so to your point, like how has that been benefited the company? Tremendously, because that's really what's what's left is the relationship, the branding and and relationship building.
Quinn Edwards (39:18)
Yeah. I wish I ⁓ was using AI, you know, five years ago and was bro my social media brand five years ago and not so full.
David Moghavem (39:26)
Like, compounding into
butt so you gotta start now.
Quinn Edwards (39:30)
Totally. Well, David, appreciate you again for coming on. ⁓ great use with AI. Triumph properties, awesome. ⁓ first of hopefully many conversations with you and and other folks at your firm or just other commercial real estate professionals that come on, but you're the man and appreciate you coming on and for everyone listening.
David Moghavem (39:49)
Awesome. Thanks, Quinn. Appreciate it.
Quinn Edwards (39:52)
Bye everyone.