Director of Real Estate
About Common
Common is the nation’s leading residential brand offering convenience and community through coliving and traditional apartments. Our signature approach to end-to-end property management and technology offerings allows us to deliver unparalleled experiences across 27 buildings, 6 cities, and over 800 members. Common is the preferred choice for both residents looking for a stress-free and all-inclusive living environment, and for real estate owners seeking reliable, above-market returns. Launched in October 2015, we now operate homes in New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. and receive over 3,000 new member applications per week.
It’s an exciting time to be part of Common’s team. We challenge ourselves every day not just to think about ways to make city living better, but to activate on those ideas in meaningful ways. Our team is comprised of real estate professionals, designers, engineers, salespeople, marketers, client service representatives, and so much more. We work collaboratively, value self-startership, and embrace a “whatever it takes” mentality to ensure our work is done and done well.
Common was founded by General Assembly co-founder Brad Hargreaves and has raised over $65MM in venture funding.
About the Role
Common's unique business model seeks to provide members access to flexible housing in numerous cities. We partner with local real estate developers and investors by seeking out residential buildings in up-and-coming neighborhoods while providing a compelling value proposition: a steady stream of income and the upside of property appreciation without the hassles of property management, leasing, and tenant relations. This structure has proven to be an extremely attractive investment opportunity, as dozens of investors and developers are now pursuing real estate acquisitions and development opportunities with Common in mind.
Common is seeking a Director of Real Estate to build and manage our real estate pipeline. Our Director of Real Estate will be responsible for sourcing potential acquisition opportunities, building and managing relationships with local developers, brokers and investments groups, as well as running necessary property level financial models.
Responsibilities
- Develop in-depth understanding of city and underlying sub-markets by owning comparables analysis and broader market analysis
- Analyze new acquisitions / development opportunities and prepare financial analysis on the viability of each transaction, incorporating a variety of capital and financing structures.
- Prepare internal and external presentation materials and documents (e.g., pitch materials, pro-formas, LOI’s).
- Work with internal and external design and construction teams to optimize floor plans for shared housing
- Identify, initiate and develop relationships with Common partners in a client facing role
- Assist in sourcing new acquisition opportunities by developing and maintaining relationships with our local developers, investors, brokers and other real estate professionals.
- Facilitate in coordination between real estate and other teams at Common (e.g., work with Marketing to get monthly lease-up velocity information)
Qualifications
- You have at least five years experience in leading real estate acquisitions.
- You have experience in Business Development or revenue generation focused roles.
- You can generate necessary real estate acquisition and development financial analyses
- You have strong interpersonal and communication skills.
- You are comfortable working in a fast-paced and dynamic startup environment.
- You are entrepreneurial, able to work without well-worn paths or established protocols but instead remain focused on our goals.
- You have successfully led teams before in prior roles and have inspired and professionally developed direct reports.
- You are known for finding creative solutions to difficult problems and your critical thinking.
- You are comfortable working in a collaborative yet goal driven environment.
- You know how to ask for help when you need it.
- You keep your cool in stressful situations.
- MBA preferred
What We Offer
Common truly values our employees and wants to do everything to ensure that our employees are not only happy and professionally fulfilled, but also that they have the opportunity to be healthy. Because of this, we are committed to providing a number of affordable and valuable health and wellness benefits for our employees such as paid vacation and sick time, medical, dental and vision insurance, Company paid life insurance, Company paid STD/LTD Insurance, FSA + HSA options, commuter transit benefits, generous paid parental leave and a 401K. Additional benefits such as Company equity, paid holidays, weekly team lunches + weekly happy hours, a fully stocked kitchen, flexible working hours, job training + development opportunities + a great wellness program are also available. And as always, we are regularly evaluating our offerings to ensure employees needs are being met.
We are committed to affirmatively providing equal opportunity to all associates and qualified applicants without regard to race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, legally protected physical or mental disability, military or veteran status or any other basis protected under applicable federal or state law.