The Role of Community Work in CRE Brokerage

Back to another episode of CRE – The Unspoken Truth. I’m Charlie Coppola, joined by my father, Craig. Today our topic is the role of community work in commercial real estate brokerage. And so I want to start with just, tell me, give me a little background on your career. What organizations were you involved with, or have you been involved with?

Well, community involvement has been at the core of my business for 40 years. Remains that way today. I’m on three boards today, but I was on, and it sounds like a lot, but I was on at least five boards at any one time, nonprofit boards, during my career. And now I’m down to three. But it has been a core piece of my career, a core piece of my being. And so I believe in it. And certainly this is a topic that I’ve been looking forward to talking about for some time. We wanted to get through the basics of, you know, the unspoken truth. And so this is one that’s meaningful to me, and we can talk about that.

Yeah. So, yeah. Are there specific, I mean, you said you’ve been a part of five boards at any point in your career, currently three. Is there one or two that you spent a decade or two on that really, you know, meant a lot personally to you?

Yeah, we were, you know, I am, well, we’re going to talk about the Banner. So I was on the Banner Foundation board for a decade. We helped bring the MD Anderson, Banner MD Anderson Center here. We raised $20 million to start a building for the MD Anderson facility here. And a year later, 18 years, 18 months later, I was diagnosed with lymphoma. And it was a crazy story, because I tell this story, but I woke up in the morning and I had a little lump in my neck. And so I’m pretty on it, so I just called my doctor. He said, “Come in.” They got me in that day. They had an opening. I went to it. He says, “Oh, I think we should get it scanned.”

So we got it scanned, and he said that the next day, it was like Tuesday. So done on a Monday. On a Tuesday he said come in. He got the scan back and he goes in the meeting, he says, “This doesn’t look good. This reading looks bad. There’s probably something there. It’s cancer.” And I just held my hand up and I said, “Hang on, let me get on the phone.” And he’s like, “What’s going on?” He’s never had this before. And I got on the phone and I go, “Hey, Hector, can you get on the phone?” And he goes, “Who are you calling?” I go, “This is the executive director of Banner MD Anderson in Phoenix,” and this is my cancer guy.

And he says, put, gave him the phone, and he read the thing, where as he was telling me, he read it to the MD Anderson guy, and the MD Anderson guy said, “We’ll take it from here.” And he goes, “What do you mean?” He’s like, “We got Craig.” And I knew him, and I, you know, raised money, and then he was just a dynamite person. And that next day he got me into MD Anderson, and the joint MD Anderson here in Phoenix and in Houston handled all of my care. And it was like, you know, so that’s a payoff. I didn’t do it for that, but that’s a hell of a story, you know. And I’m here today. It’s 12 years, it’s 12 years this month.

Yeah. And so it’s pretty cool.

It’s crazy. That’s…

So that’s a good story.

It’s a good story.

It’s not a brokerage story.

It’s not where I expected this to go, but…

Yeah, I used to not be able to tell that story without crying. So I’ve come a long ways. Let me give you another one, a better story in terms of where we’re headed for brokerage. Look, I knew early on that this was going to be my home, Phoenix, Arizona. I grew up in southern Arizona, small town. I knew I wanted to live here. Your mom and I got engaged. It was like, this is where we’re going to live and raise our kids. We’re in, you know, I’m at the home office today, and this is where we raised, we’re going to stay in our house. We’ve been in this house 25 years. You know, we’ve been married 35 years. This was our home.

So I wanted to build a relationship. I’m always shocked at how people retire and move to Sun City or whatever. They’ll move to another new community or they’ll move out of the country, and they’re like, “No, this is where I’m building my home.” And so I wanted to not only build a big brokerage career, but I wanted to build a deep connection to the community. So all of my giving, almost 100%, I would say 98% of all the charitable hours, charitable time, has been here in the community. And it was because I wanted to be here and I wanted to build relationships here, and I wake up here at 63 and I have that.

That said, I’ve also gotten business from that, because I went at it the right way. I didn’t go at it, “I’m going to join this organization so I can get business.” That was never my intent. I didn’t join the Banner Foundation board. I thought that they were doing good work in the community, and the MD Anderson name is obviously a gold standard name for cancer care. The Valley of the Sun United Way, which is a client that we’re representing again right now. We’ve represented them for a long time now, 20 years, 15 years. I’ve been active in the Valley of the Sun United Way. I think it’s a very good charity.

St. Vincent de Paul, the largest St. Vincent de Paul in the world, is here in Phoenix, and I’ve been involved with St. Vincent de Paul now for over a decade, and I love what they’re doing. I love their mission of food, clothe, house and heal. I love the mission. And so I’m good. Now I develop good relationships because I’m with those people.

I love that the intent was always because it aligned with your interests and your beliefs and your vision for your life and your community. That was kind of where I wanted to take this: how do you weigh personal interest in choosing where you’re going to spend your time on these nonprofits, and donate maybe money or time, relationships, ask for favors, ask for other people to donate? How do you choose and weigh your personal interest versus the business opportunity or your reputation, you know, all the factors?

Well, the organization where I probably spent the most time, for 15, 20 years, was NAIOP, which is the owners association. And that was an easy one. I’m committed to this industry. I’m going to be here. And every one of my clients on the landlord side is a member. So it was super easy for me to start my way at the bottom and work my way up. And I became chairman. And the year I was chairman, I was national chapter chairman of the year. And then two or three years ago, I was inducted into their hall of fame, their champion circle, whatever they call it. There’s only 20, at the time there was only 20 people that had been inducted into it.

And so that was not only career, but also commitment to NAIOP. And so I got a lot of business out of that, because I was on the board for a decade and then I became chairman, and I did a lot of work for the organization. And so that was the easy one. That’s a twofer, right? These other ones, you get twofers when you go on a good-sized board. Now, I’ve been on really big boards. Like, I’m on the Arizona Chamber board. There’s 135 people. That’s a massive board. But I think, you know, we’re the number one lobbying voice and business voice in the state of Arizona. And so that to me, that’s another twofer. It’s like, we’re here promoting business, and it’s a big board.

And so it’s like, those two align exactly with what I want. So why wouldn’t I be on that board for a long period of time? And so I love being on that board. St. Vincent de Paul isn’t a twofer. It’s just great work, great people, and I like what they’re doing. And so I’ve been really active with the people that have run it. And you know, Steve Zabilski, he’s no longer running it, but Steve Zabilski, as you know, he’s just one of the finest gentlemen you’ll ever hear or meet in your life. And Shannon Clancy, who’s now running it, is the same person.

Yeah. Yeah. And that was one of the other questions I wanted to ask, to tie this onto the brokerage side. You already shared one powerful story that, you know, your involvement hit you on the personal side, helped you on the personal side. Do you have one where your community involvement led to a deal or a relationship, you know, that you may not have gotten, or you would not have gotten, if you weren’t involved in that specific group?

Yeah. Well, we’ve been representing the Valley of the Sun United Way for 20 years. We’re doing their business. We’re literally moving them right now. We’re representing them, and it’s because of our relationship. And the same thing, we’re working with the Arizona Chamber of Commerce for their office space right now. We’re doing it. And so, yes, there is some nonprofit where you get to represent them. But also, the thing on the nonprofit side, the nonprofits kind of, they tend to talk to each other. And so we’ve done a lot of nonprofit work where we’re not on their boards, but they’re looking for somebody to do it.

So I would say if a broker is looking to kind of, like, you know, find something that you’re passionate about, there are some boards that are, you know, I look at boards sometimes and I’m like, I don’t have a passion for that. So it’s not something that really hits me. I want to spend my time and donate my money to boards. And I will give you one tip that was really interesting to me, because I’ll write 25 to 30 checks to different organizations, nonprofit checks, a year, because I’m asked by a number of my friends to give money. And I got a good tip from somebody one time. I’m going to share it right here.

He says, “I only give money if my friends call me and, the first question I ask them, how much of your personal time are you spending?” If it’s just that you’re raising money for them, then I’m not going to give any money.

Yeah.

So he wanted to make sure, one, they were on the board, that they were committing their time, that they were super passionate about it, that it just wasn’t a business where I’m out raising money. And to me, I’ve now incorporated that into my giving. I’m still giving 25 checks a year, but those checks are to people who are spending time on the organization, in the organization, and it’s meaningful to them.

Yeah. Yeah. That’s good. Always ask, right? Are you spending your own time, right before you write the check?

And the other thing, this is just a personal, I want to kind of rant on this, is I’m a big believer in community first. So, like, if I looked at my circle, I need to be healthy, then my relationship with your mom needs to be healthy, then my relationship with my kids, and then my community. I have a number of clients that are doing really good work in Africa and other third world countries, and that’s their passion. My passion is here, and I always felt like I wanted to make Phoenix, Metro Phoenix, a better place. And so I give my time and my dollars to causes where the money stays here in the community.

Yeah.

That’s mine.

Yeah, that’s good. I mean, other than this podcast, which was just a topic, do you promote your community involvement as marketing or anything for the business? Is there anything there?

We don’t have it on our website. It depends on the user. If the user is a very big community player, we will play that up. Yes. Sometimes you can go on their website and you can find out that, like, “One of our things is that we give back to the community,” and then we’re like, okay, good, we’re in alignment there. But a lot of these are like, “Hey, no, our job is to make a ton of money,” and they don’t care about it, then we’re not pitching it.

Yeah. Yeah.

We just did a pitch, and I did include one page of all the boards that we’re currently on right now. And you know, our team’s a big team, so we’ve got a number of boards, not just the three that I’m on, but Andrew’s on a couple and Nick’s on a couple, Greg’s working on one. So we’ve got several.

Yeah. The one other question I want to ask is, and you’ve mentioned you’ll be on a big board for a big organization, and then you’ll call and try to develop a relationship with, you know, other board members. Any other things? And I know we’ve talked about this some on a relationship topic podcast. Any other things you’ll do to help build relationships with other board members or other people involved with that organization?

Well, if you’re committed to the board, then that means that you’ll be on a committee or two, which means you’re going to be on a subcommittee and you’re going to meet. So, you know, have I in the past looked at who’s on the subcommittees and then said, “Yeah, I’ll hold my hand up to be on that committee because I wanted to meet that person”? The answer is yes. So yeah, I look and go, here’s the board. I look at who’s on the board. I go, “Hey, does this align? Is this a twofer? Does it align with my values and what I really want to do, and am I passionate about it?”

And two, are there some quality people on the board? I was looking through a couple people and the boards they were on, and I’m like, man, that’s a weird board, you know. Like, one, I didn’t have any interest in the nonprofit, but two, I’m like, who are these people? They’re not anybody that are in my circle. So it’s like…

Yeah.

And I’m asked a lot now to commit to boards, and I say no. I’ve learned to say no, because there’s a lot of time you can spend and waste.

Yeah, I do go back to this quote I remember. It’s like, if you want a large network, if you want a large list of people singing your praises, the best way to getting there is to become a person of value. And so I think about, you know, you can join the board, and if your main objective is to network and get to know people, but you’re not adding value, then you’re not really, you know, accomplishing your goal, right? So I think one thing that you have mentioned a little bit in here, but I know just from growing up with you as my dad, every board, every opportunity you had, you also wanted to do your best. You didn’t want to just be on the board. You were actually trying to do good work and add value to the organization.

Yeah, I suck, because I get on these boards and we need somebody to do this, and I’m like, “I’ll do it,” because I know I can do it. And so I’ve literally had to learn how to just keep my mouth shut on these boards and not offer so much. And you know, there’s a guy here in the community, John Graham with Sunbelt Holdings, and John’s on 19 boards. I mean, John is a freak of nature, and I can’t even hold myself to his standards. So when I join a board, I do have John in my head all the time going, I just want to be just half, not, you know, like 10% as good as John, because he’s committed to it.

And you have to really think about it, because again, we talked about this circle. All this community stuff is taken away from your family. So how did I get a twofer? Well, I ran Arcadia Little League, right? So, you know, I coached you. Then I coached the All-Star team. We had a great run. We met a lot of people on our run to the state finals of the Little League. You know, that was a great run, and we got a lot of exposure for that. We didn’t do it because I thought I was going to get business from it, but you know, lots of people remember when we had our state run, because we were the first team in 20 years from Arcadia to kind of have a run like we did.

And we had that little blog that we did that 4,000 people were following for a couple months, and it was just kind of magical. The run was magical. The kids were magical. The people that we met along the way were magical. And so if you can kind of generate that, along with MD Anderson. So if you just listen to these stories, the Arcadia Little League run, the Banner MD Anderson thing that I told you about earlier. We’ve had some wins, and I was involved with the Arizona Chamber bringing people to Arizona. Those have really paid off for me. So I guess I’d say that, yeah, do this.

Yeah. And I think you talk about twofers, right? And I’ve heard a number of stories. The Arcadia Little League one was a twofer because it’s a memory that we’ve had for, you know, 20 years together.

And that’s great. We still get together with guys on the team and their dads and talk about the glory days. And Cody Bellinger’s in the big leagues, who really beat us. You know, he beat us. It’s like, “Yeah, we were really good, but Cody was way better,” you know.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He’s gone on to have a hell of a career, too.

Yeah.

Yeah. Our claim to fame is Griffin Jax. Come on, Griffin. He’s, you know, he’s playing for the Twins. He’s in the big leagues.

He’s had a couple good years. He hasn’t had Cody years, but he’s got a shot.

Yeah.

You and I are filming podcasts and he’s pitching in the big leagues.

He’s pitching in the big leagues, and we love it.

The twofers, I’ve heard that story, then the Banner one you started with. I mean, these are twofers for other reasons outside of business. And I think it goes back to your point on doing this for the right purpose, you know, having the right intent when you go into this. And I think that’s something you preach with relationships, is give first, and, you know, things come back in ways you wouldn’t expect.

I don’t think you can really be a top, you know, if your job is to be, “I want to be an average broker,” you don’t have to go out and be in the community. If you want to be an upper, upper echelon broker, you’re in the community, and you’re going to have to learn how to do that. And so how do you do that? You start with the nonprofits. You’re just going to be in the community a lot. And I think if you’re not in the community, if you’re a broker right now and you’re not doing anything, you’re not…

We’re doing a deal right now in Durango, Colorado. And our broker there is the mayor. I mean, she’s in the community and she knows everybody. It’s like, okay, this is great. I love that she, you know, it’s a small community, and she ran and she got elected, and it’s like, she’s the mayor. These are people we… We did a deal with a guy out of Louisville, Kentucky, and he took us to the Kentucky Derby, and then we went to the Pendennis Club, that was his private little club, and he was the man in Louisville, Kentucky. And we had the greatest experience of the Kentucky Derby because he was in his community still there. Michael Shoring, great guy. And so those are the kind of people that you really want to work with.

Yeah. Yeah. It’s cool. I love it. So, this was kind of the first question, or the question of the topic of the podcast: what role does community work play in brokerage? And I think you just answered it with, if you’re going to be a top broker, you’ve got to do this. It’s part of the job.

Yeah.

Yeah. And you know, again, we get a bad rap as brokers, that we’re just, you know, coming in and taking advantage, because we’re, you know, we’re middlemen. We’re not adding any, we’re not building anything. And so this is a way to do this, and it’s a way to really feel good. I feel really good about, I mean, I’ll stack my nonprofit resume against anybody except John Graham. John Graham would kill me. But I’ll stack it against anybody, and the good work that we’ve done for the community. I’ll stack that up against anybody, and I feel really good about that as I am at the tail end of my career.

It’s good stuff. Thank you for sharing your stories. And that’s another episode in the books, The Unspoken Truth.

Thank you.