Bank of the Ozarks Real Estate Specialties Group
Has anyone worked for or with Bank of the Ozarks Real Estate Specialties group? From what I understand they are becoming one of the larger construction/balance sheet lenders in several major markets throughout the country. Just curious how they are viewed in the market. Thanks.
Good shop. More like a debt fund than a normal bank (more opportunistic and value-add deals and less down the middle). Spreads 300s plus vs the L+200 most banks quote on vanilla deals. Much more aggressive than most banks. If you want construction debt they are one of the only games in town right now.
Second IRRelevant. Have worked on a deal with them recently for spec office development...one of the only banks willing to lend with partial recourse on a project with minimal pre-leasing. All other banks required 50%+ preleasing, lower proceeds, crazy recourse provisions.
If Ozarks doesn't do your construction deal you're in trouble. Very easy to work with, we've closed multiple deals with them. I'd think it's a great place to gain experience now due to the sheer deal volume and exposure you'd get (since everyone under the sun is begging them for construction and non-recourse money). They work across a very wide spectrum of property types and markets. Clearly their deal flow is getting so heavy they need more analysts - not surprised. The big question is how long they'll stay afloat. We're taking bets in the office on how soon they're going under.
Sounds similar to Chorus Bank out of Chicago back in 2005/2006. They were doing all kinds of deals across the US. There was a sponsor on a deal in San Diego with a pretty rough reputation. Chorus still issued an LOI for their tower. Chorus went pop in the meltdown and the sponsor I speak of has been sued for stealing investor equity.
You hit it on the head. That's the most common comparison the senior guys throw around here. I wonder how aggressive they got on the leverage back then, I'm sure it was a lot worse than now.
Since all of the press came out on them recently, they no longer go above 50% LTC on construction. But they still cave on closing requirements such as pre-sales, pre-leasing etc and allow mezz on top.
Could you clarify why "if Ozarks doesn't do your construction deal you're in trouble"? What does it offer that others don't? Could you also talk a little bit about who else you'd turn to if the Ozarks weren't doing your deal?
I'm also not sure I understand why you both believe they're great to do business with but are likely to blow up any minute now. What is it that they do that would make them blow up?
The general idea is that they're willing to lend while others aren't. This implies that the market is starting to turn and Bank of the Ozarks could get caught with a lot of bad debt.
Bump. A few questions:
1) Anyone have experience with someone in this group? Can you share their experience on lifestyle, culture?
2) Any idea about their compensation? Is it in line with banks or PE funds?
3) How is their reputation doing in 2017?
Thank you.
I want to know how much they pay too. Just curious really. Like I've said before it seems like they have pretty high quality guys for being a non BB bank.
BUMP
I am currently interviewing with BOTO for an internship this summer in the real estate specialties group and came across some very disgruntled reviews from former employees on this site called Glass Door. Specifically, complaints revolving around poor treatment of lower level employees, something about a very detached management, corporate looking down their nose at branch personnel, not allowing employees in operations to email some of the officers, poor communication between the chain of command, focusing solely on growth without concern for fixing current issues and smoothing out business practices. Also I saw an alarming amount of talk about trust issues with co-workers and office gossip, back-stabbing and brown-nosing to get ahead. Can anyone who currently works there or has in the past speak on this? I was very excited to interview with them after having a good conversation at a career fair but I'll be honest I'm a little spooked.
Focus on getting the internship and then worry about stuff like that. It's just an internship - take the experience and move elsewhere if the people are jerks. I met mid-level guy who worked there for a couple years and left. He didn't like it either which is in line with the stuff on glass door
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