Confused/Underwhelmed since starting in June
Take this all with a grain of salt given the current market environment and that no one is having fun in Real Estate right now, mostly just needed to bitch.
I started in June at a bank doing balance sheet lending in a Tier 2 city. Pay and hours are remarkable, the people I work with are great. Debt is just extraordinarily boring. Granted I know that being a first year analyst is going to be pretty monotonous everywhere, but sometimes I feel like I barely use my brain and just regurgitate DSCRs, Debt Yields, and CompSet Penetration all day without any kind of story behind the underlying asset. I couldn't tell you what 95% of the loans I covered looked like, which is absolutely not what I pictured when I accepted the offer.
Wanted to gauge some of the more experienced Real Estate Finance professionals opinions on how this might or might not change as I progress through my career. I'm a Real Estate guy. My dad built houses, I studied construction, and was planning on working for a GC/Developer after I graduated. Real Estate Finance/Lending was a pipe dream until it wasn't anymore. The buildings and the story that accompanies is what gets me out of bed in the morning. I know the nature of being an Analyst is granular, detailed, and metrics heavy, but I'm not sure if you get to tell much of a story about a deal in debt at any level. The money's a lot better in this world, but its dry and part of me definitely misses counting doorknobs.
Appreciate any feedback and like I said above, mostly bitching. If you told me two years ago I secured a job at a Bank making way too fucking much money and that I didn't have to wear a hardhat to work anymore I would've laughed in your face. Grass is always greener, but didn't think it'd hurt to ask.
Feel this. Currently at a construction lender and want to break into the development side eventually. I’m more interested in the story of the building than sizing loans to finance it. At least I’m able to learn a little about the construction which should be helpful should I make the switch to development.
Seems like hiring slowed down a lot in that sector so could be a while.
Put in your 1-2 years then make the jump to development. Hopefully things get better by 2024 and developers start hiring more. Felt the same as you when I was on the debt side.
Where did you go after your tenure in debt? I might be playing the doom and gloom game here, but it seems all the exits people in my group get are in private credit or if they do end up at a PE shop they inevitably are staffed on all the mezz deals in a given fun. I can't imagine development/vertically integrated shops have a lot of turnover or openings, I honestly have no idea where to even start
Sounds like you are working on core/CMBS type deals.
Those deals are generally more "vanilla" and nothing really happens with them until there is a downturn.
If you want to work on exciting deals or get into the weeds on the debt side you need to work on the opportunistic/construction side.
That is where you get to here the interesting stories and see the most interesting deals. Those cool redevelopments/new builds don't generally go through bank lenders unless you are at OZK.
Those guys work on interesting deals
Working in Speciality RE (think hotels, modular housing, senior housing, data centers) so a little bit more exciting than the four main food groups in terms of pricing and loan structure, but our clients to tend to be smaller funds that pretty much only use the banks balance sheet. My team spoke to a broker yesterday and he said the only people providing debt right now in our world are family offices. Bank of the Ozarks was hot and it seemed like they were getting 50% of all the construction volume, but even they've had to slow down.
I'm at a fund at a family office so maybe that is why I'm still busy.
I'm pretty sure OZK slowed down because they had so much in the pipeline they couldn't get it all closed + because of the stuff they focus on is HVCRE, they had to watch reserves.
Totally possible that debt just isn't for you. If so, do your time and move on. No shame in that.
Lending is a great first step into getting into Development especially a more regional developer.
I 100% felt this when in credit for commercial lending. It turned out to be great experience for switching over to ownership side. Stick with it for a year or 2, learn as much as possible, and just remind yourself daily this is a step in the process - not what you'll be doing forever.
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