Development time travel question
If you could go back in time, which era would you choose to be a big ticket developer in? You’re crushing it at the peak of your career…what decade are you choosing from the 1600’s to present? I’m thinking 17th century New Amsterdam. Also, whats one thing you’d you tell your younger self before your first development project/job?
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Do you go back with your present knowledge?
My guess is most people would fall flat on their faces in older societies. Credit facilities are miniscule, liquidity is atomized across lots of small pots of capital, and access to all of it is highly dependent on close relationship networks which you definitionally wouldn't have access to. You'd probably want to be in the last 50 years or so to maximize what you can do/earn/build.
Yes you go back as you currently are, and with whatever you have on your person at the time of travel
Then I'd probably want to go back to NYC in 2002/3 and buy up everything I possibly could on the Brooklyn waterfront, knowing it was about to be rezoned.
Basing my answer purely on what I think would be the most fun I would have like 2003-2007. Cheap and easy money to do a lot of deals.
assuming I dont have to deal with the GFC in this hypothetical..
You would pick the lead-up and not the post-crisis explosion of value?
came here to say this. I work for a guy that started developing during the crisis and his returns were insane in the 2010s. interest rates were basically zero, capital was hand over fist abundant, and you were coming in at the lowest valuations on the bricks in ages. easy answer. 2010s.
Where do you find the money? Part of the problem with being a time traveler is no one will believe you.
I'd much rather land in an easy credit environment where giving a homeless person a shower and a suit qualifies them for an 8 figure loan. Plus, then you do have capital for when the market explodes. You simply dip out in 2006/07, sit on the sidelines for a year or two, and then build luxury condos in Manhattan for foreign oligarchs.
Easily mid 19th century railroad speculator. Not buying railroad stocks, but the land around railroads.
The problem with that is that the railroads tended to own all that land already. In fact, that was pretty much the mechanics of how it worked, with railroads getting huge land grants in lieu of cash subsidies.
You'd also run into a similar problem where you'd have some real trouble getting the credit to buy anything.
Real estate developer in Hawaii active from 1950 to 1980. The population nearly doubled from 500K to close to a million.
I also would probably be very old or dead by 2026, so not something I want for me. In general, if I were to develop, I want a growing population. I guess I’m doing that with senior housing; silver tsunami is here so can appreciate the present time (2010 - 2020 65+ age cohort growth rate of 39%; 85+ age group to 4X between 2000 - 2040).
Go back to the 1830s and purchase land to ground lease to tenants in Manhattan. When you read about how much money the Astor family was making and how they were able to scale the business for decades without much competition it is astonishing. Today an opportunity like that would last 5 minutes before everyone in the world with a checkbook wants in on the action.
The downside of this time period of course is I don’t think any amount of money can buy the luxuries I have become accustomed to in 2026.
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