Contributing SIORS
John Barker Jr., SIOR
Scott Henderson, SIOR
McGowan continues: “Facebook is relational,
[dealing with] friends, colleges, what someone
likes to eat. But when you bring data to the real
estate world, you can say this property is owned by
XYZ Advisors, the broker is so and so, and you can
navigate between the objects and draw inferences.
If I need to find somebody that has freezer space
I can categorize tenants that have a need for cold
storage and find buildings and map them together,
whether they are on or off the market.”
“Grubb & Ellis maintains a number of internal
systems that our research team utilizes to assist the
brokers,” says Henderson. “Additionally, the firm
has relationships with third-party providers that are
relevant to the industry. Grubb relies heavily on our
internal data because we have some of the most
talented researchers in the business; it has been
as accurate as—and in many cases more accurate
than—third-party providers.” Often, he adds, third-
party information is presented in “macro” form; the
research team can get very market-specific, down to
the trends in pockets of sub-markets.
“Early on we used Microsoft Access, but because
that just really resides on a local computer and I
couldn’t have people working with me on it, I had it
re-written in SQL database,” Klein says.
Like many small firms, Klein faced a challenge:
a limited budget in a field where expert advice can
be costly. How did he overcome that challenge?
“We went to Craigslist for the G.I.S. (Geographical
Information System) and found a programmer
in New Hampshire, and as for the database part,
I also went to Craigslist and found someone in
Bangladesh, and they did it for me really inexpen-
sively,” he says. “I sent them my Access versions,
and they converted them over.”
Tracking a Wide Range of Data
SIORs say they keep track of a wide range of
data. “I’m constantly updating the tenant side of
things,” says McGowan. “I’m able to sort out lease
expirations, so when I meet with a landlord and he
has 200,000 sq. ft. of distribution space, I can sort
out the tenants in the size range above and below
his availability.”
This, he continues, is where data mining
becomes really powerful. “I can get a tenant name,
and then the sales force contextually via LinkedIn,”
McGowan explains. “I can look at XYZ Corporation
Jim Klein, SIOR
Kevin B. McGowan, SIOR, CCIM
