T.J. Lefler on Commercial Real Estate Investments

Lefler Capital’s commercial real estate assets total more than $200 million. (Michael Woods)

What attracted you to commercial real estate investing?

I have been involved in commercial real estate for around 18 years. About six years ago I began to have clients asking to partner or buy property with them to help them understand the investing part of real estate. I quickly got the bug and enjoy fully investing in myself and with others in something we feel is valuable. I have my own money at stake and get really in the weeds on a project where I oversee monthly reporting, management and tenant issues and the eventual sale when that happens.

What are some projects you’re involved with?

All of our projects are in Arkansas, and most are in northwest Arkansas. In Little Rock, we are still working on improving the Riverdale Shopping Center, and in downtown North Little Rock the ATG/U.S. Bank Building. In northwest Arkansas, we have around 30 warehouse buildings scattered in the main cities, the Citizens Bank office building in Rogers, some downtown Bentonville retail property, and in Fayetteville, we have quite a bit of apartments and townhomes around the University of Arkansas. All of these properties I manage for my partnership groups with mainly Arkansas investors. Overall we own around 60 buildings or so in the state.

What do you enjoy most about your job?

Each day is a new day. There is always a new opportunity, and the sky is the limit. You get beat up sometimes or things don’t go your way, but then days later something great can happen. I also enjoy the people I work with. I have always felt blessed that I really like who I work with, and we are friends as well as sharing the same drive to make nice investments.

What’s the best advice you ever received?

A few fellow real estate investors have always told me how important adding value is. Each deal requires a lot of things: information, hard work, money, etc. If you can figure out a way to add value to a certain component of a deal, anyone can do this business and be a part of a project.

What’s the biggest challenge in your job?

Most commercial projects take a lot of time to figure out, and sometimes they don’t work out after spending so much effort on a deal. You can get fatigued on something and potentially spend months trying to figure something out that just wasn’t meant to be. Also, you have to be brave enough to really put yourself out there by investing your hard-earned money into a project that isn’t guaranteed to ever produce a return.