George Pino on Commercial Real Estate, Relationships, and Building Long-Term Wealth

George Pino (00:00)
You bought it as an investment. OK? So.

as an investment you should be looking at it at least biannually if not annually and determining whether or not that investment is number one giving you the right return or your expected returns and number two is there another better investment that you could make even if you sell it at a loss.

Scott Bursey (01:54)
Welcome back to the real estate pros podcast. Today we’re pulling back the curtain on a topic most agents avoid, but the top 1 % are using to dominate their local zip codes. I’m your host Scott Bursey. And today we are joined by a powerhouse in the commercial real estate world with over 35 years of experience and more than 2.5 billion in transactions as CEO of Commercial Brokers International.

He is known for his client first boutique approach and his deep commitment to community. He is one of the most respected names in commercial real estate, not just for his deals he closes, but for the long-term wealth he builds. Please welcome George Pino. George, fantastic to have you here.

George Pino (02:37)
Scott, thanks for having me. ⁓

It’s great to be here. think I need to hire you to follow me around all the time. First of all, you have a great voice, but I need that hype man up there.

Scott Bursey (02:49)
⁓ I’m excited to have you on the show and hopefully it’s showing. George, before we dive into the market dynamics, please give our audience the full story. How did your career begin and how have you been able to reach the heights of your success that you have?

George Pino (03:08)
Well, know, ⁓ it began in real estate actually as a fluke, to be frank with you. You know, I’m half Japanese, half Italian. My mother’s Japanese. I raised to go into ⁓ more into the science side of life. And I started off in college as a computer science major. But quickly realized that really wasn’t to my liking or feel of what I wanted to do with…

my life and I switched out to business marketing and I’ve always been had more of an entrepreneurial mindset. You know, I started a company in ⁓ college when it was doing actually fairly well, but it was a seasonal company. After I graduated,

I had some time off due to the seasonality of the business and a friend of mine who was working at a real estate auction company called up and said, you know, we need some part-time help. You interested in making a few thousand dollars? I’m like, you know, I’m just sitting around. Sure. And ⁓ this was a real estate auction company, ⁓ Open Outcry. And ⁓ they were the largest in the world. And ⁓

what was interesting, I found it so exciting and interesting that and within two weeks, they offered me a permanent job position. And I thought, you know what, this could actually I could see some opportunity here, I could see, you know, investing going into real estate. ⁓ I see what the investors are doing. I see how how it’s happening. And I ended up taking that job. I was assigned Texas as my territory. I’m some snot nose kid just out of college, ⁓ operating one of their largest territories on the closing department. It was amazing learning and

And, you know, I’ve been lucky enough throughout my career that I’ve had some amazing people trust me to do things that I never would have trusted myself. ⁓ And I think that responsibility and that expectation helped me get to rise myself up to those levels. Like, for instance, ⁓ about seven, six years ago,

into that company, they went public. got, I was part of a series of layoffs. I ended up getting laid off.

I was approached by a another gentleman who had at the time the largest residential real estate company in the nation. And he wanted to start a real estate auction division. And I was talking to my now business partner, and this was back in 1993 when this happened. And

He was like, well, this is what we’re building. If you’re interested, let’s do this. And I thought, you know what? Okay, I can do this. Let’s do this.

And ⁓ it was a very hard initial nine months, because that was the first time I went from a salary to a straight 100 % commission basis. And that’s exactly what we ended up doing. ⁓ And I’ve always been 100 % commission ever since then. And what ended up happening was within about two years, we were actually running that company and growing it. And within 18 months, we actually made it the second largest real estate auction company in the nation.

and we were taking a lot of the business away from our previous employers. And from there, it was great opportunity for us. I knew the backend, the operation side, the closing side, inside and out, but I didn’t really know the front end, the sales, the marketing and all that. ⁓ And it was a great synergy with my business partner that that’s what he had, but we also were able to learn off one another off that. ⁓ Cut to…

A few years later, that company was sold. And we were at that time already investing in real estate ourselves, buying multifamily property, single family flips, as well as multifamily long-term holds. ⁓ And we’re buying throughout Los Angeles, ⁓ either via auction or finding properties at the time that we liked, and then we’d buy them. ⁓ what was at the…

we were thinking, well, you what we’re going to do is just focus on the investment side. And we had an idea for ⁓ a socially responsible real estate investment company that actually was probably the first of its kind. First ever, this is before the term socially responsible investments actually was coined. ⁓ And we just came to a, had the idea, my business partner actually had the idea, but I was helped in refining it to make sure that we could actually run the model ⁓ and realizing

at that time that with the buildings that we own, we couldn’t really institute that model in it. They were too small. We started selling those and buying bigger buildings where we’d have the synergies of scale to be able to run that business model. we were then approached by a gentleman who wanted to start a commercial real estate division. And at his, was the largest residential real estate company in LA at the time. And…

He knew our previous mentor that we started the other company with and he mentioned to him that he wanted to start a commercial real estate division. He actually was told, I guess, that if you want two guys to do it, here are your two guys. He approached us. ⁓

We actually turned him down a few times, said, no, we’re going to focus on our investments. And he said, well, what’s so great about your investment? We actually mentioned it to him. And he fell in love with the idea and the concept. And he made us ⁓ all of the Godfather, an offer we couldn’t refuse. You know, where he came in as one of the strong, one of our initial investors in that company, put us in contact with a lot of investors. We had free office space use in exchange, we helped build him the commercial real estate company.

⁓ Cut to seven years later, that company is sold to Sotheby’s, NRT-owned.

And they weren’t allowed to do commercial real estate. They’re actually licensed at that time. The name is licensed by Sotheby’s, by NRT for residential real estate. They could do multifamily, but not straight commercial at that time. And so we got notice on December 9th that we were shutting down December 31st. at first again, our initial response was, okay, we have all these investments that we’ve been working on. We’re just going to focus on that. ⁓

And I still remember when we got the news, were skiing up in Mammoth and we were actually skiing with some of the agents that we had recruited, brought on board for the commercial real estate company. Cause you know, we believe in having that culture and family kind of atmosphere where not only do we, you know, if I’m spending so much time at work, as I used to say and explain, ⁓ I have a teenage daughter at home. I don’t need any more drama in my life. So the agents in the office better be like-minded and get along. ⁓

So, know, cut to lunchtime, my business partner and I looked at each other and said, well, what about all these agents we recruited and trusted us? What are we going to do with them? So, you know, I started making some calls. I was able to put them in contact with some companies that would take them on. But then a group of them came to us and said, if you start your company, we’ll come with you. Not initially what we were thinking about doing or wanting to do, but we decided, you know what?

They trust us, we’re going to trust them, let’s do this. But if we’re going to do it, we’re going to do it right.

Meaning, ⁓ commercial brokers are international. The initials, which you see above me, initially started off, the initials were client’s best interest. Because we felt that most commercial brokers didn’t necessarily have the client’s best interest in mind at that time. So we made sure that we set certain rules that all of our agents would abide by. That if they’re going to work with us, they’re going to do business alongside us, whether it’s on ⁓ the investment side.

the raising capital side or brokerage side, ⁓ then they’re going to abide by these rules, which is ultimately, ⁓ I mean, I can sum it down to one very simple one. ⁓ And, you know, it’s the golden rule. You know, what we’re taught in kindergarten. You know, one of my favorite books at that time and still, you know, everything I ever needed to learn, I know I learned in kindergarten. And that’s basically treat others like you want to be treated. And, you know, so we started that whole concept.

and

do that and that was in 2005. You know, we’ve grown since then. We have 21 agents. We keep our investments. We’ve repositioned our investments. At one point we had a portfolio of about 600 units in Los Angeles and Texas. We had an office in Texas for investments and you know, but also we’re always looking to evolve with the changing times. So that’s kind of the long story of how I got started and where this company came about.

where we were so yeah.

Scott Bursey (13:10)
That is an incredible

story. Do unto others how you would want done to you. That is fantastic. George, you’ve overseen over 2.5 billion in transactions across nearly four decades. As the market becomes more data driven and automated, what is one human element in commercial real estate that a computer still can’t calculate?

but that often makes or breaks an investment.

George Pino (13:40)
Relationships. You know, people forget that this is ultimately a relationship business. I mean, our best deals were deals that people have given us ⁓ or come to us that knew us.

you know, that gave us a first look because they knew we could perform. Whether it was with a client of mine that I had or whether it was myself that was looking to purchase. ⁓ It was those deals, know, it’s those relationships, understanding what’s coming to market, having that inside look, ⁓ knowing where to go, ⁓ not having to fight about debt or working on that because they know that might with the past track record in history, that’s never going to be faced by computers. But at the same time, I think that people who are an embracing

right now are going to be left behind.

Scott Bursey (14:23)
That’s such a key distinction. It sounds like in your world, George, the yield on the property is only half the story. The other half is the integrity. The integrity of the partnership behind the asset. In a high tech market, that rationale equity seems to be the only thing that doesn’t depreciate.

George Pino (14:31)
Absolutely.

Yeah, no, I mean, it’s the one thing that can’t be replaced.

Yes, they are getting, AI is getting to the point now where they are creating relationships, so to speak, but they’re not real relationships. And, you know, it’s that, it’s literally that touch, that feel, and ⁓ being able to go out there and create those and have those. you know, from that, I’ve been lucky enough to create and make lifelong friends through a lot of my business. I met my wife through business. ⁓ You know, so…

It’s just that that’s never going to be replaced by AI.

Scott Bursey (15:21)
Point well taken. In a market that is currently so uncertain, has your gut feeling on a partnership ever caused you to walk away from a deal that George looked perfect on paper?

George Pino (16:14)
Absolutely. ⁓ mean, but usually, mean, what looks perfect on paper usually isn’t. And what’s interesting is some of the best deals that we make are the ones that don’t look that great, but it’s our gut and our understanding of the market and human nature and human trends that make it great.

⁓ so a lot of like, for instance, the investments that I, I, I do with, whether with clients or with myself, they’re focused on, ⁓ the, or, or as I like to say, if the way I do brokerage is the same way I do my investments, I’m geographically agnostic, but extremely location driven. So if the location is extremely strong and it’s going to remain strong for whatever reasons, ⁓

I’m all in and it doesn’t, I don’t care if it’s a corporate tenant lease or whatever else, if I have the opportunity to reposition it. So, you know, going into a strong location, finding those properties that, ⁓ regardless of whether or not the tenant is there, it’s going to maintain its value because of the location itself. ⁓ for, you know, one that I sold to one of my clients that, I was,

In a 1031 exchange, just bought one myself, bought a Chase Bank myself. This came up right after I was already in escrow and went hard. But this was a Chase Bank that was, ⁓ it’s kitty corner to the Dallas Cowboy Stadium. If you cross the street, you’re in the main Dallas Cowboy Stadium parking lot. That’s a location that’s never gonna go away. It’s gonna be highly in demand. The best case scenario is if that tenant were to leave.

So that’s what I look for. It may look like paper, but it’s more the feel, the understanding of the location, understanding of the demographics, and understanding of human nature of what is gonna always maintain appeal.

Scott Bursey (18:04)
And that.

That is some powerful insight. George, it confirms that at your level, that gut feel isn’t just a hunch. It’s actually high speed pattern recognition developed over billions of dollars in deals. You’re sensing the friction be… Yeah, I mean, you’re…

George Pino (18:28)
Yeah. Yeah. No, absolutely.

Well, here’s

how I like to explain it. A lot of it’s, it’s, there’s the science, which is all the data. And that can look great. It can look, you know, how it can look great on paper, but at the same time, there’s an art.

to being able to figure out what is nice. For instance, it’s no different than I love to cook, right? So I can give you a recipe. That’s all your data. That recipe’s all in front. It’s the exact same recipe or exact same ingredients. However, what you put out and what I put out are gonna be completely different versus also a Michelin star chef and what he puts out. It’s gonna look completely different and probably taste different. ⁓

that’s the art. It’s taking that, whether it’s that or painters. Lord knows I can’t paint. ⁓ But I can have a palette of colors and all the brushes in the world. You put me up against somebody who has…

that ability to paint, it’s going to look a lot different. So that’s the art of the actual real estate deal. We have all the data. The data is the paint. But the person making the decision is the artist.

Scott Bursey (19:49)
That is great illustration. You can’t paint you say, but that was painted very nicely. George Curious, looking at the current economic climate, what is the one asset class in commercial real estate that you think is being dangerously overlooked right now?

George Pino (20:06)
You know, ultimately, think right now, multifamilies probably, and you know, everyone is saying this, is actually something to look into. You know, people are going to rent, I think with the current economy, you’re going to see more renters out there. The cost and affordability of housing is just going up, especially with, you know, because even if they bring debt down, you have other issues, the labor, the materials, all those costs are going up dramatically, and the cost of construction is going up dramatically. So,

if you can actually find that, I think is something that people are a little, because of what’s been happening in the marketplace, they’re not as, it’s not as shiny. But also, that being said, most of my, or not, I should say most, all my investments now are in single tenant net lease. ⁓

So, you know, I do like single tenant net lease. And I think that a lot of people overlook it because they don’t understand it. ⁓ And I think that’s the biggest thing. I mean, there’s the great truth in single tenant net lease that

the value of the property goes down every year that the lease goes down. Well, what they don’t tell you though is that you don’t sell it with two years or three years on the lease, you can reposition it. I’ve repositioned properties that we’ve ended up selling with two or three years remaining on the lease by even lowering the rental amount to get a long-term lease signed and get more money.

than what I paid for it because of that, even though the rent amount’s lower. You know, so it’s playing that cap rate game, understanding what’s going on and understanding that need.

Scott Bursey (21:38)
I love that. You’re not only building a brokerage, you’re building a brain trust. It’s clear that your true ROI isn’t just in the 2.5 billion in deals, George, but it’s the caliber of the leaders you’re leaving behind. George.

George Pino (21:53)
Yeah,

I, that’s actually one thing I love. I give training classes every single day for newer agents and intermediate level agents at 830 in the morning. I love doing that. think education’s, I used to all want to be a teacher. Bless their hearts, but then I had, I realized I had no patience to be a teacher.

Scott Bursey (22:11)
I’ve got to know, your firm is known for its client first boutique approach. How do you scale that intimate client experience when you’re managing billions of dollars in transactions?

George Pino (22:25)
Well, I mean, to scale it, what we’ve done is actually number one, it’s a company culture.

number one, but number two, and you know, this happened, ⁓ we had been bringing in a lot of international and national clients, but during their expansion out of our area, our geographic area, we found that, you know, we were losing a lot of them, because we weren’t able to service them. So my business partner created, you know, I had an idea in during COVID, it sat for a few years, ⁓ and decided to create a

actually maintain control and created ourselves an affiliate network. It’s called the Commercial Real Estate Affiliate Network, CRE Affiliate Network. And we handpicked and chose and went after like-minded companies that

had that same kind of client first approach mentality, but also that helpful approach. ⁓ Meaning, you know, back in the old days, you knew who the good brokers were, you knew who the bad ones were, and you knew who the good shops were and the bad shops were. In fact, know, ⁓ if you wanted to, way back in the day, if you wanted to…

tell somebody that somebody wasn’t trustworthy, you’d say, oh, they have a blank, blank mentality, you know, naming a company. And you’re like, okay, tells me everything I need to know about them. So we look for people that was exact or companies that were kind of in our same niche, but also had that same mentality of being open, honest, transparent. And so we created that we now have 37 affiliates around the world. But

because of that, you know, for instance,

We’re able to sign up one of our clients. ⁓ We’re representing ⁓ multiple national and international companies now. We went up on a bid against ⁓ all the larger firms, ⁓ the CBRE, JLL, Colliers, ⁓ for a company that was based out of China, that was actually owned by a German company, but based in China. ⁓ they’re looking to actually, they’re online retailers looking to expand on a national scale.

everybody a job and that was ⁓ tell us where we should go in these markets in these sub markets and we’re able to actually turn that around in about 72 hours every other the large companies took two to three weeks we won the award to represent them

because we’re all also the same information because we had boots on the ground, we had people there. And it was literally just reaching out to them and asking them for it. They weren’t looking for something in return or anything else other than the knowledge that if we do sign them up, you’re gonna represent them in your market as well. ⁓ But they dropped what they were doing and got us the information all within 72 hours. So it’s finding that, that’s how you scale. You find like-minded people that wanna do and grow business like you do.

Scott Bursey (25:22)
And once again, do unto others like you would like done to you is the message that I’m getting from you, George.

George Pino (25:29)
Essentially, yeah, I mean, we’ve done that all along and we have a holding company Pono asset management ⁓ over here ⁓ Pono is a Hawaiian word. There’s no direct English translation, but essentially it means to do the right thing So everything we do is trying to do the right thing, you know And in some cases the right thing has cost us money. We’ve taken losses because of that, but it was what we you know ⁓ growing up ⁓ my business partners from a small town in Nebraska of

When I say town, I think it’s legally classified as a village by the Census Bureau, ⁓ 281 people. ⁓ And I grew up in military bases, which are essentially small towns. And both, both of our parents said essentially the same thing. And that was, you my dad used to say, ⁓ do what you say, say what you do, do what you say. And his dad used to essentially tell him, you could do a thousand things right.

But if you do one thing wrong, that’s your reputation. So, you know, that’s our mindset. It’s what we do, our handshake is our word. If we say we’re gonna do something, then we’re damn well gonna do it.

Scott Bursey (26:37)
And what great principles and look at where the level that it’s reached you. George, you focus your entire career on building long-term wealth and managing billion dollar portfolios. For our audience who is ready to move beyond the single deal hustle and build a truly lasting, scalable real estate enterprise. What is the single biggest shift they need to make in their business model today, in your opinion?

George Pino (27:04)
not a business model shift, it’s a mental shift. And actually, I just wrote a white paper that’s going to be out on my blog today about this, surprisingly. I mean, I didn’t know the question, but I did. And the biggest shift is understanding why you bought that property. You bought it as an investment. OK? So.

as an investment you should be looking at it at least biannually if not annually and determining whether or not that investment is number one giving you the right return or your expected returns and number two is there another better investment that you could make even if you sell it at a loss.

If the answer is yes, you should sell it and buy the other investment. We take advantage of the tax laws that we have in place. You can 1031 exchange it. ⁓ Just don’t do it on an annual basis, because now it turns into short-term gain. ⁓ But I always tell people when they call me up, I get calls all the time on properties that we own, and they ask, would you sell it? And I say, absolutely, I’ll sell it.

You know, I’ll sell any property at any time. I’m not tied to it as long as it meets my goals and what I’m trying to achieve. I’ll even sell a property at a loss if I have another property I can exchange into that’s going to give me a better return or better opportunity.

Scott Bursey (28:26)
That is the fundamental shift from simply being a deal operator to becoming a true enterprise architect. Thank you for painting that picture.

George, we must know, what’s one piece of advice you can share with our listeners?

George Pino (28:40)
You know, I think ultimately, this sounds a little crazy, but you know, I think that the best advice I had is make sure that you have, you know, work hard, play hard, but make sure you make time for your family and everything else, you know, that you have that’s going out there that you can spend that time. You know, I’ve been lucky enough that ⁓

You know, when I was younger, I put a lot of hours in. mean, when we’re doing that, we’re starting that real estate auction company and the… ⁓

when we’re starting that to get to number two in a year and a half, I was working 18 hour, 20 hour days, literally. I mean, we would take naps in our office. ⁓ Our assistant would walk into the office and the lights, we’d be blacked out and literally they’d walk over us to get to the files or whatever else. And I, I’m taking a nap. But that afforded me the opportunity that, you know, as when I had kids,

and started growing and they started growing up, it afforded me the opportunity to not miss any time with them. ⁓ So I think the sacrifices that what I would advise is that the sacrifices that you make early on will pay dividends off down the road. So whether it’s in time, mean, ultimately what we’re doing, what I do and I look at this for, it’s not to gather wealth, it’s really buying time.

and using the money that you have to buy time, whether it’s hiring somebody to do some of the work, yard work or whatever. happen to like yard work, so I do it all myself. ⁓ But, you know, cleaning the pool, I’m not going to do that. The wealth or the creation of money is to actually buy time for you so that you can spend it wisely with your loved ones. And that’s what I’d recommend.

Scott Bursey (30:31)
Incredibly well said. It’s a reminder that we aren’t just in the business of moving buildings. We’re in the business of building people who move with them and spending that time with those people. George, thank you for showing us what a 2.5 billion legacy looks like.

George Pino (30:48)
I don’t know about legacy, I’m glad to be on the channel here.

Scott Bursey (30:53)
For our listeners who want to follow your work or connect with you, George, or learn more about your insights, what’s the best way for them to reach out?

George Pino (31:01)
You know, I actually am a little bit more old school. ⁓

you can reach out to me direct line. always return calls within four business hours, regardless of who it is. That’s GPino@CB or 310-943-8536, or you can always email me at ⁓ [email protected] That’s usually the fastest, easiest way to get ahold of me. And I’m happy to give advice. think that, like I said, we’ve been fortunate and lucky to have great mentors and people that would actually help us, ⁓

We didn’t have an issue when we got started. I mean, I think my business partner’s first education in real estate was, what do I do? And the guy dropped the yellow pages for all you that are old enough to know what a yellow page is. And all he said was, call everybody. That was his whole education. So a lot of what we do is try and give back to the community by education. You know, we’ve made a lot of mistakes. I’m happy to share those mistakes so that people can learn from them and not make the same mistakes.

Scott Bursey (32:03)
George, it was an honor. Thank you.

George Pino (32:05)
Thank you for having me, Scott.

Scott Bursey (32:06)
And thank you to all of our listeners for tuning in. If you found value in today’s episode, please make sure you’re subscribed. Until next time, keep your standards high and your vision clear. We’ll see you on the next episode, everyone.