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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, Micah Johnson interviews Anthony Halligan, a rising star in commercial real estate. Anthony shares his journey from a disciplined upbringing to becoming a successful investor in upstate New York. He emphasizes the importance of building a strong team with diverse skill sets and innovative strategies for sourcing properties. The conversation highlights the significance of due diligence, tenant relationships, and ambitious growth goals as Anthony aims to expand his business nationally.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Anthony Halligan (00:00)
So a traditional investor will hop on the market, right? I’m sure we are all familiar with Crexi, LoopNet, Zillow, all of those major marketing platforms with every possible listing that we know is a hot lead, right? How we have attempted to and successfullyflip the script so far is to invert that process. Instead of approaching the listings and trying to find a good deal on the front end, we’ve approached the tenants. We’ve approached multi-billion dollar national companies and their real estate departments to try to understand what they are looking for in any given market.
Micah Johnson (02:12)
Hey everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Micah Johnson. And today I’m speaking with Anthony Halligan, who’s been making some serious moves in the commercial real estate space. Anthony, welcome in man, glad to have you.Anthony Halligan (02:24)
Hi, Micah. Thank you so much. I appreciate you having me on the podcast.Micah Johnson (02:29)
Yeah, absolutely. I’m excited for our talk today. I think our listeners are going to take something away from how you and your team have approached how you do commercial real estate and your way to find that edge to be successful. So excited to dig in on that. For people who may not know you yet, let us know what’s your main focus right now and what markets do you operate in?Anthony Halligan (02:51)
Yeah, so we operate out of upstate New York. So we’re local here in Syracuse. Our primary focus is on the commercial real estate. So we invest a little bit in industrial and then also in retail. We also own a couple short term rentals. ⁓ That’s really a ⁓ side piece to the business. But upstate New York, we love it. It’s snowy. It’s a whole lot of fun sometimes. Not today, but hey, for the most part, sometimes it’s fun up here.Micah Johnson (03:21)
I heard that man. Well, I’ve never made it to upstate New York yet. It’s on my list. I want to go see it. So take us back a little bit. What led you to real commercial real estate? How did you end up in this business? And tell me a little about the team you work with.Anthony Halligan (03:36)
Sure. So I guess taking it back way back in 1999, I was born one of 15 kids. So I learned from a very young age, a severe discipline. My mother was a drill sergeant in the nicest way possible to say that. I learned leadership management skills from her. All of my siblings, exception of one, are younger than me. So I always had to be that figure.Micah Johnson (03:53)
youAnthony Halligan (04:05)
management or leadership. People ask me do I have management experience I say absolutely I’m 26 years old but I have 26 years of it right so so it really started there and then you know fast forward to three years ago four years ago my brother and I signed on with an industrial real estate developer here in Syracuse they’re a nationwide companyThey had $40 million worth of commercial real estate when we signed on. We were acquisitions officers and helped that company obtain over $160 million of additional real estate. So learning from them and their processes, there were certain aspects of their processes that we did not care for. Certainly a lot to learn from and a lot of talent incorporated into that, that we were able to pick up. And we decided
Micah Johnson (04:48)
Mmm.Anthony Halligan (05:03)
Well, to heck with this, if we’re making them millions, let’s go find a way to do that ourselves. So we’ve formed a partnership with two other individuals and here we are today.Micah Johnson (05:10)
Gotcha.Well, that was something we talked about pre-recording. It’s not just a particular set of partnership that you built. Like, yo, each bring unique skillsets to make sure you’re successful in doing this. How important was that in getting this endeavor started?
Anthony Halligan (06:03)
One, two,Yeah, so I actually tell a lot of people this, that I believe any business hinges on the people that are in those leadership positions and also hinges on the people that own the company. And me personally, I don’t believe that I could take down what we’ve successfully done so far myself. I actually know that. I know that for a fact. There are so many missing gaps in my skill set. So the four core people that we have, ⁓
One was the money guy, right? The guy with the funds that came to the table with money from the beginning. He’s also a finance guru. He was a top producer for JP Morgan for a while. So very happy that we were able to get him within our circle. ⁓ Two would be the relationship guy. He owns an insurance company and he has connections with a wealth of individuals, especially here locally, a wealth of companies, right? So we have
construction connections, we have connections with tenants, which is, I’ll go into that later, but the tenant relationship is certainly the most valuable. ⁓ One is a licensed broker, that’s my brother. I love working with him, but he’s a licensed broker. He has a pulse on the market. He’s constantly checking the market, checking the listings, the lease listings, ⁓ how we compare and contrast with the market. And then of course myself and… ⁓
What I like to say that I bring to the table, although maybe not ⁓ as an expert, is the hospitality side of things. I like to look out for our tenants, make sure they’re well taken care of, make sure that our guests on our Airbnbs are fully satisfied, five-star reviews all around. That’s ultimately my goal. And the reason why I do that is because I want long-term relationships with these people.
I want returning guests to my Airbnb and I want long-term relationships with my tenants so that they stay in our building forever, at least for my lifetime. And we have that asset stabilized ⁓ continuously.
Micah Johnson (08:20)
Absolutely, man. we all know, and if you don’t knowyet, learning how to get more from the same customer is the best way. New customers, they’re most expensive to go find. So it’s key to build those long-lasting relationships, which has actually led into a unique way that y’all source properties we shortly discussed. I’m excited to dig into. So y’all, created your commercial real estate company. You’re looking for these assets.
What is that way that you’re actually targeting them and going about finding the right properties to buy?
Anthony Halligan (08:57)
Yeah, Mike, a great question. ⁓ I love this. And I’d love to share with the audience here how we do this.So a traditional investor will hop on the market, right? I’m sure we are all familiar with Crexi, LoopNet, Zillow, all of those major marketing platforms with every possible listing that we know is a hot lead, right? So a traditional investor will do that. How we have attempted to and successfully
flip the script so far is to invert that process. Instead of approaching the listings and trying to find a good deal on the front end, we’ve approached the tenants. We’ve approached multi-billion dollar national companies and their real estate departments to try to understand what they are looking for in any given market.
So that’s allowed us to essentially ⁓ procure an investment. We’re the investor, we buy the property.
Micah Johnson (09:48)
Mmm.Anthony Halligan (09:55)
and it’s stabilized on day one, if that makes sense. ⁓Micah Johnson (09:58)
It does, it does. And that’s a big thing forinvestors is how quick can you get something to cashflow, right? A lot of folks buy businesses for that reason. They want cashflow that next day. And what you’re talking about is along that same vein where I already know who’s going to be in it. I went and found what they wanted, what they’re looking for first. So that when I’m going out looking for the property, I’m not just clicking on each listing to try to figure out, know, is this one I want? Is this one I don’t want? I know going in.
that this is what I’m looking for, which when you know what you’re looking for, it’s way easier to find.
Anthony Halligan (11:10)
Absolutely. And Micah, just to throw it out there as well, 100 % of the properties that we have closed on to date have not been on the market. So how we approach it traditionally is those tenants have been looking on the market. They’ve been seeing all of those listings out there. And we’re not afraid, we’re young and hungry. We’re not afraid to pick up the phone, to dial the numbers.find those property owners and simply ask the question, are you willing to sell? It’s a very simple pitch. You’re not selling a product. You’re not selling a service. You are asking them, are you interested in selling your property? And more times than not, since we have flipped the script and we have a tenant who’s willing to pay us a premium for finding them an option, we’re now able to offer those property owners ⁓ a dollar amount that they’re more than satisfied with.
It could be slightly above market. It could be at market rate, could be a quick sale. We can get creative on it. But because of the system that we’ve created, we’re able to not low bulb these property owners and really come in on the front end with a value that makes sense to them and to us with the tenant that we carry in.
Micah Johnson (12:24)
man, that’s next level. Again, like you’re going in with all the tools thatyou need and those property owners get pounded all the time. There’s somebody calling them. It’s not as if y’all are the only ones. So when you’re able to come in there and sound different, show up different, it’s really a stark contrast to what they’re used to, which is low balling, someone feeling like they’re trying to take what they have, because commercial is its own animal.
Right? Like single family residential is full of getting it as deep as a discount as possible, which that exists in commercial, but it’s a whole different game when you start getting up there.
Anthony Halligan (13:01)
Absolutely. And yeah, I’ve seen that myself. We come on those phone calls, we portray a very real buyer with a very real need. You know, we’re conveying to them with as much transparency as possible, not disclosing who our tenant is, but conveying to them that we have an absolute necessity to close on a property in this market. And when we do that, it opens up their eyes to theyou know, the option of actually selling that property. And of course, the next step is simply convincing them to look at an offer. And most, you know, most property owners have a price in mind that they would sell. And more often than not, they have a pulse on the market as well. So it really, it really is not a hard pitch and it allows us to flip the script. We’ve got both angles working for us. And so far it’s been ultra successful.
Micah Johnson (13:56)
love how it creates you as a legitimate buyer. And that’s something that you have to overcome quick in the industry. Is this a real person? Is this credible? Are they actually gonna get the deal done? A lot of people sign contracts, but not everybody can get that deal done. So when you’re able to show up there with that, I have this, I need to buy this. This is gonna be either your building or somebody else’s building, but it’s going to be bought.that creates an urgency and then a credibility to, okay, this is real. can actually, so that seller that maybe they weren’t thinking super seriously about selling until they heard that right message. Cause I don’t remember what the statistics used to be and these may be completely made up. But when I was getting into sales, was like 3 % of people are always going to, they got their money out. They’re ready to buy. 7 % of people, if they hear the right message, they’ll buy. About 30 %
Anthony Halligan (14:43)
Right, right.Micah Johnson (14:48)
They’re on the fence. They really need to understand. And then 60 % you’re not gonna do. They’re just not ready yet. But the money lives in that 37 % that if you got the right message, everybody gets the ones that have their money out or just ready to get rid of it. But the other ones where you can establish that credibility, build that relationship the right way, and then shift them into the mindset of, I can actually do this now. This can be a today thing where…We can, you honey, was thinking about selling the property for years, but now we actually have this lined up. Man, you opened their life back up to them. That’s powerful.
Anthony Halligan (16:03)
Absolutely. And we have a rigorous due diligence process and we do it on the front end. So 90 % I always tell these property owners, 90 % of our due diligence we do before we even send you an offer. And what I mean by that is we will always look at the property. We’re going to come tour it. We’re going to walk our tenant, our prospective tenant through the property to verify that it is something that they are interested in, that the location works.that the layout of the property itself works, that the parking works, every possible aspect that they could be considering. And those two main things were 90 % there, right? We’re going to actually contact our banks as well and make sure that the banks are on board with, here’s the lease structure that we’re going to put in this building. You know, here’s the tenant that we’re going to put in this building. Here’s the construction that we plan on doing. Make sure that we have a good, soft feeling from our bank as well.
So conveying that message to these property owners that we are so real, ⁓ our tenants on board, our construction companies on board, our banks on board. Now let’s go to moving on to signing a contract, right?
Micah Johnson (17:13)
Right. Now you’re down to a number which has already been predetermined. Y’all know what you can do. So there’s not like this anxiety about it. And then it’s simply do you want to or not? And that’s in my opinion, that’s how to do a real estate deal. How many things can you take care of upfront as a professional to especially in a competitive market? Those are the edges that you need to have to get the deals that you’re after because 2025 was a pretty good year for y’all. What was it about 8 million in assets you said you put under?Anthony Halligan (17:44)
Yeah, so our first year in business is actually about eight months since our first transaction that actually went to the closing table. So in about eight months, we did $8 million worth of transactions ⁓ this first year.Micah Johnson (17:59)
Excellent man. So what are y’all excited about for 2026? What’s the big opportunity that y’all are looking for?Anthony Halligan (18:05)
Yeah, so 2026, I’m real excited about it. So looking into 2026, we want to strengthen the relationships with our tenants that we’ve already successfully executed transactions with. That’s the primary goal, right, is to strengthen those transactions. With that strengthening of that bond and that relationship, we can then exponentially grow.because now they trust us, now they believe in us, they’ve seen our ability, they’ve seen our capabilities of executing on these requirements. And we’ve already seen it. They’re sending us more requirements. They’re sending us markets outside of upstate New York. We’re working in Missouri. We’re actually working in Texas, believe it or not. So we’re working in these markets that they’re not overly familiar with, we’re not overly familiar with, but all it takes is a phone call. It’s the same process. ⁓
the property owners, we asked them if they’d be interested in selling. It’s the same exact process. And they know that we’re able to execute. So our ultimate goal is to 2X our business. We’re looking to hit 16 million in assets, well, in additional assets this upcoming year in 2026, which would effectively land us around the $24 million portfolio valuation. ⁓ And we’re looking to 2X the year after. So every year over year, we want a 2X.
And I think it’s more than possible with the system that we have in place. ⁓
Micah Johnson (19:35)
Itdoes. There’s so much power, especially when you have to start leaving your backyard. But when you’re leaving your backyard with your tenant already in place and all these other little pieces there, it makes, again, choosing what you’re looking for just that much simpler.
Anthony Halligan (19:51)
Absolutely. I mean, the process itself is a process that works in any market. That’s what I love about what we’ve created. The companies that we chase to work for and the tenants that go in our building, they’re national companies. And the reason why we do that is because it opens that world for us to become a national company. If we are strictly in upstate New York, we might work with the Ma and Pop shops. We might work withMicah Johnson (20:00)
Mm.Anthony Halligan (20:19)
the local franchises, the people that are trying to expand here locally. We’re not interested in that. We’re interested in expanding nationwide. So those core relationships that we have with those tenants, that’s our ticket to that. And so far, it’s proving to be true. We have requirements in multiple states. We have contracts out in multiple states. And we’re discussing ⁓ transactions with property owners right now.in multiple states. a beautiful thing and that’s how we’re going to grow in 2026. We’re going to expand not just in our backyard, we’re going to expand across the country.
Micah Johnson (20:58)
think a powerful point that you made there that I want the listeners to look at is y’all know what you’re trying to do. You know, you just said it. We want to be national. And that idea is what led you to, if we want to be national, we need these, okay? And it’s the whole concept of just inverting. When you know what you want to do, now we can backdoor how to get there. It shows you exactly where you are today.Anthony Halligan (20:59)
It’s now.Micah Johnson (21:26)
I call them ADLs, your activities of daily living. What is it that you need to do today? Because you got to do that to get to where you’re ultimately going, but it’s not made up. It’s like business planning. That’s what they do. Where are you now? Or where are you trying to get to? Where are you now? Here’s the steps from back during those steps.Eliminates anxiety, again, that’s a big thing in entrepreneurship world. There’s already enough of it. How many processes can you make redundant? Like you said, if I know my process works everywhere, now that eliminates this many problems that I don’t have to deal with anymore. And now I can focus and keep doing that thing over and over, because what the best I’ve learned, the guys have done this and girls have done this for 40, 50 years, it’s the boring part.
They’ve done the boring part over and over and over again. And that’s what creates the wealth. But they all went through this phase upfront of what’s my boring part going to be? What is that thing that I’m going to figure out that I’m just going to start repeating? And y’all are on a great track for that. So that’s awesome. So you’re buying in multiple States. You’ve got a process that’s working nationwide. That’s where you’re on your mission to
If there are listeners out there that want to learn more about you or find out how they can maybe be involved, what’s the best way to find you?
Anthony Halligan (22:45)
So the best way would be via our website, ⁓ has information about each individual partner, including myself. And that is at www.decidedacquisitions.com. That website will show you ⁓ our portfolio. It’ll also show you information regarding each one of us, our individuals. It’ll give youlinks to my LinkedIn account. ⁓ I’m very active on LinkedIn. love talking to people, following people, watching their journeys and sharing mine as well. ⁓ And you can contact any one of us through that website for our expertise. ⁓
Micah Johnson (23:30)
Excellent. And for those, we’ll make sure that that linkis in the show notes so that you can check it out. Anything. I appreciate you being here today, man. Thanks for sharing your time, your story, your perspective with us. I love hearing about folks out there, hard charging, finding a way to get it done and bring that dream to life that they have, putting the team together, finding that tenant, man. I love the way you’re going about it. So thanks for sharing that with us. Feel like our listeners definitely got some value. And if you did,
Please make sure you like today’s episode. Share it with someone you think could benefit from it. Don’t forget to subscribe to our podcast. We’ve got more conversations coming up with operators, just like Anthony, that are out there building real businesses. Thanks for joining us. We’ll see you in the next episode.
