The latest episode of the AZ Big Podcast with Michael & Amy has officially dropped. Episode 19 guest M. Brennan Ray from Burch & Cracchiolo talks about how the real estate sector has a demand for attorneys in the Arizona market and reveals an interesting history his family has in the Valley.
LISTEN TO THE PODCAST: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1TdMyZR2yUlwZeyPBYkbMF?si=K6tr5rxYStq055o3TRIi1Q
Listen to more of the AZ Big Podcast here.
Podcast Transcript:
Michael Gossie
Welcome to the AZ Big Podcast sponsored by Burch and Cracchiolo. I'm Michael Gossie, editor in chief at AZ Big Media, and I'm joined by my co-host Amy Lindsey, our publisher. Today, we are joined in the studio by Brennan Ray, shareholder at Burch & Cracchiolo. Brennan, thank you so much for being here today.
Brennan Ray
Thank you, Michael, Amy, good morning, it's a pleasure to be here.
Amy Lindsey
Thank you. All right, Brennan, let's start off. You have a long-standing history, family history in Arizona. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your family background?
Brennan Ray
Sure. Happy to do so. So, my family, the Ray family has been primarily in the Southeast Valley probably since the mid to late 1800s. My father, James Wilford, my father, my great grandfather James Wilford Ray, came here to the valley and settled and had property out near where Chandler-Gilbert Community College is today. That's where the family farm is, and fortunate enough to have continued to live in Chandler in the Southeast Valley since that time frame.
Michael Gossie
So, it's weird for you when you drive on Ray Road, and it's named after your family.
Brennan Ray
It's a little weird, you know, it's something that we've been used to since, you know obviously, I was a kid. But, it's pretty special. My family enjoys a rich heritage in Chandler, at Chandler High in particular. When I've got two older kids when they graduated recently, they were 4th generation raised to go through Chandler High.
Amy Lindsey
Oh, that's fantastic.
Michael Gossie
That's great. And Brennan you have a sports background. Can, can and… I'm always intrigued by people who find success in business after having a successful sports career. Can you tell? Us a little bit about how sports has impacted your law practice or impacted your professional career?
Brennan Ray
Yeah. So, I grew up playing all kinds of sports in high school and ended up playing basketball in college and the thing that I learned about sports is that it's life. You learn how to work together with people. You learn how to overcome challenges. You may even have a teammate or two that you might not see eye to eye with, but you have a common goal at the end of the day, which is to win a game. And so, through all that, through the hard work that it takes to be successful in sports, have direct application to what I do as an attorney.
Especially in zoning land use a lot of what I do. I have to deal with neighbors, Elected’s and various other groups of people that may not see eye to eye on what I or my client wants to get accomplished. And so, it takes a lot of problem-solving, no different than I'd problem solve or strategize to win a game and get along with teammates. And stuff like that.
Michael Gossie
So, you said we were talking a little bit earlier and you said you're kind of a defensive specialist in basketball. How does that mindset help you in your, in your law practice?
Brennan Ray
So, one of the things that being a defensive specialist does is you have to be able to adapt on the fly. You don't know if you're going to guard someone who's a point guard who's fast or a big man down low, so you have to be able to be quick on your feet, no pun intended, and to be able to adapt the circumstances. When we're having public meetings with neighbors, sometimes they get a little emotional, a little passionate about what they feel. And I have to be able to adapt accordingly. Same thing if we're in a public hearing. In front of a City Council, Board of Supervisors. Have to be able to be able to pivot rather quickly to make sure that what our client wants we're able to get and answer the questions that come our way.
Amy Lindsey
So, talk about adapting. How would you describe what's going on in Arizona's real estate sector right now?
Brennan Ray
So that's a great question. The real estate sector right now is off the chart. It is just incredible. I was visiting with a paralegal who's been with us for over 40 years and as we were talking about things, this is as busy a real estate cycle as there's ever been and that. Floods leading up to the great crash in 2007, 2008. It is just gangbusters. One of the things that we see within the industry is a real need for a lot of industrial buildings. With COVID, with the shutdown, a lot of people want to onshore. Bring things back here to the States and manufacturing and industrial is huge. The other aspect that we see that is just taking off is the residential market, in particular multifamily. There is a housing crisis shortage in the valley and then we start to talk about affordability and what our kids and grandkids can afford and we start to see those challenges and it's the age-old economics of supply and demand. If we have more supply, then we're able to meet the demand.
Michael Gossie
Brennan, we have a million questions for you, but before we get to them, I have to say the attorneys at Burch & Cracchiolo have been proving for more than 50 years that a successful business or legal case of any kind starts when you hire the right lawyer, Brennan's probably your guy. Let them prove it to you. Learn more bcattorneys.com. That's bcattorneys.com. So, you’re a southeast valley guy. But things seem to be kind of exploding all over the valley. Do you see any hot spots that we should be watching in the future?
Brennan Ray
Yeah, that's a great question. In terms of hot spots, if it's a vacant piece of dirt, it's probably hot and that's. Just that's just kind of the way it's going. These days, I know the West Valley is poised to do real well when the 303 came along a number of years ago, it really opened things up on that west side for jobs to bring in some manufacturing jobs. Big, recognizable names as you drive up and down the 303 you see that, but then there's also the need for housing out there. And so, the west side is really poised to take off. You look at Buckeye even further to the West and all of the available land that they've got. And so, it's going to be exciting to see how the West Valley continues to develop.
The East Valley: it's seen its growth and it's looking at its new cycle of adapting and redevelopment and adaptive reuse of old buildings. Commercial buildings that may no longer be viable, especially coming out of COVID and stuff like that, and so. It's this constant change and you know, I'm excited. I'm a southeast valley kid. I've seen the changes I can remember when there was nothing but alfalfa fields and hay fields out in Chandler and look at what it is today. I'm excited to see that growth take place on the west side and certainly as you look at it, the 202 running through south Phoenix, Laveen area, all of these areas are are exciting. It's going to be great to watch what happens.
Michael Gossie
Yeah, it's so fascinating to me because before my time in Arizona, I've been here since 2000. Somebody told me that Gilbert was known as the hay capital of the world. And now it's this, you know, hot hotbed of like, you know, tech companies and innovative companies – it just fascinates me.
Amy Lindsey
I actually grew up in the West Valley and I'm with you. It is just absolutely amazing. I mean, I've, I've been here way before. we expected a 101, let alone a 303 freeway needed out there, so it's amazing when you drive by there, all the industrial that's moving out in the west valley.
Brennan Ray
Oh yeah, it’s great to see.
Amy Lindsey
So, Brennan, what would you say is the highest demand for real estate attorneys right now?
Brennan Ray
So, with so many real estate deals happening, you have a need for a lot of different attorneys on the front end. You want someone who is able to review title. A lot of these properties have encumbrances against them, some have been there for a while and some of them make them challenging to develop. And so you want an attorney that's experienced in looking at title review and understanding those things. You want someone from a transactional standpoint that can crank out a contract and be able to do that. And then when you go to develop it, you want a good land use attorney to be able to advise you to the pitfalls of going through a public process. Of working with municipalities, they're professional staff. Of working with elected’s and neighbors and it really going back to what we started our conversation about sports. It really takes a good team approach to real estate and developing it from attorneys, from architects, from engineers, like anything you want to make sure you've got a good team behind you to achieve the prize.
Michael Gossie
You know you mentioned a little bit about the industrial projects going on. All the multifamily, are those the hot sectors that you see continuing in the future or do you see other sectors kind of stepping up too.
Brennan Ray
Yeah, I think the industrial has continued – going to continue to be huge. I think you should look at that. It's going to be big. The multifamily, I think, that's going to continue to be big as well because land is expensive, and people aren't willing to pay for a single-family home what they could have been, and then just the demand with the scarcity of land and I know we think of Maricopa County is there's lots of vacant land, but when you start to really get down into the nitty gritty, there is a scarcity of residential land that is available. And you know people's buying habits have changed – what people look for in homes. And so, I see multifamily is continuing to be important. It provides a wonderful place. I don't know if you've had the opportunity to tour any of these recent multifamily developments that have been built there resorts with resort-style amenities. And so, it really provides a good lifestyle choice that's different from what we've seen.
Michael Gossie
You know you talked a little bit about land and Arizona has been attractive for a number of years because of it's affordable land. But we're seeing these blockbuster land deals. Do you see those land prices continuing to go up or what do you see going on there?
Brennan Ray
I think they're going to continue to go up as long as the economy continues to ride as well as it has. It'll be interesting to see what the feds do with interest rates and slowing down their buyback program, but until there's a I think a shift we see in interest rates, I think you're going to see those land prices continue to tick up.
Amy Lindsey
How long do you think is the runway for the hot real estate market right now in Arizona?
Brennan Ray
I'm certainly no expert by any stretch of the imagination, but in terms of what I'm hearing, people tell me they think that 2022 is going to be just as crazy as the past year and a half, two years have been. There's some belief that what happens in ‘22 is tied to the midterm elections. Certainly, politics, to some extent, plays and impacts the real estate market.
Michael Gossie
OK, Brennan, we're running out of time, but I have one last question for you. I'm going to put you on the spot, OK, what's your outlook for real estate going into 2022 and beyond?
Brennan Ray
Historically, value has always been in real estate and I don't see that changing anytime soon. I think those people that are able to invest in real estate and you're able to acquire properties. You're going to continue to do well, I don't know that I'd see it as a short term flip. Throughout history, those people that have been able to do well have accumulated land and have held them for long periods of time. So that's on the one side. On the development side, it's going to continue to be gangbusters.
Michael Gossie
I know, I know you mentioned earlier that your family had a lot of landout in the southeast valley, how did that help you in, your in your practice, it's kind of seeing what they what they did with their land and then holding the land?
Brennan Ray
That's a great question. I wish I could answer it. I wish I had a better understanding of what they did in the past with that land but it's nice to be able to have those, that historical perspective. To be able to see how land has changed, to see how cities have developed. Because I know that's going to help me as we do work out on the west side and you know south Phoenix and see those changes too.
Michael Gossie
Great. Thank you so much for listening to AZ Big Podcast with Michael and Amy. And once again, thank you to Brennan Ray from Burch & Cracchiolo. And thank you to our sponsors, Burch and Cracchiolo. Thank you so much, Brennan.
Brennan Ray
Thanks guys.
Appreciate it.
Amy Lindsey
Thank you.