2021 Annual Letter
A RECORD-BREAKING YEAR
Seventeen years ago, the seeds that would eventually become Fort were planted. In 2005, I bought a 3-bed/2-bath student rental property near Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, TX for $103,000. Fast forward 16 years, Fort has now crossed the $1 billion mark in total transactions.
What is most impressive to me is not the number, but the team behind the number. Creating something great requires a dedicated and passionate team, and Fort is made up of 25 team members who show up every day for something larger than themselves. We’ve set a lofty mission “to be the best real estate operator in the world.” Our business is simple: acquire real estate, operate it with excellence, and provide exceptional returns to our investors and stakeholders. By focusing on these core things, the results take care of themselves.
This past year was undoubtedly our best year ever in sourcing new investment opportunities—not by a little, but by 435% over our prior best performing year. Many folks in our industry do things the same way, but we have focused on paving our own path. By restructuring our Deal Team in 2021, we were able to drastically increase the amount of deals we vetted. Out of the 254 deals we looked at purchasing, we underwrote 125 of those, and ultimately closed 12 industrial and office deals across the state of Texas for a total value of $286M. We also sold a total of $238M in assets, which included two industrial portfolios.