Latest / Mic Hamptons Podcast: Hamptons Real Estate & the People Behind It / The Real Estate Roundup - An HNG and Quincy Club Event on The Mic Hamptons Podcast
Transcript
- 0:06Laurie: Great question.
- 0:18Chris Beninati: Alright everybody. We are about to begin and I just wanted to say a few words first. First and foremost, thank you very much for coming tonight. We are very excited for tonight's panel all about real estate in the Hamptons. If you haven't met me personally, my name is Chris Beninati.
- 0:39I'm the vice president of Hamptons Networking Group and the cofounder of the Quincy Club. For those who aren't familiar with H and G, it is a more structured and professional networking community. We have one profession, excuse me, one professional per seat, per industry seat, and we meet every Thursday morning at 7AM in Hampton Bays. With H and G, we've seen how valuable it can be to have one professional representing each industry and building those deeper one to one relationships. From that, we also saw an opportunity to expand that reach, to bring together experts from different industries, create more collaboration, and broaden the community here in the Hamptons.
- 1:29For us, the Quincy Club really grew out of what we learned through H and G, the power of bringing the right people together in a very intentional way. That's how the Quincy Club was born. That's what we have here in the room tonight. Tonight is the beginning of what we hope will be a series of conversations like this one, bringing together industry experts to share their knowledge, showcase their thought leadership, and create opportunities to connect and collaborate. The Hamptons is such a unique and nuanced community, And we think that there's a lot of value in getting the right people in the right room, which is exactly what we're excited to continue continue to do through the Quincy Club.
- 2:13We're really excited that you're here and that you are all a part of it. We wanna have a lot of planned, we have a lot of planned and ways for everybody to get involved. As we always mention, this is about you. This is about the membership. This is about collaboration.
- 2:31This is about really highlighting all of us here. If you haven't already, please see Ashley tonight from Flying Point Media who did a great job putting this all together. Laurie as well. Let's give it a round of applause for her and the entire team, Michael, and everybody have really worked hard. If you have specific questions about the Quincy Club membership and events, please come see me or anybody after, especially our leadership team from H and G.
- 3:00We've really put a lot of effort into these events, hard work, and we want you guys to really take advantage of the opportunities we're creating for you. For tonight's panel, we have a series of five questions of different topics. I'll ask the question and I will allow each member to have two minutes to answer the question as it pertains to their sector within the real estate market. Okay? So, before we start, I wanna introduce our panel members tonight and I'm gonna let them introduce themselves and what they do one by one starting with mister Michael Peterson.
- 3:44Michael Petersohn: So, I'm imagining everybody in their underwear because I heard that makes you feel more comfortable. Michael Peterson, I'm with Brown Harris Stevens, real estate agent. This is my seat in the group and Chris and myself founded this group with Brian Champagne and a few others of almost four years ago and just to be real brief, we were four people sitting in a basement kind of sharing notes and trying to figure things out and it's morphed really quickly. Now, I think we're at 35 people which is great. Yep.
- 4:19For HNG.
- 4:20Chris Beninati: Absolutely.
- 4:20Michael Petersohn: And that's that's the our excitement. So, real estate in the Hamptons purchases sales and just any inquiries. That's that's me.
- 4:29Dan Cowan: Thank you, Mike. Dan? How's everybody doing? Dan Cowan with Hartford Funding. All residential financing looking for the most creative options.
- 4:39We work with first time homebuyers, investors, people looking to relocate. We're licensed in 33 of the 50 states. Joined H and G about two and a half years ago. Haven't looked back once. It's been an awesome experience.
- 4:51So, super excited to give you guys some more insight on the Hamptons Real Estate. Nice.
- 4:57Rick McMaster: Everybody. Rick McMaster. I am the real estate investor of the group. So, it's really exciting to be here and see everybody. It's gonna be good.
- 5:04I'm gonna enjoy this a lot.
- 5:06Chad Breidis: Thank you, Rick. Hello, H and G and guests. My name is Chad Brides. I'm an attorney with Van Cot Ebrahimi. I'm a real estate attorney.
- 5:14I focus on investing and how to buy real estate in the Hamptons and the best way to get a return on that investment. Protect your legal assets and try to make it as tax deferred as possible. In conjunction with some CPAs and other professionals.
- 5:32Chris Beninati: Thank you, panel. So, So, one of our topics today that we're gonna talk about and break down is really around planning and strategy. So, the planning and strategy, we have a lot of people that wanna buy in the Hamptons but really we have to ask ourselves, when is the best time to loop in each professional from this panel? So, let's start with you, Mike. When is the best time for you to be looped in to somebody's dream of buying their home?
- 6:04Maybe it's buying a summer home, whatever it may be. When is the right time to bring each of you, these questions for each of you into the mix here? Mike, you wanna kick us kick us off?
- 6:13Michael Petersohn: Sure. So, I guess in today's world, everybody's got a computer. Everybody's got access to information. So, they're all looking, looking, looking, looking. By the time they get to me, it's it's really they've done a whole lot of research on, you know, where they think the market is and what they think value is and so, I guess from my perspective, you know, I'm I'm usually the first person that that they'll that folks will engage with.
- 6:42Usually, the first person that, you know, they'll ask questions of and then, I'll, you know, my job is then to immediately ask questions like, do you need financing? You know, what what what is your game plan? Are you an investor? Are you going to be, you know, you know, what what are you going to use this for? Is this going to be something that you'll share with your family?
- 6:58Is this something that you're looking to flip? You know, which is something we in this group really focus on quite a bit. Then, do you have an attorney? If not, I can absolutely recommend the single best attorney that I've ever dealt with in real estate and there are, you know, there are a lot of good ones, Chad. It's great.
- 7:17So, that's kind of then then for me, the next process is really just kind of going through like, are are you, you know, I I joke about this a lot in in when we're together on a Thursday morning but are you people come to me all the time with $4,000,000 visions and a $2,000,000 budget. How do you bridge that gap? What's the delta? And how do you get to how do you bridge that delta? So, it's been a lot of understanding, okay, well, can I bring in Joe and his team for to understand what the costs are going to be to do renovations?
- 7:50I always get really frustrated. I'll run out of time in a second but the I always get frustrated with agents that that will sit there and say, just move these walls and do that. Immediately, the answer from everybody is, how much is that gonna cost? So to have this group is just, you know, I always say thank you every week but thank you everybody. It's like this is that's how I wanna engage with folks.
- 8:09Chris Beninati: Amazing. Thank you, Mike. Dan, for you, obviously, bringing in the realtor but then bringing in the. Yeah. You're to pay for this.
- 8:18Dan Cowan: So, yeah. Close. Yeah, most of the time, I'll get introduced through the realtor, you know, but we typically try and break that point of contact around three to four months or three to five months prior to the purchase that is, you know, they're planning to, hey, we want to buy something this summer so we can use it all summer long. We usually want to make those introductions, you know, November, December. That way, they can prepare with what documents they need, what kind of financing options they're going
- 8:43Rick McMaster: to go
- 8:43Dan Cowan: with. Because sometimes if you're going to be buying these properties out here in the Hamptons, they're above certain price points and you have to either if you're going to do a conventional loan, you know, those timelines, a jumbo loan takes a little bit longer than a traditional purchase because you know, has to go through additional underwriting. There's sources of larger deposits and you know, down payments. You have to source all that. So, typically, the jumbo loans will run a little bit longer over time but we have non QM products which is non qualified mortgages where you can close on a property if it's an investment property or something like that in three to four weeks but you still want to get introduced in the process about three to four months prior to when you're looking to make that final purchase.
- 9:25Chris Beninati: Amazing. Thank you.
- 9:26Michael Petersohn: Yeah.
- 9:27Dan Cowan: If you can. Sometimes, depends on your negotiations and stuff. You know, it could take six months, eight months if after you've been approved just trying to find that specific property. You know, the Hamptons is a competitive market. So, you could be submitting offers and counter offers and going back and forth bidding wars for two months on the same property.
- 9:44So, usually three to four months is the introduction introductory time.
- 9:49Chris Beninati: Thank you, Dan.
- 9:51Rick McMaster: It has to be really Mike that would be the first one to be a realtor that would be the front person that's going to be there. Next in line is gonna be you to tell me what this is gonna cost me to be able what's it's gonna be out of pocket? Am I gonna pay for it entirely entirely? Or am I gonna be financing it with you? So that's the way that I do it.
- 10:10And then it's also bringing you in, Chad, to make sure that there's no legalities with this. We've had instances where we looked at a piece of property. We went through the whole gambit. They accepted our bid, and then all of a sudden later on, we found out that it was actually going into foreclosure. And they had no right to actually have it on the market.
- 10:26So that was a bit of a a.
- 10:28Rick McMaster: Letdown.
- 10:28Rick McMaster: Letdown. Big letdown. But it's actually it's a collective group. So everybody in H and G really has a specific part in this whole process. It's not just the the group that's here right now.
- 10:40We would be bringing in the plumbers, the electricians, we would bring in the carpenters, we would bring in the window people. It would be everybody in H and G.
- 10:48Chad Breidis: Thank you, Rick. Alright. So, I really get involved depending on what the client wants to do and how they want to do it. My job is to remain fluid. My job is to communicate.
- 11:02My job is to tell the client, hey, you know, legally, we can't do this. Hey, here's the risk if you want to take it this way. Clients who finance with hard money, I typically talk to them before they even talk to a realtor. The most traditional way is what we're describing here. It goes, you know, realtor, finance, and then me once a memo comes out and I draft a contract of sale.
- 11:26But out here in the Hamptons, it's a little different. Sometimes we have to source money. Sometimes we have to do a lot of hard money documents and understanding and due diligence. We have to start LLCs, start corporations, make sure all the papers are in order. So for me, it's really focused on communication, where the investor wants to go, and how they wanna go and go about doing it.
- 11:53Chris Beninati: Thank you, panel. That was great. Our second topic that we're gonna discuss with everybody is around the budget. Obviously, the budget is very important. So, what is the true cost of buying Hamptons Real Estate?
- 12:05That's something that we should really discuss,
- 12:07Rick McMaster: right?
- 12:07Chris Beninati: What is the true cost? So we can go down the panel one by one again but Mike, why don't you dig a little bit deeper into that and everybody go into a little bit deeper about the true cost of buying out here.
- 12:20Michael Petersohn: So, I guess, it's a big education process for most buyers when they're when they first are starting to get involved out here. If you if you're a first time buying in the Hamptons, nobody understands what the community preservation fund is. That's usually a shocker for a lot of folks. So, it's two and a half percent. 2% goes into a fund to buy back and retire land.
- 12:43At this point, the CPF is retired about sixteen, thousand acres out here and then another half percent was just added on about two years ago which is for low income housing which we desperately need to help alleviate traffic problems. So, that's that's a shocker for a lot of people just out of the gate but it's just understanding, you know, you know, all the real estate conveyance costs and then thinking about in terms of if they're getting a mortgage, you know, starting to, you know, engage on. You know the costs involved there. I think in going back to the group. Having people that can show up from our group to help me, you know, get people across the finish line so they understand what the costs are when you when you're buying, you know, especially a fixer upper unless it's brand new construction, you're going to want to do certain things and people are from the city are really scared.
- 13:34Like, you know, most of our buyers are financial services, whatever coming from Manhattan and they're coming out here and they just don't know, you know, what they don't know and so, having people to hand hold them through that process has been a huge win for myself and I think for the group, You know,
- 13:48Michael Petersohn: just to to get people across the finish
- 13:50Michael Petersohn: line to understand those costs.
- 13:53Chris Beninati: Thank you, Mike. Dan, the question is or the topic is budget but what is the true cost of buying Hamptons Real Estate?
- 13:59Dan Cowan: Yeah. Mike brought up a good point is that CPF, the community preservation fund is a huge thing because a lot of times, if you don't know if you're purchasing East Of Riverhead Township, like Mike says, it's a two and a half percent closing cost in addition. So, if you're buying a house that could be listed at $2,000,000 now you have, you know, those an additional almost 50 a little over $50.00 in additional closing costs that if you were purchasing a house $2,000,000 just West Of Riverhead Township, you wouldn't have to pay that. New York State Mansion Tax, any properties over $1,000,000, you have to pay an additional 1% into your closing cost that goes to New York State. So that's another thing you have to be prepared for, but, closing costs can obviously vary depending on which loan products you're gonna be using.
- 14:41If you go with a non QM, if you're looking to get some creative financing because you don't have traditional W twos and pay stubs and you're looking to use like some of your business income or if you have different sources. There's additional closing costs with those. However, you're able to use funds whereas your business may show that it's clearing $400.00 a year but you as an individual only pay yourself $30.00. You're not buying a house for $2,000,000 making $30.00 a year but your business is bringing in 400,000. We're able to get you that creative financing.
- 15:13However, you know, sometimes the closing costs may vary but at least you're able to be eligible to get the property. Yeah and there are ways to do 10% down or most of the time, 20% down will save you the most.
- 15:25Chris Beninati: Thank you, Dan.
- 15:28Rick McMaster: So, the some of the hidden costs that you could really not even imagine are what you're going to be doing after you purchase it. So, you've got the purchase price is your one thing but then you have the carrying cost of the actual house itself which is can be astronomical. If you're gonna be doing home improvements, that's one other aspect of it. You've got your taxes that you're gonna be paying on a yearly basis. You have to factor that into what you're gonna be paying plus your mortgage.
- 15:50You're gonna be doing your maintenance. That's gonna be your pool, your lawn, your windows, your cleaning person. You've got all these other things and then you have to think about, are you going to be doing this as a rental home? And that's a whole different bracket because then you're bringing in another group of people. But then at the end, you have to really realize the fact that you're gonna be doing something that's gonna be either for you or it's gonna be for somebody else.
- 16:14And can you carry this for the next two to five years? And you have to do that math because you have to think down the line. Thank you, Rick.
- 16:23Chad Breidis: That's great insight. Thank you.
- 16:24Michael Petersohn: Yeah. Yeah.
- 16:26Chad Breidis: I think I'll take this opportunity to express that I'm the attorney and I need a new boat and truck. So, the cost is going to be really high. No, I'm I'm kidding. Chyperius.com. Right?
- 16:41I think we've really stressed a lot of the hidden costs. I think closing costs are coming into that. I think broker fees, we see carrying costs, we see CPF, title closer cost, your title insurance, all of that stuff is hidden fees. I always tell people, you know, who are getting mortgages, take away about 10% and make sure you show up with that in cash at the table. You're also gonna have adjustments at the table if it's fuel, oil, propane.
- 17:09You're gonna have to make adjustments for those. You're gonna have to make adjustments for prepaid taxes. So, there's lots of cost. It's not something you know, to take lightly. You've gotta be prepared.
- 17:19I like getting involved as early as possible because my retainer agreement spells out all these costs right upfront and I have managed to avoid a lot of situations with that where they're like, oh my god, I have show up with another $80.00.
- 17:31Rick McMaster: That's the reason why everybody kind of gets involved at the same time. It's not just one individual person. Everybody is in this collective group. We get, it's a phone call.
- 17:40Chris Beninati: Everybody's gotta play that
- 17:41Michael Petersohn: role. Yeah.
- 17:41Chad Breidis: Also, I want a boat.
- 17:44Chris Beninati: Let's let's keep let's keep the microphone. Let's keep the microphone back to Chad GPT. Our next topic is gonna be about restrictions and we'll leave it to the attorney to make things a little bit boring in the room. So, when investing in the Hamptons, what is something that buyers overlook? Sort of like what we're talking about.
- 18:03What's something that they miss that they don't know that you can go a little bit more into detail that you've seen?
- 18:09Chad Breidis: Well, lately, what we've been focused on a lot at the firm is foreign investments. Foreign firms, German, French firms, French, foreign LLCs, corporations, trusts, buying, American property. And selling American property. And so there's a lot of extra restrictions, extra money pulled to the side by governments who are doing that. You know, it's repeat the question.
- 18:39Chris Beninati: When the topic is restrictions but when investing into the Hamptons market.
- 18:43Rick McMaster: Right.
- 18:43Chris Beninati: That's something that most buyers are really overlooking. Sort of touching on what we talked about.
- 18:48Chad Breidis: Right. So, more restrictions, you know, you've got the zoning boards, you got the village boards. If you're planning on on building or changing any of the formats, you've got, I think the biggest restriction in the Hamptons is your neighbor. I would say that that boundary line agreements, understandings, pyramid laws, that all has to do with your neighbor.
- 19:09Unknown Speaker: Yeah.
- 19:10Chad Breidis: So, really when you're out here knowing your broker who's been selling everything on the street, knowing who he's put, knowing what's, hey, this development's coming. Hey, this is gonna happen. That's a very important key to this. Because they're they're really in on the restrictions, the neighborhood, and to me, it's the people you're moving next to.
- 19:26Rick McMaster: So true.
- 19:28Chris Beninati: Thank you.
- 19:30Rick McMaster: Repeat that again. Sorry. The
- 19:33Chris Beninati: topic is restrictions and we're talking about when you're investing in the Hamptons and Rick, it'll be great to get your point of view on this. What is something that buyers overlook?
- 19:43Rick McMaster: So, everybody has a tendency to think that when they buy the house, they can do whatever they want and there are huge restrictions that we have to abide by. Could be a 10 foot setback. It could be a 15 foot setback. It could be a 20 foot setback. So this knowledge really has to be something that you're aware of in the beginning.
- 19:59You just can't dump in a shed. You can't put a pool in where you want it. It has to be going before the building inspector. You have to submit this paperwork. That's item number one.
- 20:09Going forward, there's, as you were saying, it's really about getting to know your neighbor because if your neighbor puts up a roadblock for you, you're screwed. No pun intended but you really are. And you have a tendency to, we as people, if you're not friendly to your neighbor, you're gonna have problems. The other person to really get, I don't wanna say handle on, but you have to become friends with the building inspectors and everybody in the building department because this is who is going to make sure that everything goes properly. The other stumbles that you're going to have are the ZBA and the ARB.
- 20:44Those are people that they have an opinion and it doesn't mean it's your opinion. I had an example in Southampton here recently where she thought that what I wanted to do is very passe. That is not a bit of language that she's allowed to use because if I want to paint my house pink, you can't tell me I can't. Okay? And if you tell me that all the houses are going to be pink, I don't want that but you can't tell me that.
- 21:08So, she had to be
- 21:08Chad Breidis: corrected by her attorney. Thank you.
- 21:12Dan Cowan: Can you repeat the question again?
- 21:14Chris Beninati: No, I'm just kidding.
- 21:14Dan Cowan: I gotta think I think we got it by the third time.
- 21:17Chris Beninati: For the third time.
- 21:18Dan Cowan: No. So, with some restrictions and things to know about when purchasing out there like again, with that CPF, the commute conservation, land conservation, pecanic pay taxes huge to not overlook. Something else is the certain townships are looking into restricting the short term rentals. So, you can stay up to date with those because I know they're they're always looking to pass that because they don't want partiers just here for the weekend. If you know, there's somebody's going be renting the property for two months or a full month, that's different but they don't want those weekend partiers.
- 21:48Fema, the flood zones, Suffolk County is looking into restructuring that. So, that's definitely something when you're purchasing and you get in the surveys and titled reports to be prepared for. Certain things are shifting. You may have to get flood insurance whereas couple years ago, if you were to buy that same property, you maybe not did wouldn't have had to. Even so, it's that's just something a restrictions that are they're always changing.
- 22:12So, that's why it's important to make sure you're constantly in contact or if something, you know, just because you purchased something a year and a half, two, three years ago, you can't just automatically assume in just because it's in the same area or you're using a similar contract that everything's going to go the exact same because they're always changing the guidelines every year. So it's important to make sure you're using professionals that are always up to date with the newest guidelines.
- 22:35Chris Beninati: If there was only a group of people that met on a weekly basis. Yeah. For the benefit of the community, it'd be great. Thank you, Dan.
- 22:43Michael Petersohn: Yeah, of course.
- 22:44Michael Petersohn: Alright.
- 22:45Chris Beninati: So, my turn? Michael, yes. Restrictions when you're investing in the Hamptons. So, always Something most of your buyers don't even realize.
- 22:54Michael Petersohn: So, there's a just to be a lot of topics have been discussed already but things people don't take consideration are things like noise. Are you close to an airport light? Are you close to a school? I've had deals fall apart because people didn't realize until the eleventh hour there's a cemetery, you know, that dates back four hundred years on the corner of the property. Like, I'll never buy that.
- 23:19Like, me, it doesn't bother me but so, those are.
- 23:23Chris Beninati: Quiet over there but.
- 23:24Michael Petersohn: Great neighbors. Yep. Absolutely. And great for Halloween parties. But the so I think those are those are issues.
- 23:33You know, I think the the group's kind of covered most of it at this point. So,
- 23:38Chris Beninati: give you feedback on No.
- 23:40Chad Breidis: That's great.
- 23:40Chris Beninati: Thank you, Paddle. That was great insight. And the next topic that we're gonna be discussing is technology. So how has technology affected the real estate process? You can loop in artificial intelligence and so forth.
- 23:54But Mike, let's start with you as you have the mic, but also from your standpoint, how has technology really affected the business at large?
- 24:03Michael Petersohn: Again, so everybody's got a computer at this point. Everybody can do their own research. I think people, I think technology has actually been really beneficial for me recently especially, you know, in light of it's so simple but ChatGPT, I spent an hour today kind of looking at a property that I had my colleagues. I I showed something to my colleagues and they were like, like, oh, that's horrible. I would never pay X for that.
- 24:27I said, look what the neighborhood is. Something that's trading now asking a million 5 and I was like, this is a great deal and everything on the street is trading at $4,000,000 but it's horrible looking and then, you know, Joe and the group and others have said, we like ugly because ugly can be fixed and it's so true. So, then, I spent the next half hour kind of, you know, putting, you know, changing it around, changing around, changing the facade. All of sudden, it, you know, it went from ugly duckling to this modern house and without moving any external walls. Yeah, there's a cost to it but well, you know, the question is, if you can buy that house for listed in a million 5, get it for a million 4, put in $400.00 that this group would turn and look at.
- 25:07You know, getting away from technology a little bit but that it's AI has been a great bridge for that. So, you can kind of see, you know, what the end product should be and then you have to figure out what the delta is like if so I buy for a million 4, put in 4, am I getting 2.5 on, you know, on on that? Is it is is it worth doing and I'll argue all day long, putting money into, you know, fixer uppers is the way to go. So, I think that's where technology has been incredibly beneficial. Aside from that, I'd, you know, we're we still show up every day and hold hold people's hands as they walk through houses and explain.
- 25:42Yeah. The the process and it's still very. Balancing act. Yeah. Yeah.
- 25:46It's it it it's tactile. You have to go and see and smell and and hear but that's where I think technology has been helpful for us.
- 25:55Chris Beninati: Perfect. Dan, how has technology affected the real estate process obviously from your point of view?
- 26:01Dan Cowan: Yeah. So, technology and AI have made our jobs immensely more structured in a sense of being able to expedite some of the processes behind the scenes. Our turnaround time for closings as far as receiving the contract to getting to the closing table may have taken on average thirty to thirty five days. We've implemented systems now with the underwriters and the processors for document review using AI. Just upload all the pay stubs, let it formulate, like, instead of having to do all this manually, or in our systems semi manually having to import the numbers and it'll do the calculations for you.
- 26:36But now, we just have to drop in the images of the pay stubs and it's more often than not, it is spot on, to the penny for what we need as far as qualifying purposes. So, it's cut down our closing time by at least ten days. So, now, our closings are closer to twenty to twenty five days. We closed one the other day. This is rare.
- 26:54I've been eighteen days or from seventeen days from getting the the contract to closing.
- 27:00Rick McMaster: We were cleared we
- 27:01Dan Cowan: were cleared on the seventeenth day but scheduling conflict to close on the eighteenth day but as far as marketing, it's unmatched, you know, the technology and the AI for what it can do as far as our marketing team and just being able to get posts and get information out there on the process is it's been, you know, immensely supportive for us. Another thing which is huge is appraisals. So, we've got this system now where there there's these they're tracking all of the sales that are been been done in specific areas and whatnot. So our underwriters are actually getting appraisal waivers. So depending on how much Wow.
- 27:36Yeah. Your debt to income ratio and what you're putting as far as a down payment, we're able to just waive the appraisal completely just because of these programs and softwares they're using that are able to track hundreds of sales in that given area. We're now, not only is it expedited cutting down four or five days of the process, it's also saving the buyer a few 100 or sometimes thousands of dollars not having to pay for that.
- 27:57Chris Beninati: Yep.
- 27:58Dan Cowan: We're even getting approval all the time for a desktop appraisal which is somewhat newer seeing where they don't have to go there and physically inspect the property. They just do essentially a drive by saying, how the property hasn't burnt down. It still looks, it's just making sure the structure's there and without the implement of AI and some of these programs that are doing behind the scenes, we wouldn't have those those tools.
- 28:19Chris Beninati: Thank you, Dan.
- 28:19Michael Petersohn: Longer than two minutes. Yeah, it was. I gotta,
- 28:21Rick McMaster: I forgot about the appraisal part.
- 28:22Michael Petersohn: Excited. Where's the dog? Well, I
- 28:24Rick McMaster: don't know. We're all excited about it. You've already touched base on a lot of stuff. I don't know if this is gonna be there it is. But we've already touched base on a lot of what we're talking about.
- 28:33But one of the things that that the AI is doing is it's it's all of our due diligence lists have shrunk down immensely. What would used to take us days to do can be done in hours. So as you're saying, you know, with your you're able to close a deal with ten days less. That's just because of AI. The one thing that it does not do is it doesn't replace you, it doesn't replace you, and it doesn't replace you because I need you to give your input.
- 28:58I need your physical input to be able to judge if this is a good deal or not. I need you to be able to tell me that yes, this is something that is valuable and I'm gonna make money in the end. And you're the one that's gonna tell me if it's a piece of garbage. And that's what I really need. So when I'm looking at something to invest and what people don't really realize is that this is part of the obstacles.
- 29:20Chris Beninati: Thank you.
- 29:22Chad Breidis: I love technology. It's my favorite thing in the world when a client comes to me and says, I got this off chat GPT. I'm like, yes. I'm making my boat money. That's what we're.
- 29:33Chris Beninati: If you haven't
- 29:34Michael Petersohn: all heard, Chad
- 29:35Chris Beninati: really wants a boat.
- 29:37Chad Breidis: But on on another flip side, it's helped me, it's helped my practice immensely personally by being, I have a printer in my car out there hooked up to a little hotspot that I can do contracts right here tonight if somebody wants it. If if Mike comes up to me and he goes, hey, I got an investor who wants this, you know, sheep. I I'll be like, okay, we can print the contract right now. We can do it right now and I love being able to do that. I love negotiating on the road.
- 30:04I love that technology has allowed me to become mobile, to go to homes, to talk to investors, to go to businesses, and to be there and be able to can do my job 100% on the road.
- 30:15Chris Beninati: So, I'm a big fan. Amazing. Yep. Indeed. Free printing services.
- 30:22Michael Petersohn: Chad GPT in the house.
- 30:24Chris Beninati: So, our last topic for tonight is really for each panelist to share a personal case study. So for example, our question is, what is one of the biggest hurdles or problems that you have faced in a project that you have helped get over the finish line? We know this is a near and dear topic for all of you, so what's a hurdle that you have overcome? Think just Just name one.
- 30:56Michael Petersohn: Mold. So mold is everywhere. It's in this restaurant right now. It's it's pervasive. I know.
- 31:05It's hard to believe. It's a really nice restaurant though, and and there's not very there's very little. But I've had I've had deals fall apart because people don't understand it. They don't understand the remediation, you know, can be done. And then I've I've got a deal right now where someone in the group is actually very keenly interested investing in a house because it is riddled with mold.
- 31:27It's like, hey, that's my Andre. It's that's my solution. Like, that's what I can do. So, I so I've I get I had a a lady that, you know, wanted to buy a home and and again, had aspirations of a $5,000,000 house and this house was could be had. It started at five and got the deal done at $2.08.
- 31:47And it would just but it was riddled with mold and she was so fearful and finally understood the process of what, you know, what can be done and how easily it can be remedied, you know, and and guaranteed. So that was probably not what you were expecting.
- 32:04Chris Beninati: Thank you.
- 32:06Dan Cowan: So was the like a personal story about how we came overcame an obstacle?
- 32:10Chris Beninati: Yeah. Overcame an obstacle with a buyer that you found a way to make it work.
- 32:14Dan Cowan: Yeah. So actually just recently, shameless plug on Mike Hamptons podcast when we were talking. I explained this story. So it's I had a buyer last October who was looking to purchase a investment property in East Hampton and depending on the program that they were using, they needed an additional, they needed 20% down payment minimum but if you can get 25, it drops the rate or significant margin. So, he has other properties in Florida and whatnot.
- 32:41So, he he forgot about the Peconic, this Peconic Bay tax, the additional two. 5% of his closing cost. So, he didn't end up having that disposable money to get that extra 5% down payment. So, what we did is the math on taking out money from his condo in Miami. He had a purchase property in Florida and with the difference with that monthly payment and using what with the cash we took out of that to put a larger down payment on the East Hampton property, he ended up saving himself a few $100 and he was able to get this proper like this property overall but just being able to look through that additional creative option of pulling money out of one property to make the overall payment of the two much lower compared to just saying, no, this is you don't have the additional 5% down payment.
- 33:24Sorry, this is your payment. This is what you're stuck with.
- 33:27Michael Petersohn: And Dan's group is actually really, really good at that creative financing.
- 33:33Rick McMaster: So there's too many to really describe, I'll use the house that I'm working on right now as an as an example because it's a pretty good one. It's there's multiple things that I've experienced on this one. First is the pyramid law. There's a my one, my western boundary is only 10 feet from the property line. The eastern boundary I think is 16 feet, maybe maybe a little bit more than that.
- 33:56But what the town gives you in a situation as that they their property line when you're looking at this typically a a pyramid law is 30 feet above and it goes to the property line. You draw a line from the from that that marker on the edge up 30 feet and then you go over to the other side of the property line. That's the that's the area that you're allowed to work in. So, in my instance, this was, I was way over what I wanted to do to put a second floor into this house but they give you a reprieve by five feet because of the narrowness of the property. So, that meant that my property line didn't start at grade.
- 34:29It was five feet above which was a lot easier to be able to go through these the process that we had. It was also making it a little bit easier on my neighbors as well. In doing so, we try to exemplify what the neighbor had and also bring that into the house that we are doing right now, to make it so that it fits the neighborhood pretty well. The other obstacle was going before the ZBA, and she did not like the fact that I wanted to do a metal roof and I said to her, what would you like me to do? And then she made a comment and said, we'd like it to be shingled and then I said, and this is only for the pool house and so she said, well, we'd like you to shingle and I said, well, what type of shingle?
- 35:08What does it wanna be? You know, would you like asphalt or would you like wood shingles? And she says, oh, wood. I said, okay. And I said, then that means you're gonna want me to do this on the main house.
- 35:17And they said, oh, no. We didn't say that. We didn't say that at all. But you implied that. So by listening to what they're saying sometimes, you have to understand that this is the right path to go down.
- 35:30You have to go down the right path.
- 35:32Chris Beninati: Thank you.
- 35:34Chad Breidis: Chat. I face hurdles and provide solutions constantly. That is my job as an attorney, a solution provider. I would say the number one thing that I face out in East Hampton is scheduling people's personal schedules with their financial commitments, with their what we call the treasure chest, the ten thirty one exchanges. Everybody out in East Hampton has one.
- 35:54Everybody's doing it. So, you have to identify the property but you have to set up the other ten thirty one treasure chest. So, it's all a scheduling. It's really feels like a business. You gotta schedule both attorneys.
- 36:07You gotta schedule title. You gotta schedule any hard money lenders to show up in their attorneys and then you have to schedule the 10:30 ones which are always in Florida or North Carolina or California, not in state. So, for me, the hurdles really come on the East end with with managing all of those schedules and those busy those busy movements.
- 36:29Chris Beninati: Thank you very much. So that is our panel for this evening. Let's give everybody a round of applause that's on stage. So what we'll do now is if anybody has a question for one of the panelists, we welcome some questions. Obviously, we're welcome to network and chat around the room, but if anybody has a specific question, let us know, pass over the mic.
- 36:59Does anybody have anything that they want to ask one of the panelists?
- 37:05Laurie: Somebody has a question, I know they do.
- 37:09Chris Beninati: We have one over there.
- 37:15Unknown Speaker: Check, check. This is not specific to any one panelist, but if someone were to want to get involved with H and G, what's the best way for them to do it?
- 37:27Chris Beninati: So you have to come to a meeting and check us out. Thursday morning, 7AM in Hampton Bays, the American Legion. When you come, you're going to see the group that is really sort of brings everything together, right? So, if you're really interested in joining, you come to the morning meeting. You get to meet everybody.
- 37:47You get to hear all these stories. You get to really see how the business is done. I think coming up and showing up shows a lot and showing up these types of events is great. We have an application and a process but the team has become truly a family, right? It's become a great thing.
- 38:04So, I'm going to let Mike say a few words too.
- 38:07Michael Petersohn: Thank you. Sorry. And there's also the Quincy Club which is what tonight is. So, we are one seat per profession. We always encourage people to show up.
- 38:16I I'm a real estate agent. You ever go to other, you know, networking groups. They never invite their competitors and I think it's every every week, everybody's like, oh my god, you know, who do you wanna meet? I wanna meet more real estate agents. Great.
- 38:30Like, okay, I take it to heart. So, they can't take my seat. I'm not about to give this up. I I it's a valuable seat and I enjoy it very very much but that being said, I invite other realtors and the but the Quincy Club, if you're a realtor, you can come and and participate with this group the same way. So, I think that's that's the important thing.
- 38:50Chris Beninati: Yeah, the Quincy Club and what we're doing here tonight is not limited. One seat per profession. Obviously, there's some overlap but that's what makes everything stronger. We're all here to, you know, be connected through the Hamptons community. So, Jamie, thank you for the question.
- 39:04Anybody else have any other questions? In terms of property taxes, why are the taxes so low in the Hamptons? We're going to pass off to Jeopardy Low. You
- 39:19Chad Breidis: know how we talked about that mansion tax? So, these are the these are the estate tax.
- 39:25Chris Beninati: They get their money somewhere.
- 39:26Chad Breidis: Right. These are the estate taxes that that are paid on these mansions out here and they help offset all the costs and all the all the other taxes that people in Southampton would normally have to pay that, you know, Brookhaven has to pay, maybe Riverhead has to pay but it really has to do with the estate section of East Hampton and South in Southampton.
- 39:47Laurie: Anybody else? Questions?
- 39:49Michael Petersohn: Oh,
- 39:52Laurie: sorry, Lana.
- 39:55Lana Wear: So we've talked quite a bit about the microenvironment and individual deals, but I'd love to hear from you all's perspective what you're seeing at the macro level, what's happening in the market, what's changing out here, if you're a real estate investor, what should you be watching for your next purchase?
- 40:08Chris Beninati: It's a great question.
- 40:13Michael Petersohn: So if I got this right, but on a macro level, what's what's changing out here? Gosh. With so leaving politics aside, the unfortunately, unfortunately, fortunately, this country, the rich keep getting richer, poor not as not doing as well. There's a lot of money that's, you know, most of our deal flow comes from the city or high heel, you know, high net worth individuals abroad. That has continued to be the the case out here.
- 40:45The the high end, you know, beachfronts, larger properties are just gapping higher every every month. So, that that trend is not ended. It is continues to filter down. So, the the market's bid. I've had somebody today say to me that sorry, there you are.
- 41:04That's something today like, oh, I'm just gonna wait. The market's gonna come my way. No, it just doesn't. Nope. Just doesn't.
- 41:10Sorry and if you feel that way, you know, I'm not your guy. So, I I'm sorry. Is that is that okay?
- 41:17Chris Beninati: Yes. I
- 41:18Chad Breidis: just like to expand on that a little bit. I think what Mike is trying to say is when you see a deal, jump it. If it's not your dream deal, jump it because out here, it is competitive, it is hot, it is heated, and it's constantly being bid up, bid up, bid up. So, if you get a deal that you think, and you're wishy washy on it and you're trying to press the other side, I want this, I want to pull, I want this, you're not going to win. Jump on the deals out here.
- 41:43Dan Cowan: To tie along with that, we always say it in in the office but. Yeah, saying we can't on if it's connected but marry the right with Chad, what Chad was saying, marry the house, date the rate. Interest rates the past month and a half have not been friendly. They've been going on the up and up and then we get a little bit of relief and then it goes right back. However, the house won't always be there.
- 42:05If you know, you can if you could physically make it happen or financially make it happen to get into the house, do the repairs, hold on to those those holding costs, and get weather the storm, the rates will eventually come down. You refinance. You could do whatever, and then that payment becomes much more feasible. And if it's an investment property, you know, for what you just when the property does become available to rent, if you've done the the repairs and changes, you could charge a little extra for the time being for that rent. And then once you do the refinance, you could always restructure that, lease agreement.
- 42:34Laurie: Thanks. Alright. I got another question over here.
- 42:37Michael Petersohn: Hello. I would just want to ask two questions. Who is your ideal client? And what makes Green Green Company marketing different than other agencies in Hamptons? Thank you.
- 42:51Michael Petersohn: What was the question on marketing? Sorry.
- 42:53Michael Petersohn: What is the difference between your company? What makes a difference than other companies, other marketing companies?
- 42:58Laurie: So, who's your ideal client?
- 43:01Michael Petersohn: And who's your ideal client?
- 43:02Rick McMaster: There was
- 43:02Michael Petersohn: just kind of two questions. Ideal client. So, ideal client is someone's got it's easy to joke and say someone's got a lot of money. It's someone that's, you know, that that has knowledge and understanding of real estate. Like, that that's the ideal client.
- 43:14I, you know, I'm happy to hold people's hands, happy to just guide them through a conversation and get them from A to B. You know, I, you know, people that that have done this before that have they're experienced investors, that's everybody. That that's that's the easiest win because then you can, they'll listen to you if they if they, you know, if you provide sound advice, they'll listen to you. I, you know, that if that if that answers that. Then, as far as from a marketing perspective, I would just yeah, I think so for this for this group, this room, H and G, Hamptons Networking Group, the, you know, we all support each other.
- 43:52We help each other. Flying Point Media, has been instrumental in really kind of changing the the way that we get our our name out there and no one to my knowledge, nobody's doing anything even remotely close to what we're doing in this room right now and it's a win. Everybody's benefiting. Everybody's, we're all making money off it but we're also more important than that, believe it or not, is is just the camaraderie and the support structure so that end users, clients that you utilize our services, really get, you know, the the best bang for their buck.
- 44:26Dan Cowan: In addition to that, like an ideal client is just somebody that's organized and responsive. You know, whether it's a first time home buyer or an experienced investor, just somebody that's gonna be if you reach out with a question or, hey, I need this document for the underwriter or processors requesting it, Somebody that's not gonna take three or four days just to get back to you, just responsive and organized is ideal because we work with anybody first time home buyers, like I said, to investors.
- 44:52Rick McMaster: So one the first things is really to go to you to find out what you can spend. And then the second part is gonna be going then to the real estate agent. I really don't like this mic. And so yeah I'm gonna pee. So but do you go to the real estate agent afterwards?
- 45:08And then then you'd be going to your lawyer to see if this is actually something feasible. Because it's all the other hidden costs that you've got there that you gotta figure out because if you can't afford it, you're gonna be looking at something that is so out of reach that the if you get frustrated and so, it's always best to find out how much money you can get and then add that 10% on because that's what the closing costs are gonna be and everybody goes there and if you don't have 10%. So, if you're going after a house, that's $1.1000000 dollars, that's 10% of that. That's $110.00 you have to have to close the place. That's maybe.
- 45:42It could be even more. Perfect
- 45:46Chad Breidis: client is the person who recognizes what they don't know and trusts others and puts the people in the right place to help them through what they don't know and gain that knowledge. What makes H and G different than the other networking groups in the Hamptons having experienced them firsthand. H and G puts our money back in our pocket. Look at this. This is directly related to us who are investing in this group and the money gets turned around directly back to us to market ourselves, to promote ourselves, to continue to grow our group.
- 46:20There's no national network taking a cut. There's no processor taking a cut. This is us. A lot of us volunteer our time to keep it going and because we love it, it's a community and we recognize the potential for our growth here as compared to other networking groups. Whoo.
- 46:38Laurie: Great. Hang on. I got oh, jeez. I have another question. One more question.
- 46:44One more question. One more question.
- 46:48Unknown Speaker: I'm gonna close this out here. So markets tend to be cyclical. History tends to repeat itself. Long Island sometimes, especially the Hamptons seems to be the exception to the rule. You guys talk about the Hamptons are booming and growing and is there an end in sight for you guys or what do you guys see for the future in the next two to five years of Hamptons real estate?
- 47:16Michael Petersohn: You always have to keep in mind that you're you're competing against the CPF. The compute so the community preservation fund is right now is has got about 750,000,000 in it. Every time there's a transaction out here, that money goes into that fund. So it's two and a half percent of the purchase price. It's a $10,000,000 home.
- 47:37It's approximately, you know, $250,000. Boom. Goes in. So, you're constantly, so they're constantly retiring land. They're constantly, if if there's a how, an old house that sits between two nice pieces of land, But by that, if there's so much money now, it's it's a it it's if you look at if you if you I wish there was a Bloomberg.
- 47:55I love Bloomberg. I wish there's a Bloomberg app for real estate in the Hamptons because I love to graph it because basically, you look at a graph of the Hamptons and it's really goes up and then levels off and goes up and then levels off. I've, you know, even when financial demise, you know, 2008, I think the sell off was like 10 or 15% and then, you know, I bought my house in '20, my current house, 2011 and it's almost quadrupled in value. Like, at the end of the day, that's that's it. Sorry.
- 48:34Chad Breidis: Climate change. I think we've focused on it a lot. I think the next big thing for East Hampton is the change of the FEMA maps. I think that's gonna drive a lot of change out here that not of a lot of us expect because with the FEMA maps come expansion of wetland protections and everything else. So, for me, climate change is going to be the major changer out here.
- 48:55Real estate out here is always going to go up but when you change FEMA maps, you start getting insurance involved, you start getting all that stuff. It starts taking away what people have to invest. Okay.
- 49:05Laurie: Alright, we got one more question. This time, I mean it.
- 49:11Rick McMaster: This is just following up on what this gentleman was saying before about, You know the Hamptons kind of seem to be immune to any kind of cyclical downturn. I've been out here for twenty five years and I keep saying it's never going to get busier. This is the busiest summer like it's the traffic can't get worse and then next summer it's worse. At what point does do we hit a saturation point where we just can't take any more people? Where the idea of going to the country?
- 49:43I love when people from the city, you know, say they're going to the Hamptons. They call it the country. It used to be the country is not the country anymore. At what point do we lose that that feeling that people originally came out here and have been coming out here for decades, for one hundred years because they wanted to escape things. They wanted the beach, the country, and all that and now they're dealing with traffic.
- 50:07I mean, you guys must have seen the July 4, the July 5 was a freaking nightmare. Who wants to do that? You know, I love it out here. I'm going to stay out here the rest of my life but I'd love to hear from the experts as to like when are we reaching a point, a saturation point where all of this the draw of the Hamptons doesn't become a draw anymore because we got too many people?
- 50:33Rick McMaster: I I think that this year happens to be one of those cyclical things that everything aligned really really well with a lot of traffic. We had road construction on Shinnecock Canal. We had the open. We have now the Hampton Classic. The president just came through or the vice president just came through here today.
- 50:52That just screwed everybody up. That was a good, I'd say, another two hours. I was in the building department and nobody was there. It was like, it was dead at 09:00 in the morning and I had to wait another hour before they all came in. So, we're going through an a situation right now where I think it's just a really a lot of traffic is coming out here.
- 51:09Also, it's it's not so much the people that own, it's the people that rent. We're getting a lot of renters that come out. August is the by far our worst month that you can imagine and I agree 100. How how much worse could it be? But yes, this year, it's it's disgusting.
- 51:27Perfect storm. I just want to,
- 51:30Dan Cowan: yeah, just add real quick. I do think that over the past last summer, this summer, and maybe I don't foresee it going too far into the future but I do think that influencer effect of trying to draw all the attention of these big name people on social media. Hey, I'm going to this club or this bounce or whatever it may be this upcoming weekend or these DJs where that's bringing in people that necessarily wouldn't have been out here that weekend or like the July 4 and it's just bring yet and I don't I think that that fad will dilute itself over the next summer or two because it's not doesn't make sense for these out of towners that are just coming in for and taking that long long trip. I think they're gonna get tired of it after a year or two and then it'll settle back down to what we would probably recognize five to ten years ago.
- 52:18Michael Petersohn: We also have a lot of, so wars in Eastern Europe, etcetera. The world's a little wonky right now and people have this was not traveling this year. Rentals are hugely up, which has made it incredibly more problematic. You know, this this particular season. Every year, so the only argument I would make against what you're saying is that they keep retiring land, they keep the building department's been very slow at at issuing new permits.
- 52:47Thank you and and so, you know, it it is problematic. I would argue that ten months of the year, it's absolutely magical here and for two months of the year, when everybody really wants to be here, you know, pick and choose your times to travel.
- 53:02Rick McMaster: On the ten year, ten months of
- 53:04Michael Petersohn: the year. I've been making money year round on whether you'd get, it is what it is. But, yeah, I know. I, like, I feel bad for people that that try to commute out.
- 53:13Rick McMaster: More money to be made in the ten month. Actually, eleven months out of the there's more money to be made in the eleven months out of the year than the the the last one. Well, okay. So, I'm gonna I I I was born in Nassau County and I I kind of must moved out here and I was born in 1960 and I used to come out here as a little boy and this was all farmland and I loved it and my neighbors, they were, they had cabana rights to Georgia Association which I didn't even know that they'd existed but we were able to go to Georgia or Georgia Beach on the the Pond Side and it was great and then my parents retired out here in 1975. I've seen a lot of change and I never thought in my wildest dreams that this area was gonna become what it became.
- 54:07When somebody would say, where were you from? I'd say Eastern Long Island. I would never say exactly because they wouldn't know it and now, it's a household name. Oh, you come from the Hamptons. We've created our own nightmare.
- 54:19It's not the people that live here. It's the people that are buying into here. So, and we're also the ones that rely upon them to feed me. I mean, that's how you're gonna get your boat. I already have mine.
- 54:31Yeah. Mike's gonna get his car. You're gonna get your bigger house. You're gonna get some really great people out of this whole deal. We're gonna we all prosper from that hellhole of two months and that's just the way that it is and it's not I don't think it's gonna change that much.
- 54:46Hopefully, it might simmer down by 10% but I think that this year was that perfect storm and I'm praying and I agree with you. I mean, it was murderous trying to get from point a to point b.
- 54:56Laurie: Thanks. Alright, we're gonna close it.
- 54:58Chad Breidis: We're gonna Let me just let me just jump, on this. Sir, I I would say that this is a voter situation. The towns and and really held on the on the mini level here at town. It's about showing up to town hall. It's about voting on restrictions on Airbnb's, on ownership by mega corporations.
- 55:19It's about taking taking a stand against what you think is happening here and it's showing up and it's being there and it's and it's and it's voicing your opinion on it. So, you know, you show up the the towns are doing what they can. They're trying to put on fourteen day limits for these things. So, we're not getting pounded every weekend. They're they're doing what they can and so, on a on a level for us out here to maintain the Hamptons look, there's gotta be a balance as we were as we were discussing here, we rely on it for money.
- 55:50Let's be honest. But we also wanna keep it going and that's part of what you're saying there and I would say, it's a local town issue and that everybody is focusing on it. The towns aren't ignoring it. They're listening to the people but it takes a lot to get people together to say, hey, and especially when a lot of those people that are gonna be forced out of home ownership are the mega corporations with the most money.
- 56:14Chris Beninati: So, I'm gonna do a couple quick closing things but let's give a round of applause again for the panel. If you are not a member of H and G or not a member of the Quincy Club, please approach one of the members anywhere and they will tell you how profound and impactful this group is and just keep in mind, three years ago in 2023, the idea for Quincy Club started and it was first initially, we're gonna have a dinner for three professionals, three to five professionals at Bobby Vans in the middle of the winter and now look at what we created. So let's give a round of applause to each and everybody here, network, and thank you very much.
- 56:57Laurie: And if you haven't already, if you guys could just scan the QR codes. We're just trying to take registration for everyone in the room. We're gonna be just having some follow-up. If you guys can share what your thoughts were of this, what other types of events you would like to see, it's gonna be really helpful. So there's QR codes around, so appreciate you coming out.
- 57:16Thanks.
- 57:17Dan Cowan: Thanks so much.