The Passing of a Colleague

It was with great shock and sadness to learn this last weekend of the death of one of our colleagues, Michael Bradley.

Michael was working for Celtic Bank looking at some of their REO assets in Texas when he and two co-workers hit fog and crashed the plane they were in, leaving no survivors.

When someone you know dies unexpectedly, whether in a car crash, or as in the instance, in a plane crash, it puts you in an altered state of mind.  The truth of how fragile life is becomes much more palpable when the tragedy is close to home like this was.

Michael was my age and had been in the business for the same duration as me.  While we never worked on a deal together, we took several CCIM courses together, and I think it is fair to say we thought of each other as contemporaries and with mutual respect.

Mike was the kind of guy who you knew just “had things figured out”.  You weren’t sure how, but you knew that Mike was going to get the job done.

He always seemed to have unique and creative deals working and he truly was a self-made man.

Like me, I know he was passionate about his career and did what he believed in.  From reading his obituary, I know he had people he cared about in his life, and he had several recreational pursuits that he enjoyed.

I know this is not our typical blog post, but this really hit me this week, and I wanted to take a moment to reflect on Michaels life with the question:

Am I doing what I can to live as fully as possible while I am here? 

The answer for me is most days, Yes!  I love working in industrial real estate, and helping people to achieve and sustain their dreams of owning or leasing commercial real estate in Utah and nationally.

I am blessed with an incredible wife and two dogs, (who are more like our kids).  We travel extensively and get to spend time pursuing our hobbies.  We engage with the community and volunteer to organizations and people we care about. 

My life is full and blessed. 

It is my hope that you are living fully and realizing your dreams.  Make a point to reach out to someone you care about and let them know it today!

Michael Bradley
1968-2013

Utah Industrial Market Attracting More Institutional Money

Cole Corporate Income Trust announced this week the purchase of seven new assets including a 150,000 square foot distribution facility leased by Fedex Ground in Salt Lake City. Why should Salt Lake be on the radar for national institutional money? Although Salt Lake City is only number 48 in terms of size of population in the rankings of metropolitan areas, it is ranked number 14th in square feet per person of national warehouse markets on the path of goods movement.  Due to Salt Lake’s position on this pathway, moving materials to manufacturers and from manufacturers to retailers, it contributes to keeping demand for warehouse space high and vacancies low. It is also one of the reasons why Industrial Real Estate in Utah will continue to attract institutional investment.

Fiscal Cliff Resolution?!

Congress has given the markets some much needed clarity in regards to the fiscal cliff and taxes. Some of the highlights in the news from the recent congressional action include:

• A permanent extension of the Bush tax cuts for the middle class
• An increase in taxes for couples earning over $450,000 (individuals earning $400,000) from 35% to 39.6%
• An increase in the dividend and capital gains tax rates for couples earning $450,000 ($400,000 for individuals) from 15% to 20%

o    (plus a 3.8% surcharge for the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare)

• An increase on estate tax from 35% to 40%, with an exemption up to $5,000,000 per couple
• A permanent fix to the Alternative Minimum Tax with an index to inflation
• An extension of the unemployment benefits for another year
• No extension of the temporary 2% payroll tax cut from the Bush era

One of the biggest benefits of the decisions of the last few days is some decisions were made and market uncertainty in some regards has been eliminated. Still left on the agenda for congressional action:

• No resolution to the $110 billion  in spending cuts that was to be enacted January 1, 2013 as part of sequestration (postponed for two months)
• No increase to the debt ceiling, which also needs to be addressed in two months

SIOR of the Year Award Luncheon

We would like to send a big congratulations to our own Michael Jeppesen for the successful execution of the first ever “Utah SIOR of the Year Award Luncheon” this past Wednesday. As president of the Utah SIOR chapter, Michael came up with the idea for the event as a way to bring recognition to the accomplishments of some of the Utah SIOR Chapter Members. The event brought together who we believe to be the best in class of the Utah Real Estate Market including, SIOR Chapter Members, Developers, Owners, and fellow Real Estate Practitioners. 

We could not be more proud of Michael and his success with this first ever event!

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