COVER STORY
DENNIS CISTERNA
In 2000, one of Cisterna’s first on-the-road assignments was a market evaluation for a master-planned community in Denver called Stapleton. “It was an old airport that was being redeveloped, and I remember thinking how cool it was that there were going to be 20,000 houses in that development,” he said. “A few years later, I drove through Stapleton on another assignment, and it was just awesome to see the neighborhoods I had been consulting on were built and had families living in them. It was just a neat, fulfilling experience that created a passion that never really left me.” Today, Cisterna lives in that Stapleton community. for cutting-edge tools and advances in sector-related services and technology.” Cisterna cited the evolution of private capital as an example of big business benefitting smaller investors. “There used to be few or no options outside of Fannie and Freddie or hard-money lenders if you wanted to finance an SFR rental property. Now, the industry has billions of dollars available for that purpose, and markets all over the country and investors at all levels have benefited from that shift,” he said. Another example: property management services, Cisterna said. “There are so many different types of technology today that enable smaller investors to grow and leverage their
“EVEN IF I’MMAKING DECISIONSTOBUY ORRENOVATE HUNDREDSOR THOUSANDS OFHOUSES, IN THEBACKOFMY MIND I KNOW THE FINISHED PRODUCT, REGARDLESSOF WHATSERVICE I’MPROVIDING, ISAPLACE FORAHAPPY HOMEOWNEROR AHAPPYRENTER TOHAVE SAFETY, SECURITY, AND PEACEOFMIND.”
advantage of everything they can “from the top down” in the real estate industry. Likewise, he said, it is the responsibility of the industry giants to drive evolution, progress, services, and technology. “There is a place in every asset class for small investors and big investors. Small investors own more of the market, but larger institutions drive change,” he explained. “Smaller investors should not be threatened by the presence of true institutional investors (companies, by Cisterna’s definition, that have hundreds of millions in assets under management) in the market. Those are the companies that you can look to for unique insights and innovations. They are the catalysts for development,
closely with Blackstone Group to create B2R Finance in 2013 to serve that underserved population of investors.
jumped in with both feet.”
how it’s shaped going forward,” Cisterna said. “I’m fully vested into this sector for the remainder of my career.”
A PASSION FOR EVOLUTION Cisterna’s version of “jumping in with both feet” involved a transition to Johnson Capital in early 2013 to run their Opportunistic Finance Group and expand capital-raising opportunities within the residential investment space. Within a few months he had teamed up with Blackstone Group, the largest alternative investment firm in the world, to co-create B2R Finance. “That was a huge evolutionary piece of the puzzle for the SFR industry,” he observed. “No one else at the time was offering term financing for single-family rental portfolios on a national basis, and we developed a process to offer them five- and 10-year fixed-rate loans.” B2R Finance was one of the first private lenders focused on providing term financing for single-family residential (SFR) rental property investors. Dennis Cisterna (at Johnson Capital at the time) worked
Today, B2R is part of Finance Company of America.
A PLACE FOR EVERY INVESTOR ON THE CUTTING EDGE OF INDUSTRY For someone with a background in “big finance” and institutional investing, Cisterna’s interest in the SFR space is surprisingly oriented on the individual household and the individual investor. “Making money is great, but there is also something inherently attractive about residential investments in general. Investors should feel really good when they see the fruits of their labor resulting in people having the ability to own or rent a good home that they want to live in. You don’t get that same kind of feeling if you finance an office building,” he said honestly. Because of his background working with hedge funds and huge investment firms, Cisterna believes the best way for real estate investors running relatively small real estate businesses to thrive is to take
From there, Cisterna moved to FirstKey Lending, a subsidiary of Cerberus Capital Management, and one of the leading private investment firms in the nation. “We completed the first multi-borrower SFR rental securitization in the market and set a precedent for that type of private lending for the future at the same time,” he said. In 2016, he moved to Investability as the company’s chief revenue officer and was selected to serve as the CEO of the company in mid-2017. “I feel like this company and my position is the natural continuation of fulfilling that prophecy of taking the single-family investment sector to the next level. My background really fits well into where this industry is headed and, as a thought leader in the space, I want to make sure I can continue to be an architect for
Investability Solutions offers an extensive set of services to the institutional SFR investment community in a single, seamless platform including renovation services, property management, acquisitions, data analytics and brokerage services. Investability Solutions is part of the Altisource Portfolio Solutions S.A. (NASDAQ: ASPS) family of businesses. For more information visit investability.com
DENNIS CISTERNA
24 | think realty magazine :: may 2018
thinkrealty . com | 25
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