About Us
Developers and builders can no longer 'just guess' when launching a project. From planning to financing to sales and marketing, builders must make rigorous, objective, and accurate decisions.
We work as trusted consultants, advisors, or (on occasion), as partners with our developer clients.
Our goal is to help you realize your vision by providing you with strong, strategic assistance and execution. Our services are flexible; we can work on an a la carte basis, or provide turnkey assistance in the areas you delegate to us. Our compensation is primarily performance based and is designed to align your objectives with ours.
Our focus is on the high-impact issues facing real estate development. From capital raising, to strategic positioning, to pre-sales or lender workouts, our team is focused on providing realistic, rigorous, objective, and highly value added services.
Our team includes:
David Camp
David has contributed to over $1 billion in real estate sales. Working with such prestigious brands as the Ritz Carlton, Centex Destination Properties, Lowe's, and the Ginn Company, David brings a wealth of sales leadership to clients. He has hired, trained and managed sales teams from Florida, Texas, Hawaii, and the Cayman Islands. He has won numerous awards as salesman and manager. He maintains an extensive network of industry relationships which help him jump start sales and the sales teams for his clients.
Omar M. Pedraza, JD.
Omar is currently Director of Business Development for EquityLock Financial. Prior to joining EquityLock,he was Managing Director, Axiom Realty Capital responsible for all investment banking services. Omar also spent four years with Banc of America Securities and left as Senior Vice President, Equity Research Analyst in 2001. In 1999, as a result of his modeling, his senior analyst’s earnings estimates were ranked the most accurate by Wall Street Journal. Omar also spent one and a half years at Merrill Lynch on the futures, options and derivatives desk and one year as equity research analyst for a hedge fund in Hong Kong outsourced by Soros Funds. He has also worked as a consultant for capital raising activities for a captive insurance company and a real estate ‘destination’ club. Omar has a B.S. in Accounting and a Juris Doctorate, both from Brigham Young University.
Doug Bendt
Mr. Bendt was the director of research for C-BASS from 2002-2007, creating models of mortgage credit and prepayments as well as home prices for the industry’s largest investor in below-investment grade mortgage-backed securities. Prior to joining C-BASS, Mr. Bendt was the president and founder of Mortgage Risk Assessment Corporation (MRAC) from 1992 until its sale in 2002; MRAC produced home price indexes and an industry-leading automated property valuation model, which are now distributed by the First American Corporation. He was also the founder of the mortgage securities division of Dow Jones Telerate, which produced a proprietary short-run prepayment model, the Advance Factor Service (AFS). His prior stints included credit strategy at First Chicago and the Treasury Economics Group of Chase Manhattan. He received his masters’degree in economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison as well as his bachelors’ degree in psychology and political science.
Jon Thielan
Jon is also the Managing Director of New Condos Online and NCO Capital (see www.newcondosonline.com), the leading online publication for multi-unit developments. While at New Condos Online, he was instrumental in ramping up sales and traffic, placing hundreds of clients in front of more than 300,000 site visitors monthly. He also personally negotiated over $200M of real estate between developers and his portfolio of investment groups. Jon has been a frequent keynote speaker at industry events focusing on real estate private equity and distressed real estate investment opportunities.
Jim McDermott
Jim began his career on Wall Street. Beginning at a specialty mid-tier broker/dealer and investment banking firm he became CEO of the company advancing through the bond department, investment banking, research and sales. Under his leadership the company grew from $40 million to $150 million in annual revenues and from 40 employees to 155+. Currently his work focuses on denovo banking, research, privatization strategy, and purchases of distressed debt portfolios and consulting on capitalization needs for real estate and middle market companies.
Mike Bishop, JD.
An attorney by training, Mike is an entrepreneur and has established several successful ventures. Most recently he negotiated over $400 million in structured preconstruction stage real estate purchases. Mike was previously a principal with a wealth planning firm for high net worth individuals where the firm managed financial transactions of over $100,000,000 per year. Transactions included financial derivatives, estate planning, captive insurance management, and other alternative risk transfer structures. Mike has a Bachelor’s degrees in History and a Juris Doctorate degree. Out of law school, he worked as director of regulatory affairs for an insurance holding company.
Roger Hall
Most recently, Roger was responsible for raising institutional capital from pension funds, endowments and fund of funds for co-mingled real estate funds. In this capacity, Roger was responsible for helping funds tailor their investment strategy, geographic focus and overall presentation to fit the demands of the institutional investor community.
Prior to raising institutional capital, Roger worked as an associate for the Edgewater Funds, a $1 billion Chicago-based private equity firm, where he was responsible for assisting senior investment professionals with identifying new investment opportunities, performing due diligence on companies and markets and monitoring existing portfolio companies. Prior to the Edgewater Funds, Roger was a senior associate for a regional investment bank based in Southern California and was intimately involved in equity and merger and acquisition transactions totaling approximately $200 million.
Roger started his career at the FDIC in 1991. Roger has a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Management from Brigham Young University and a MBA from the University of Chicago.
Michael I. Connolly, MBA
Michael has over 25 years experience helping business leaders and owners create exceptional value for companies in in transition by combining business development skills and financing capabilities. Mr. Connolly is responsible for capitalization, leadership development, profit and loss and exit strategies for client companies. He is expert at developing teammates through goal alignment and motivating a team to be their collective best.
As founder of Mount Juliet Ventures he has most recently transformed successful private and public national companies including Softbrands, ElderLife, Insignia Systems, Jamba Juice, Great Clips for Hair, Chili's, SuperCuts and The Hotel Donaldson. Previously, Mr. Connolly was Chief Operating Officer of Trammel Crow Company, where he restructured over $300 million in commercial debt. He was the founder and President of the Tax and Business Services Division at American Express, Inc. where he grew revenues from zero to $25 million in three years. Mr. Connolly began his career with McKinsey and Company as a management consultant. Mr. Connolly has a BA in History from Pomona College , and an MBA with honors from the Harvard Business School.
Michael has three children: Nellie, Mary and Paul. He enjoys a wide range of cultural and outdoor activities. Michael also enjoys "operating at the edge of his ignorance" by remaining curious about new ideas. His business passion is growing or turning around companies while getting the best from his teammates.