How I got here

Background & Inspiration

I spent five years learning New York City block by block, first in retail leasing, then in investment sales. Now I'm building a company, and it turns out founders need the same thing brokers do: you have to actually understand people, what they want and what they need, before they'll trust you with anything.

I've lived in a lot of places before Manhattan stuck. I’ve called Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Colorado home at some point in my life. That kind of moving around teaches you to read a room fast, which turns out to be useful whether you're pitching an owner on an exclusive listing or trying to convince someone to use software that doesn't exist yet.

Photography has always been a passion of mine, but I never took it seriously until I filled in for a photographer at the last minute and realized I could actually make some money doing it on the side. That accident turned into a real part of how I spend my time now.

Career snapshot

Raven Property Advisors (Investment Sales) — Senior Director of Investment Sales, promoted within a year. Ran underwriting, pitches, and deal execution on multifamily and mixed-use assets across NYC. Learned that the sale is never really about the spreadsheet, it's about whether the client believes you'll be straight with them when the numbers get complicated.

Meridian Capital Group (Retail Leasing) — Represented tenants and advised landlords across Manhattan, from sourcing space to closing terms. Learned how to read a neighborhood and match a business to a block before either side knew it was a fit.

Four Winds Interactive (Business Development) — My first exposure to a "real" software company. They were funded and growing, and I had the view from the bottom up, at first setting meetings for sellers, then working on how to best sharpen my own sales pitches.

Nolan Transportation Group (Business Development) — My first real job. A classic boiler room of a sales floor. We were in at 6am, music blaring, people yelling across the room to book trucks at rates before they moved. A whirlwind of an experience early on. Sink or swim. Dial or be fired.

That run through commercial real estate is also where I started studying for a Master's in Real Estate Finance at NYU, which gave me the underwriting instincts I still lean on now, even outside of real estate.

What's next

I'm currently building Fora, my first company, while still shooting photography on the side. Most days that means writing product specs in the morning and editing photos at night, which is a strange but honest way to live. I write about both halves of it here, on Raw Files: the founder side, the photography side, and the places where they collide.