Casey Roloff is the visionary behind Seabrook, Washington—a purpose-built, walkable town inspired by new urbanist principles and over two decades in the making.

In this episode, he shares how low leverage, long-term thinking, and a deep respect for timeless town design helped Seabrook survive market cycles and become a model for a new kind of American development.

We also dive into his vision for scaling this movement, his take on car-centric suburbia, and what it will take to make great places accessible to the next generation of homeowners.

The Thesis Driven Leader Series is made possible with the support of Neutral. Neutral is redefining multifamily real estate with a focus on sustainability, resident health and well-being. For example, Neutral is building the tallest mass timber and Passive House residential building in the U.S with a state-of-art wellness club in Milwaukee. Beyond environmental impact, Neutral offers investors access to substantial sustainable tax credits and deductions. Accredited investors can explore available opportunities at invest.neutral.us or connect directly with their team to learn more.

What does it take to build a world-class tech strategy inside one of America’s largest multifamily REITs? Rukus Esi, the Chief Digital Officer at AvalonBay Communities and today’s guest, is in the driver’s seat. From centralization and AI to predictive maintenance and PropTech fatigue, Rukus joins us to share how AvalonBay vets new technology, pilots solutions across 90,000+ units, and stays ahead in a rapidly evolving PropTech landscape. If you’re building for—or operating in—multifamily, this is a must-listen about what it takes to deploy and scale technology in real estate.

The Thesis Driven Leader Series is made possible with the support of Neutral. Neutral is redefining multifamily real estate with a focus on sustainability, resident health and well-being. For example, Neutral is building the tallest mass timber and Passive House residential building in the U.S with a state-of-art wellness club in Milwaukee. Beyond environmental impact, Neutral offers investors access to substantial sustainable tax credits and deductions. Accredited investors can explore available opportunities at invest.neutral.us or connect directly with their team to learn more.

Real estate capital markets are undergoing a tremendous transformation, with tried-and-true strategies no longer offering the opportunities they once did. Today’s guest, Brandon Sedloff, has a unique perspective on the changes afoot.

As Chief Real Estate Officer at investment management software platform Juniper Square, Sedloff has a special view of the real estate investment landscape. In today’s episode, he’ll share some of those insights and dig into the changes on the horizon.

This episode covers Juniper Square’s journey–where Sedloff was employee #5–as well as the state of the capital markets, evolutions in the investment management world, and advice for real estate sponsors hitting the fundraising trail.

Sedloff has a perspective unlike any other, so you won’t want to miss this conversation.

The Thesis Driven Leader Series is made possible with the support ofNeutral. Neutral is redefining multifamily real estate with a focus on sustainability, resident health and well-being. For example, Neutral is building the tallest mass timber and Passive House residential building in the U.S with a state-of-art wellness club in Milwaukee. Beyond environmental impact, Neutral offers investors access to substantial sustainable tax credits and deductions. Accredited investors can explore available opportunities atinvest.neutral.us orconnect directly with their team to learn more.

Being a real estate developer can be a lonely business. But one builder is making it a little less so. This episode’s guest, Sean Sweeney, has built an audience by telling the story of life as a developer, warts and all.

Co-founder of Hall Sweeney Properties, Sweeney built a reputation as a thoughtful multifamily builder in the Minneapolis area. We’ll discuss his development work and story as well as his efforts to build camaraderie–online and offline–in the real estate community. The episode will also touch on how cities could make better housing policy and the secrets to success as an aspiring real estate developer.

Sean Sweeney has a unique way of approaching the real estate development journey, so I’d encourage everyone to check this one out!

The Thesis Driven Leader Series is made possible with the support ofNeutral. Neutral is redefining multifamily real estate with a focus on sustainability, resident health and well-being. For example, Neutral is building the tallest mass timber and Passive House residential building in the U.S with a state-of-art wellness club in Milwaukee. Beyond environmental impact, Neutral offers investors access to substantial sustainable tax credits and deductions. Accredited investors can explore available opportunities at invest.neutral.us or connect directly with their team to learn more.

The blending of apartments and hotels has been one of the biggest real estate trends of the past decade. And this episode’s guest, Roman Pedan, co-founder and CEO of Kasa, has had a front row seat.

This episode is a wide-ranging conversation covering the future of multifamily, the role and evolution of flex rentals, and technologies on the horizon that have the potential to overturn real estate conventional wisdom.

We’ll also discuss how Kasa has navigated the tumultuous post-pandemic years, which have seen a number of flex rental operators struggle and fail, as well as how real estate owners should approach innovation and the capital markets.

Roman is one of the most thoughtful real estate entrepreneurs I know, so you won’t want to miss this conversation.

The Thesis Driven Leader Series is made possible with the support ofNeutral. Neutral is redefining multifamily real estate with a focus on sustainability, resident health and well-being. For example, Neutral is building the tallest mass timber and Passive House residential building in the U.S with a state-of-art wellness club in Milwaukee. Beyond environmental impact, Neutral offers investors access to substantial sustainable tax credits and deductions. Accredited investors can explore available opportunities atinvest.neutral.us orconnect directly with their team to learn more.

How many venture investors once ran a residential real estate brokerage?

Era Ventures Founder and Managing Partner Clelia Peters just might be the only one. In 2014, she took the reins at Warburg Realty, her family’s real estate brokerage firm and the largest independent brokerage in NYC. Along the way, she built one of the most impressive backgrounds in proptech investing, co-founding top accelerator program MetaProp and joining Bain Capital Ventures as a Venture Partner.

Since going off on our own and founding Era Ventures with partner Raja Ghawi in 2021, Peters has taken an unorthodox approach to proptech venture investing. She’s hasn’t been afraid to bet on sticks-and-bricks concepts, backing companies working in the physical world including Truehold and Welcome Homes.

Our conversation digs into her investment thesis as well as the broader real estate tech landscape, her process, the future of sticks-and-bricks concepts, and much more.

Season Two is made possible with the support of Neutral. Neutral is redefining multifamily real estate with a focus on sustainability, resident health and well-being. For example, Neutral is building the tallest mass timber and Passive House residential building in the U.S with a state-of-art wellness club in Milwaukee. Beyond environmental impact, Neutral offers investors access to substantial sustainable tax credits and deductions. Accredited investors can explore available opportunities at invest.neutral.us or connect directly with their team to learn more.

While Charles Marohn began his career as an engineer, he soon realized that the problems plaguing American urban design - particularly in the suburbs - ran deep. So he quit his engineering job and began writing about how to redesign cities for livability and people rather than cars. His work - including books Strong Towns and Confessions of a Recovering Engineer - became very influential in the New Urbanist movement and the past decade of innovation in urban design and real estate development.

In this episode, Marohn joins Brad on the final episode of Season One of the Thesis Driven Leader Series to discuss the future of cities. We'll touch on the design and policy interventions that would save lives and improve our cities' finances as well as how real estate developers should approach designing better places. We'll also discuss the role that technology can - and cannot - play in making cities better.

Marohn brings a perspective and insights that will be relevant for anyone looking to innovate in the built world.

Real estate is nothing without people. Even the most beautiful, historic spaces occasionally need a boost, and Stephanie Blake is the magician making that happen. As CEO of Skylight, she’s responsible for activating spaces ranging from New York’s Moynihan Station and St. John’s Terminal to San Francisco’s Ferry Building and Detroit’s Michigan Central Station.

Blake has built a reputation working with governments, brands, and real estate developers to build a sense of place and activity in incredible and often unconventional spaces. This week, she speaks with Brad about how she uses placemaking activations to bring vibrancy, purpose, and community to real estate of all types.

Placemaking strategies have gained popularity for a variety of reasons; they help developers drive interim revenue, market a space that might be challenging for the public to understand and encourage businesses to come to an area that might otherwise be lacking. Skylight’s brand of activation is a powerful toolkit for developers and governments alike, particularly as cities reconsider the role of offices, gathering places and central business districts in a post-pandemic world.

Through her work, Blake puts her background in history to work. Each Skylight project begins with studying the context of space including both the history and the neighborhood. And it culminates working with brands to create extraordinary experiences in those spaces like NY Fashion Week, food festivals and concerts - to name just a few.

This interview is full of rich insights about how developers can position their spaces to be welcoming places from day one, including the power of a blank canvas and lessons for operators repurposing challenging spaces.