🏙️ a dream on paper

Good morning. It's Sunday, June 28, and in this week's edition, we're covering how far Downtown LA office has fallen, with a Bunker Hill tower that fetched $430 a foot a decade ago now trading near $150, what core inflation running north of 4% means for your borrowing costs now that a September rate hike is back on the table, and a guest Deep Dive from my partner Rafik Moore on why the only dream that ever gets built is the one you put on paper. First time reading? Sign up here.

And, as always, send us feedback at [email protected].

The Real Deal lays out how far Downtown LA office has fallen, and the per-foot math tells the story. A decade ago, Bank of America Plaza on Bunker Hill was worth $605 million, about $430 a foot. Today, Capital Group owns it for $210 million, about $150 a foot. A neighboring tower once traded near $465 a foot. Now it is valued around $120. Before the pandemic, DTLA office ran about $450 a foot. Today the comps cluster between $100 and $150, with vacancy pushing 35%. Brookfield drove much of the slide, defaulting on a $400 million loan on BofA Plaza and a $500 million loan on the Wells Fargo Center North Tower, which 601W then grabbed for $180 million. The counter-signal: Carolwood and Rising are still signing 15- and 26-year leases at the reset basis, where private capital buys and institutions already left.

"I Investigated Jeff Bezos' Secret $16B AI Company": Andreas Klinger digs into Project Prometheus, Bezos's stealth $16.2 billion venture backed by BlackRock, Goldman, and JP Morgan at a $40 billion-plus valuation. The goal is an "AWS for manufacturing" - idea to design to prototype to factory floor in one loop. For industrial operators, this is the demand side of the reshoring story: who builds, where, and how much space it eats. Watch here

"Day in The Life of a Commercial Real Estate Investor": Graham Storey spends a day with an investor who owns $400 million in real estate, touring properties and breaking down how his thinking shifted from buying houses to buying warehouses. A grounded look at the boring, repeatable work behind a portfolio that size, with no hype attached. Watch here

Politico reports the Fed's preferred inflation gauge rose at a 4.1% annual rate last month, more than double the 2% target, with core PCE running at its fastest pace in almost three years. Markets now price a 64% chance that new Fed chair Kevin Warsh hikes as soon as September, a sharp reversal from the cuts Trump has demanded heading into the midterms. Bank of America's team expects three-quarters of a point in hikes by year-end; other desks still see a hold. The wild card is energy: oil and gas have plunged since the Iran conflict wound down, and two-year yields fell after the report, so the hike trade could fade as fast as it appeared.

CRE Impact: The rate-cut thesis is dead for now, and a hike is back on the table. Anyone underwriting a 2026-2027 refi off lower rates is modeling the wrong direction. Stress-test for flat-to-higher debt costs and build real cushion, because the Fed is not riding to the rescue before the election.

Blueprint for Your Dream Life

This week's Deep Dive belongs to Rafik Moore - close friend, partner, and someone whose thinking I trust. Here's Rafik.

I've built several houses in my life. And every time I walk through a finished one - walls straight, lights glowing, rooms waiting for furniture - I'm reminded of something simple:

Every house begins as an idea.

Before the walls. Before the windows. Before a single nail, the whole house exists only in someone's mind. Then it goes on paper. And from that moment, something invisible starts turning real. Your life works the exact same way.

The blueprint comes first. Nobody starts a house by pouring concrete. They start by imagining it - the rooms, the windows, the life that unfolds inside. That vision becomes drawings. The drawings become a blueprint. Most people never draw one for their own future. They wake up, work, pay bills, repeat. They're building hard - just not their house. Someone else's. A dream in your head is a fantasy. A dream on paper is a blueprint. Write it down. Make it specific enough to feel real.

Every builder needs an architect. When I met my mentor Alex, he already had a $100M portfolio. He became my architect - showed me how the structure worked. How to finance, how to weigh risk, how to build relationships. More than that, he gave me access: bankers, capital partners, deal flow. I don't think I'd be where I am without him. The path is shorter than you think - but only if someone who's walked it shows you the way. So go find them. Offer value. Show up humble. Then listen more than you talk.

Pick one lane. We live in an incredible time - a laptop and Wi-Fi give you more opportunity than most kings ever had. But abundance is its own trap. Too many shiny objects. Too many half-built houses with the foundation exposed to the rain. I've fallen for it more than I'd like to admit. The antidote is uncomfortable in its simplicity: pick one lane, commit to one system, and say no - firmly - to everything else. Ray Dalio said it best: you can have anything, but you can't have everything. Every great builder went deep, not wide.

No one builds alone. A house needs many hands - plumbers, electricians, inspectors. A portfolio is no different: investors, bankers, brokers, contractors. Deal by deal, brick by brick, the structure rises.

Your life is a construction project. Time passes either way. The only question is whether you'll pick up the brick in your hand.

- Rafik Moore