Industry Profile: Stephen Price of Graywood - Part 1

Recently, NewInHomes.com’s friend Stephen Price was announced as the new President and CEO of Graywood Developments. So we decided to meet up with Stephen to learn more about his history, his new job, and his goals for Graywood moving forward.

Part 1 of our conversation focuses on Stephen’s background and how he made his way to Graywood.

NewInHomes (NIH): Simple question — why real estate?

Stephen Price (SP): This is a fun business. At first, I didn’t envision real estate as a career. But funny enough, real estate, development in particular, is the most stimulating job of all. Every project is the process of starting and completing a company, and you’re essentially taking that company public, going to the investors and seeing it through. You also have three or four going at each time; each building affected by different local forces, politics, policy, constraints, different consumers, so it’s a fascinating business and one I’m extremely enthusiastic to be a part of.

NIH: How did you get your start in the business?

SP: Real estate was the first decision that I made, and I made that decision in business school at the University of Ontario. My father was an entrepreneur and ran a multitude of businesses. One of his businesses was manufacturing and distributing chemicals. At one time, he was running his business out of a leased building that was not suiting his needs, so he decided that he would buy a piece of land and build his own building. That was my first exposure to the business. I found it interesting that you could build something for your specific needs from nothing. I watched my father lay bricks, instructing the team – it got my feet wet at a very early age.

With that in mind, I moved off to university to study commerce. To be truthful, I couldn’t really envision doing anything other than business. While in school, I picked up specific skills, accounting, finance, etc. I started to gain a further interest in the entrepreneurial side of business. I then transferred to Western and realized that I had a lot of paths. Some students were interested in investment banking, and that was something that I looked at as well; however, I couldn’t face sitting in the same cubical day after day on a trading floor. Even though the issues were diverse and global, that lacked the tangible aspect that real estate possesses. So I turned down those opportunities and instead took a position with a small family real estate company based in Bradford., Ont., which was run by the Orsi Family.

NIH: What was your role with Orsi?

SP: I worked for a gentleman named Lou Orsi, but primarily worked beside his son Angelo, who was the same age as I. The idea was that with my business school background, I might help bolster the business acumen within the company, specifically with the young son who was about to inherit a substantial portfolio. I worked alongside Angelo and the rest of his team for a few years in the early ‘90s. It was something I loved right away, but the time just didn’t work. The early ‘90s was not a great time to be involved in the real estate business.

NIH: What was your next step?

SP: From there, I went to work with a company that worked in real estate advisory, working with owners who had problems – financing problems, leasing issues, etc. We started to provide services to those people under the banner ‘Corporate Planning Associates.’ I was in the real estate division for eight years restructuring real estate. Through that process we ran a portfolio of over 60 properties over many asset classes. We were executing leases, working with property managers, redeveloping shopping centres – we had our hands on every aspect of the business and oversaw a fairly substantial portfolio of properties.

Our investors kept asking what the next step was, so we determined to seek out a liquidity program for them. For the assets that fit together, we would design a plan. The assets that did not fit together, we sold separately on behalf of the owners. The more conventional retail properties fit together into a corporation. Each owner agreed to exchange their assets for a share of a bigger company that held a collection of much bigger assets. We then took that new portfolio public. At that point I was the Executive Vice-President, the Vice-President of Financing, as well as the Vice-President of Acquisitions. My partner was the CEO, and we ran that business for two and a half years. In September of 2000, we completed a sale of the business. From 1990 to 2000, all of my activity was development, finance, acquisitions — anything that you could possibly do in real estate.

NIH: That seems like a lot of experience in a short time. Was the plan to then make a move into development?

SP: From that point, I took time off and attempted to figure out what my next move would be. I joined Great West Life Realty Advisors as the Head of Acquisitions for Eastern Canada, which included Ontario, which took up two-thirds of their total investment activities. At that time, they were Canada Life; we did some other acquisitions and then entered into a massive disposition program. That went quite well and I was asked by the president what type of role I would be interested in, and I took over the multi-family rental apartment building portfolio, and I stayed there for another four years. It didn’t have a residential focus initially, but it became a key focus as the years moved on. From there, I was recruited to join Graywood.

Part 2 of our conversation with Stephen will focus on his decision to join Graywood, and his vision for the company moving forward. Look for Part 2 next week!