Straight Talk From a Business Rebel
1591848237
Sam Zell
Notes
I want to see what they are like on their home court, how they treat their people and the examples they set.
…my real compensation for that job wasn’t monetary. It was learning about and getting comfortable with rejection.
I fully realized the value of tenacity. I just had to assume there was a way through any obstacle, and then I’d find it. This is perhaps my most fundamental principle of entrepreneurialism, and to success in general.
By the time I got through both of those projects, I realized development was more complex and risky than I had thought. In addition to problems with the blueprints, city regulators can change the game midstream with new fees and costs; the economy can shift, causing tenant demand to evaporate during the time it takes to get the building up; banks can come down on you; and on and on.
Jay (Pritzker) taught me to use simplicity as a strategy. He had an uncanny ability to grasp an extremely complex situation and immediately locate the weakness…I like to say my father taught me how to be, law school taught me how to think, Jay taught me how to understand risk.
It was a lesson neither of us ever forgot, and we referred to it often. The deal’s not done until it’s done.
…first-mover advantage requires conviction…I am not a reckless person, but taking risks is really the only way to consistently achieve above-average returns…An entrepreneur is anyone who is independent, creative, inventive, and willing to take risks.
Replacement cost mattered more to me than rents or comparable prices or vacancies or economic growth or stock price. This was because replacement cost determined the price of future competition.
Sentimentality about an asset leads to a lack of discipline.
You cant wish potential on someone else.
Zeckendorf: The Autobiography of the Man who Played a Real-Life Game of Monopoly and Won the Largest Real Estate Empire in History.