Staying Code Compliant To Protect Your Portfolio with Brian Seymour

Presenter:

What's up everybody, and welcome back to another episode of Loop It In, The DoorLoop Podcast where we pick the brains of experts in property management, real estate and investing. Tech? We cover it. Marketing? That too. So whether you want actionable tips or the insider scoop from top performers in their industries, this is one show you won't want to miss. Be sure to subscribe so you won't miss out on any future episode.

David:

Hey everyone, this is Dave Bitton, co-founder and CMO of DoorLoop, and I'll be your host for today's show. If you're tuning into our audio-only podcast, you can also watch the video version of this on our website at doorloop.com/podcast. We're going to be joined today by Brian Seymour, a prominent real estate lawyer that's been practicing real estate law for nearly 30 years now. He's currently a shareholder and partner at Gunster law firm and the co-chair of their Real Property practice. He also represents landowners, developers, landlords, and property managers that are either doing ground-up development side plans and legal issues once they're actually managing the property. He's also deeply involved in the local community and gives back a lot of his time to numerous foundations and charities and actually told me before this talk that he just loves giving back, solving problems and helping people, and that's why he does what he does today.

So today, we're going to talk about how landlords and property managers can protect themselves from code enforcement violations or even getting a government lien on their property. We're also going to discuss Brian's vision for Florida and the future of property management and also how to maximize your property valuations. So Brian, thank you again so much for joining us.

Brian:

It's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for giving me the opportunity.

David:

Of course.

Brian:

Great to see you.

David:

You too, you too. Always a pleasure. So tell everyone, first and foremost, about yourself and your journey to where you got to today. It's a long journey, but let's make it short.

Brian:

Well, I'm 53, so I'm not going to start from zero, but I actually ... it's an interesting journey because I grew up on welfare in Southern California and put myself through college. I was in the military and figured out I wanted to be a lawyer but didn't know what I wanted to do. I thought I did and ended up never doing what I thought I wanted to do.

So a lot of my journey has been a bit circuitous, but what I found was that what I really love to do is help people, I wanted ... in a lot of different ways, and I can't help everybody. I'm not silly enough to believe that, and I certainly have two kids in college and a mortgage and a wife, so I can't be a complete bleeding heart. But in my practice, what I like to do is self-solve problems. I like to do that. And that comes from growing up, needing help and always looking for ways, in both philanthropy and business, to provide value to people and help them out when they have issues. And what career has taken the path towards 98% somehow related to property, commercial real [inaudible 00:03:09].

David:

Wow. So I may have missed that in the beginning you said you always knew you wanted to be a lawyer?

Brian:

No, I actually had no idea. I was a military police officer. In 1991, I went to Saudi Arabia. I was in college and took some time off and went to Saudi Arabia, came back and realized that life was too short to be an accountant, for me. I was studying, but it's not my personality type. And started looking at what I wanted to do, and one of my professors pulled me aside and said, "You need to go to law school." This is what you were ..." maybe I argued too much in class, but it really was the directive, someone who said, "You can do more."

It's hard when you grow up on welfare, when you don't have an image of something to follow, to figure out where you want to go. You think what you can see. And he brought in that scope for me and gave me that opportunity to think broader.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

Pushed me, and thank God I will. And he's just passed unfortunately, but I will always think of him. And I told him over the course of decades, numerous times, how much I'm grateful for him, for my life.

David:

Wow, incredible. So you became a lawyer, and then when did you decide that you wanted to get into the real estate industry?

Brian:

I didn't. I loved my property professor, my first year of law school, and I worked on a textbook with her my first summer between my first and second year of law school. And fast-forward a couple of years, when I moved to Florida, I got an offer to come work at Gunster where I've been now for over 26 years.

David:

Oh, wow.

Brian:

And it was primarily looking at litigation, but the firm happened to need someone to work on property rights, litigation. A lot of eminent domain work, they were building ... The firm at the time was building an eminent domain practice. And I got assigned to ... Again, my story is all about people. I got assigned to the greatest mentor you could ever have, a friend, colleague, his kids, I've been to their weddings, he's been ... he was at my kids' bar mitzvahs. I mean, we were very ... He and his wife actually came to a proposal rally. I was speaking out last week.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

We're very close, and that ... he was doing this practice. And what happened over time is I really started to enjoy it. I really got into it. And because we were doing the litigation side, I was supporting a lot of the land development lawyers in their process because we might have to sue or we might get sued or challenged and helping to make sure we have all that ready.

So, I started this practice in real estate, sort of by accident, if you will, or by happenstance. And we grew this from a litigation practice to a full-scale, large ... typically larger, more complex development practice. And he's since left the practice of law because he's smarter than I am and-

David:

Recovering attorney, recovering attorney.

Brian:

He is. I actually love it. I really do. I love my job. I love what I do. It's challenging, it's stressful. But when you're in real estate and you drive around town and you can say, "Look, I made an impact." We worked on the Palm Beach outlets, which is now Tanger Outlets in West Palm Beach.

David:

Yep, I've been there.

Brian:

And we took a dilapidated property and we turned it into a vibrant property, and that then had a ripple effect. The hotel across the street suddenly did facade upgrades and started working on their landscaping.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

And property values start going. And so you can see the impact that real estate done can have on a community, despite the fact that sometimes the communities don't want it, don't like it, are afraid of it, which is totally reasonable. But when you do it and you work with the communities, you can provide a lot of value. And so for me, I fell in love with it that way.

David:

Wow, I didn't know that. I've actually stopped there a few times too, those outlets. When I would drive to and from Orlando, I would run out of electricity in my Tesla, and that's one of the super charge-

Brian:

Oh, we have charging stations for you [inaudible 00:07:16].

David:

Yeah, I'm there and you have 40 minutes to kill, you go shopping. So it's a beautiful outlet.

Brian:

It came out beautifully. And getting to work with New England Development, from inception all the way through, in fact, I'm still working on pieces of it after they sold to Clarion and now Tanger's involved. But I'll tell you, some of the greatest clients I've ever had.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

These people were wonderful people to work with. They were very sure about, they need to have a certain ways. We had to work with the city and work with our neighbors. There's a residential community immediately north about some things. And we had a lot of different issues. And then I worked with them throughout when issues would come up. And they were such phenomenal people.

David:

Amazing.

Brian:

They're good people. They care about where they're building the communities, they do it right. And it was really just a pleasure. And that at the time was the biggest project that I'd ever worked on. And then I got to do the baseball stadium for West Palm Beach which-

David:

Wow.

Brian:

... as a baseball fan I'll tell you, is ... I should have just retired at 45 because I'm not doing better than doing baseball stadium.

David:

So when you say doing ... you did a baseball stadium, you did Palm Beach House, how was Gunster and you involved?

Brian:

So it could be a variety of different things, depending on what clients' needs are, but a lot of times on those sorts of deals, I quarterbacked the entire thing. In outlets, it was largely the development approval process. There were some issues with purchase and sale. It was effectively, even though it was one property, an assembly. Because back in the day, the boxes were owned, the dirt was owned, by the retailer, so Macy's will own their box, and Sears would own their box and Penny's would own their box. And so, it was a little bit like an assemblage in that. And I had to look at how some of those issues came up in the real estate transactions, working with some really tremendous lawyers at Goulston & Storrs in Boston who were the real estate lawyers for the developer.

But the baseball stadium was, we ended up really ... all of the legal issues that came up. And so, I quarterbacked a team of lawyers that handled some corporate issues, some environmental permitting issues, land use and land development contracts between city, county, county and baseball teams.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

We had some vendor contract issues, some issues with state on funding, I mean, insurance.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

So we pulled all the pieces that we had in the law firm together, and at various times, might've had 20 lawyers and staff working on different things.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

It was very cool. I say not a day, my wife has said, not a day for seven months that I didn't work on it. Sitting at a lacrosse game, calling the architect when one of my kids got taken out of the lacrosse game, and I would come back when they get put back in and having a conversation about what we need to do but it really ... we dealt with all the contracts, all the construction contracts, all of the dispute issues that come up during the course of development like that, working with the various parties, making sure everybody was rowing the same boat. And so, that was a lot of fun, a lot of fun.

David:

Wow, wow.

Brian:

Look, I look out for clients. My goal in life is, in my practice, particularly in this case, is help my clients get to their goals. And so, what happens is they call me with a lot of different things, and even if it's not my particular area of law, I bring people to the table and then we help.

David:

You are a problem solver by nature, basically.

Brian:

Yeah, yeah. Again, it goes back to the core, right?

David:

Right.

Brian:

Of who I am.

David:

Helping.

Brian:

I see things, I want to make them better.

David:

Yeah, yeah, awesome. And by the way, congrats. I saw this recently that you became the chair of the business board in Palm Beach County. Is that right?

Brian:

Yes. October 1 was our new fiscal year, and I became the chair of the Business Development Board of Palm Beach County, which is an unbelievable honor because there are a lot of really smart people involved and people who give their time and have been asked to chair the board there is a really, really meaningful thing. And I've said a long time, I want my kids to come home. My kids are way smarter than me, both of them. One is going to be a lawyer, one's going to be an engineer, and specifically he wants to do aerospace engineering.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

What we've done with the BDB and the change of the economy here at Palm Beach County, it allows my kids to have opportunities to come back they might not have. And to now have that chance to be able to do that for a lot of other people is really cool.

David:

That's incredible. One day they'll realize how much of an impact you've had on that local system. One day.

Brian:

My kids maybe. My wife just wants to know why I'm never home.

David:

Exactly. Soon, soon. So going back to Gunster, who are your typical clients that you're helping and serving today?

Brian:

Look, we're a large commercial offer. We have almost 300 lawyers at offices at every major market in the state of Florida. And so, we tend to represent ... we represent businesses, property owners in this case particularly. And a lot of times they tend to be larger owners, we are not structured to do small deals. But one of the things I do is I keep connected with folks who can help in different ways. So, if you've got a lease that you need to do, that is not enough for us to do because you're doing a one-off on a small piece, I have a friend who I think is a phenomenal real estate lawyer, a couple of friends who are really great real estate ... and I say, "Here, go call that."

David:

Got it.

Brian:

And so, our client base really ... tends to be the more complex and people who need more, and sometimes they don't have huge issues. I've got a code enforcement matter that it seems like it's not a big deal, but it's a commercial shopping center that has enough square footage that frankly, the property manager had been trying to work through it. It was getting challenging and fines racking up day by day by day. And all of a sudden the number now became something. And I tried to help the guy with ... helping him out without charging him to try to guide, it wasn't going to happen. And so in those cases, sometimes we get in because even though it looks like it may be a small number or a small matter, it could have larger scale implications. And sometimes we do those as well, but we're always honest with the client about, "Look, this is going to cost a lot of money." I can't do something for $2,000. I can't do something for $5,000. So if the issues are not six, really seven figure issues, we don't want to necessarily get involved, but sometimes we can help them, clients, find the right place. And I find when you treat people right, that always comes back for you again.

David:

So that's actually a great segue into the next part, which is code enforcement issues. We spoke about it last time. What are some of the typical code enforcement issues you see people having?

Brian:

It could be a number of things. And from a landlord perspective, you got a little bit of a different issue because your tenants can have a code enforcement matter at the state of Florida, and I only practice in the state of Florida, so I can't speak broadly. I suspect there's some similarities across the country, particularly as Florida tends to be more property owner friendly, as a general rule. But the tenant who puts up a sign without permit doesn't get the code enforcement violation, the landlord does.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

And if a lease doesn't have a follow all compliance with laws provision, you could have a problem as a landlord saying, "Hey, you got to go fix this." You can't just self-help. You have to go through. And local governments could say, "Look, we ought to enforce our codes. Your problem with your tenant is your problem." And so, that can be a challenge for landlords a lot of times.

And the other issues are a lot of ... depending on where you are, some places are really into the sort of optics they have property made at standards. You have to keep your trees up, you have to keep your papers up, those things can come up. But you'll always get a code of enforcement from if you have a life safety issue, if you have trip hazards, you have a pavement parking lot and the pavers start popping up. Now, whether they become real trip hazards or not, because some local governments also like to raise money that way, you can have it if a dumpster enclosure isn't closed, then they come by and you get a notice. Well, how are you supposed to deal with some of that?

And so, most of the time, if you keep your property up, if you're careful about it, if it looks safe, it looks good, you're not going to have huge problems with code enforcement. It's when things start not getting taken care of and they really start noticing or they get a complaint.

David:

Interesting.

Brian:

And a complaint now has to, of the state of Florida, you can no longer do anonymous complaints. So I think you may see a little bit of a reduction in some complaints coming because the legislature passed the law to that effect. But most development orders for a new development, even if you buy it after it applies to you, you can't have offsite impacts. You can't have offsite flooding. Well, if you don't take care of your drains and all of a sudden you've got water going onto your neighbor's property, you got to fix that. And the notice provisions apply. If you get a code enforcement notice, don't email. Don't guess, don't think, call, pick up the phone. If you can't get a call, then you shoot an email because you do want to document that you're trying to do the right thing. And ask them to come out. Because a lot of times what happens with the code enforcement notice is they'll cite a code provision that says property maintenance. Well, I've got a 12 acre piece of property, or I've got a two buildings on it. Well, which piece and where? Which tree died?

David:

Wow.

Brian:

And to say, "Okay, let's go out together. Show me what you need me to do, document that," so that you can, then when it gets done, you can say, "Okay, here's what we've done." And if you're very careful and if you've got a decent and reasonable code enforcement officer, which a lot of them are, they tend to not be bad people. And some jurisdictions are more difficult than others, but most of the time they just want it done. And so, if you can walk through and explain the work and get a real understanding, then you have to figure out how to handle it.

Because what happens without is I don't ... that costs a lot of money. And sometimes I get those calls and sometimes my response is, "Well, you could probably manage it X or Y and you might be able to solve it this way." Another may be, "Well, too bad. You got to." Right?

David:

Yep.

Brian:

And it's tough sometimes, but there's not a lot of leeway, particularly once you get past that first hearing and you don't appeal it, you don't have legal basis at that point. You don't have a lot of leverage to work from. And so you're at the mercy of folks to say, "Please work with me." But again, the more you try, the more you work with, the more you're engaged with them, the less likely you're going to have, "Too bad. We're going to fine you anyway."

David:

Got it.

Brian:

And if you do get to those points, so it tends, a lawyer could come in and say, "Look, here's why this is an issue." I have one literally was the dumpster enclosure, and I said, "Do you want me to have somebody sit in front of the dumpster closure, 24 hours a day?" I mean, I'm doing what I can. And so there has to be some reasonableness and a special, and we were able to work through with code enforcement officer. They weren't happy, but that's what it was.

Sometimes they're wrong. Sometimes you have a development and you're allowed to do certain things and they think you're not, but things override. So, if it gets to that point where it's a real problem, sometimes a lawyer can help with that.

David:

So basically, keep good records from the very beginning. Make sure you show that you're taking action.

Brian:

Take it seriously.

David:

Take it seriously.

Brian:

Be careful about it.

David:

Maybe seek outside counsel sooner rather than later before you get to that hearing stage. Otherwise, you're stuck.

Brian:

If you go to a hearing and you don't have a lawyer and you don't say anything, there's not much that can happen after that.

David:

Wow, okay. Good to know.

Brian:

At least here in the state Florida, because you've got a 30-day appeal period. If you don't appeal the special master order, it's final and you can't fight.

David:

What do the fines range from? Is it like $500 up to a million dollars?

Brian:

So it's interesting. They're not fined in mass, they're fined on a daily basis.

David:

Oh wow.

Brian:

So depending on what it is, it could be as low as $50 a day. It can go up to a thousand. Typically, it's in the 250 to 500 for most jurisdictions I've had to deal with. On major issues and repeat violations, and this is a challenge on repeat violations because what some jurisdictions will do is say, "You had a previous property maintenance violation," but it was two palms that had died and you didn't replace that. You then went and replaced. And then they come back and say, "You have a repeat violation because now your pavers are not cleaned up or your driveway's got a problem." And they'll say it's a repeat violation. And I think that's an unfair place to be.

David:

For sure.

Brian:

Because at a repeat violation, they could start charging you, particularly if you have life safety issues, $5,000 a day.

David:

Wow. Okay, got it.

Brian:

So, you got to be careful.

David:

Is there insurance against this? Is there insurance against violations or code enforcement?

Brian:

Probably not.

David:

Right, wow.

Brian:

Because what insurer is going to put their hands, and you're not doing your job to keep track of this. And again, if you have a tenant, you have to be extra careful. If the violation comes and it's something that a tenant is required to maintain under your lease, very quickly look at that lease and put a formal notice under the lease on the tenant. Because that's your best defense.

David:

Yeah. You mentioned the follow all ... Yeah, you mentioned the follow all laws provisions. So if you put that provision in the lease agreement and the tenant does not follow it, you have basis to sue them and claim damages?

Brian:

Evict them.

David:

And evict them, okay, okay.

Brian:

Yeah, typically it's an eviction. You're not going to get damages from most small tenants and you don't want to do it. That's not the point. It's not trying to evict them. But the local government doesn't go after the tenant. They go after the property owner and they could ... I mean, look, if it gets really bad, they could literally, and it very rarely happens, but they could lien your property and foreclose on it.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

Well, if your tenant is the problem and you can't do anything about the tenant, it's an issue. But if you can say to them, "Hey, look, this is a tenant problem. I understand. I have sent them the notice. I have said they're required of the lease, they need to go get it permitted or removed," or whatever the issue may be. It happens a lot with signs because tenants like to put up their signs in their windows and to say we're trying, at least they'll give you some time usually that work with you.

And if you have to, the tenant, at least you could take it to court and say, "Look, we don't want to do this, but they're not following the law," and the lease says they have to comply with law, which is in most leases, "And I don't want to evict them, but here it is." And that's sometimes ... if you put them into that ... Look, you make a phone call first to the tenant, you don't want to cause problems, right? I'm not telling you how to property manage. I'm saying legally, these are ways you can do it.

You pick up the phone and you say, "Hey, you did this without a permit. Go get your permit and keep me copied." "No, I don't care. I can do this. I'm not going to do this." And then you start going, "Okay, well now we have a problem tenant." And that's where you get some of those things.

David:

Okay, got it. Any other major issues you see landlords or property managers coming to you for besides code enforcement? We can give some advice here on how to protect themselves.

Brian:

Once you're built and you're going, it's a lot of tenancy issues. In some places you have to be really careful, particularly on a multi-use project, with restrictions. No build restrictions. Use restrictions. So if you put in a CVS, you can't put in another pharmacy because that lease, I guarantee you, says you can't do that. And once you sign that lease with that other pharmacy and you didn't look, you've got a problem. Because now, you are going to breach somebody. And so, make sure that before you get too far along, you're looking at those sorts of things.

We had somebody lease ... create and lease an out parcel against ... We represented the tenant. There was a no build area. They put a building up in the no build area, never looked at the lease. And when we sent the letter, now this guy's got a problem. He's either going to breach our lease or he is going to breach their lease. And then he tried to solve it, and in doing so, he still didn't look at his own leases and he gave signage rights that belonged to somebody else and he created yet another problem. So, don't be so quick to get a deal that you create a problem. I recommend that the property managers and the owners keep matrices of those sorts of things. When you have larger properties, particularly. I mean some of the smaller properties, it's a little bit easier when you have the mom and pops, but if you have any kind of a national tenant, any CVS level, much less if you get into Walmarts and some of the major chain restaurants and things like that, you got to be really careful about those things and you got to be able to keep track of them. And so, every time you go to lease somebody else, you say, "Okay, let's look at this. Let's make sure this matrix is right." And you save yourself a lot of headaches and a lot of problems.

Sometimes if this had happened and they had come to us as a tenant, my client probably would've been fine because there was ways they could have worked together, but when we find out about it because they cut the line and we suddenly don't have power, it doesn't work so well.

David:

Well, they're being more reactive than proactive. It seems like they're not consulting with their counsel before doing these major decisions.

Brian:

We cost money, I get it. I get it, right?

David:

Yeah, yeah.

Brian:

We do. And so a lot of times they don't want to spend the money and you don't always have to, but at least if you've got yourself organized and you're really looking, and I have one client, his property manager in-house, he has multiple properties and she's amazing. We're looking at a redevelopment of one of his properties. She knows what every lease restriction is. She says, "We can't do this here. If we construct here, it has to be during this time of year." And that's on me. That's somebody who really thinks through it, where they're really solving a problem ahead of time, think it through it. Because those things on leases can be a major issue.

And then make sure your security company and your maintenance company are good. Because we've had issues where we have harassment complaint against the security company, security guard.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

And it came to the landlord. Now it's very quickly we were like, "Look, this doesn't work for us," and we provide the security. We went to the company that we have a contract with and said, "You're replacing him," because things were set up right. But a lot of times it's thinking through what the potential problems are ahead of time.

David:

Interesting.

Brian:

If I was going to create a problem, what would it look like?

David:

Interesting. Okay, the hypotheticals.

Brian:

Right. And look, the longer you've been doing this, the more you've seen different things. And you don't want to go overboard and lawyers do this all the time, I have a ... Security people do this all the time because the job is to protect you. And the perfect protection also can mean you're never going to get a deal done. So, it really has to balance between understanding what the issues and risks are and the older the property manager have to work together.

The smaller properties, it's a little harder because you don't have the cashflow to hire someone like me to look at it necessarily. But most of it's fairly straightforward. You're using pretty simple leases a lot of times. You've got things, you're careful. Those are the issues. And then like I said, if you just keep track of it and update it as you go, make sure you understand what your requirements are for your property, if somebody comes. Just never ignore anything with the government particularly, but even with your tenants, it's not just bad business because you say, "Okay, I'll get another tenant." But you could end up with a different problem.

David:

So I have a slogan that I came up with for you while you were speaking. It was, when in doubt, consult.

Brian:

Yes. Sometimes a quick conversation can ... and it's not always legal advice. It's practical. I've told clients numerous times ... and like I said, I do a lot of development, and a lot of very complicated, large scale development. And I tell clients all the time, "You're right, and it doesn't matter. We're going to do this even though you're right because it's the right thing to do. And because you're not getting an approval without it, and we know you're not going to file a lawsuit and they know it. So let's figure out the right way to try to balance and get something done." Because if it's a real deal killer, we need to fight the fight.

But I had a client, I want to meet with their neighbors, and I said, "I don't care. You're going to, and you're going to listen to what they have to say, and this is what it is. And if there's things we can do for them, we're going to do it because that's worth you getting your approval and you're not being extorted. These are people who were worried about their neighborhoods." And if we can't do it, that's fine. We just explain why. And at least we try. We always try.

And it's part of how I do things, but it's also part of how you're going to get things done because you have to talk to people and yeah, you're right. You shouldn't have to. It's not required under the code that you have these meetings, but it is something that you need to do if you want to move forward. So yeah, you're right but so what, those are things-

David:

I have an interesting-

Brian:

... too bad.

David:

Yeah, yeah. I have an interesting question for you. I wasn't going to go in this direction, but it came up to the top of my mind because recently I've had one or two legal agreements to sign, but they were pretty standard. I pretty much knew what they were, but there was ... they always hide. They always have some ... not hide but they always have some very advanced language that only attorneys can understand. They try to make it complicated. So, I've been throwing these agreements into ChatGPT and say, "Simplify this as if you're talking to a middle school student," and they do a really good job. So, any take on AI at all? I don't see it replacing lawyers anytime soon. But are people using it?

Brian:

Well people, yes, some lawyers are, but if you watch, it's fraught with problems because what you think simplified it, may have taken away a whole lot of your legal rights.

David:

Possibly, yeah.

Brian:

So, I'm going to give you an example in a contract, a construction contract context. It's not necessarily specific to this, although if you're doing work on your property, you do have construction contracts as well, right?

David:

Yeah.

Brian:

Or [inaudible 00:30:00]. So, there's a concept called pay when paid. If you draft a contract that says, "We are getting paid by master developer and then we pay you," and it's clear as day in the language that it's meant to be when we get paid, you get paid, but it doesn't have this phrase pay when paid. Because ChatGPT took that out. It is not a pay when paid provision.

David:

Interesting.

Brian:

Because what ChatGPT doesn't know what can't do, or any generative AI, it doesn't actually know the case law. It doesn't know how things happened. It doesn't know statutory requirements.

David:

Doesn't have experience there.

Brian:

And it's a worry, by the way, if lawyers overuse it and don't train your lawyers, no one's going to know how to do it. Now we're going to be starting over from 1865 with lawyers writing new law because it was all done by ChatGPT. And people are going to have to learn practice law again, right?

David:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Brian:

But there's value to it in understanding some things in trying, and maybe it could save you a little bit, but you have to be extra careful. Evictions happen under statute. You can't have a lease ... what happens if that lease takes out the compliance provision that I talked about earlier and you didn't think about it?

And so look, if you know the key phrases, you know key things, you've been doing it long enough, it could probably help you a little bit. It could give you a sense of, okay, what is missing? It can give you a comparison point to look at and say, why is that? But if you just rely on it, you may be falling into a trap where the computer gave you something that is not worthy of the paper it gets printed on, or the DocuSign that it gets signed with. And there's that piece.

I mean, I have a judge was telling a story a few weeks ago. Someone was arguing DocuSign wasn't a legally valid signature because it said in the contract, it said electronic signatures, but it said PDF, et cetera. And they were arguing because it didn't have the word DocuSign that it wasn't valid. Now, it's valid, it just is. So, we know that, it's going to come out that way. But I hear the story and now my contracts all have DocuSign, or similar, or for examples. That's the kind of stuff that the generative AI wouldn't catch necessarily. It may eventually, but lawyers have gone to court try to have briefs written by generative AI and literally cited case law that didn't exist.

There's a rule in one of the federal districts in Texas, one of the judges actually entered an order, that you have to now certify as the lawyer that you did not use artificial intelligence-

David:

Wow.

Brian:

... or that you checked every single citation because that happened. And the judge says, "I can't find any of these cases because they literally didn't exist."

David:

Wow, wow.

Brian:

So imagine, it sounds great, and if you're doing a work of fiction or you want to write a new bible, sure. But for a legal document, there's a reason we do things. It sounds a lot of times, and lawyers definitely can over-complicate things, but there's often a reason and it's from some case law that has come out or statutory provisions that exist that require certain things to happen.

So, you have to be careful about how you do that. Doesn't mean it's not worth doing and saying, "Okay, these are things I might think about," but don't believe that it's necessarily action.

David:

Right, right. So you did mention before that you also help clients with ground-up development. You do a lot of site plan approvals and you generally see a lot of site plans, I'm assuming?

Brian:

Sure.

David:

So is there anything, any new trend that you're seeing? Do you have a vision for what Florida will become because of all these site plans that you're seeing?

Brian:

Well, it's interesting. It depends a little bit on where you are. In your downtown areas, you're seeing different things. It's some of the major downtowns, they're starting to talk about getting rid of parking requirements, where they have real transit opportunities. So like New York, you don't have to do parking in Manhattan.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

Because not everybody has cars, or you can reduce. Now, the market's still going to drive, no pun intended, some of that. But those are the kinds of things because right now parking spot, a structured parking is $40,000 space, basically from the last I heard from a client.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

So if I could remove a hundred spaces, I just save myself a lot of money on the deal.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

But if I can't sell it because I removed the hundred spaces, it doesn't matter. So there's a balance between that. But I have seen a lot of different things looking at that. We've certainly moved in the last probably five or six years in Florida, towards more zeroscape, more native landscape to try to deal with some water issues. In a lot of the country, you've got major water issues and we're trying to deal with that on a new development side.

You want the green, you want to make it look nice, but you can't suck up all the water either. And so, I know California has had major issues. We're trying to get ahead of that somewhat, even that's a challenge. So, some of that happens.

Traffic circulation issues are changing. I think in the next five to 10 years, you may see changes in development patterns related to either automation, you're going to see ... I don't know how long that's going to be, but when you start having automated vehicular traffic. You've seen already adjustments for the ride share services, the Ubers and Lyfts, downtown West Palm Beach has an on-demand, on-point system, where they'll come pick you up and take you somewhere-

David:

Cool.

Brian:

... similar. So you suddenly don't necessarily need the same kind of parking for your retail or your office spaces.

David:

Wow.

Brian:

Where you have some ability for people to do that. I think that will shake out over time through various organizations to study that. Whether it's ULI, or the Institute of Traffic Engineers, they track a lot of that, try to redo their studies.

Some enterprising grad student going for their PhD in traffic engineering is going to start looking at that in great detail. And I think that's some of the change you'll see. Automation will help with that.

But from a design perspective, the only other thing really comes is place-making. People want to be places they're comfortable, right?

David:

Yeah.

Brian:

And so, some of the bulk of buildings has changed. It's a little lighter, we want to put it private or public open spaces, places where people are comfortable outside. And again, your weather changes. Where you're comfortable outside in Florida in December, you're not comfortable outside in New York in December. Where you're comfortable outside in New York in ... Well, New York's, not even in June, June's too hot but providing shade trees and providing covering and providing opportunities for people to gather in spaces, that's part of it.

And then architecturally, we've seen changes in design, with more open floor plan and huddle rooms and different things where people can meet but not have their own individual offices. So, those are trends that are coming do effect design, but at the core, it still ... it's a lot of the same. And until we have a lot of data to support change, we won't see a ton of it but I think ... and here in Florida, there are markets that are going to definitely move in that direction or are looking to move in that direction and be at the forefront-

David:

Got it.

Brian:

... to try to help with that.

David:

Awesome. And I think when we spoke offline, you may have mentioned that if you manage your own properties, you have some ideas of how they can maximize their values. Did we speak about that? And if so, how can someone maximize the value of their property?

Brian:

Sorry about that.

David:

No, go ahead.

Brian:

Had to drink a little water. So, it's really looking at what the market drives and what you can offer. So you have a property that's been there for a while, you may be able to reposition it a little bit. If you have a large enough property, you have no out parcels. You may now be able to get an out parcel development on it. Taking a look at whether you can cut your spaces in different ways.

You got to put money into it to get money out of it, but there may be changes in code, there may be changes in market that allow you to reposition yourself a little bit to be more attractive, to get a little bit of a higher rent. I'd say look around you. If you've seen rents in residential around your retail properties going up, you may be wanting to upgrade your own property to attract those people who are more likely to come.

And then look at what may be available. Right now in the state of Florida, there are a lot of strip setters that, subject to leasing and subject to all kinds of property specific issues, could be repositioned for mixed use with affordable housing. And in a lot of the state ... We have a crisis, and it's throughout Florida, it's not just Southeast or Southwest Florida that people think it is. And being able to say, "Okay, I could take this property and we can find a way to add some affordable housing pieces to it," and because of some statutory provisions that were just passed, we can do that without having to do a zoning change, without having to do a land use change, without having to go through a bunch of public process and add value in that way as well. Maybe not as much as people think, but be able to do some of that. If you're on major transit corridors, particularly where people could bus to and from work, you suddenly have the ability to take an old center and revitalize it with some mixed use that could be very valuable.

David:

Awesome, love it. And all right, so to get to the last part, the conclusion of the show. So a few last questions for you. First off is, is there anything big or exciting that you're working on today or anything big or exciting that you're excited for in the future, for real estate?

Brian:

Some of that I'm not actually allowed to talk about because until-

David:

Yep, figured.

Brian:

... it goes public, it can't be public. But I will tell you, I think that the trends, particularly with the way we're developing some of the office and residential developments that we're working on, the large ones, is really fun and interesting because we're changing the way people are at work at live.

I think that looking at alternative means of transportation in the land use patterns and in the development patterns is a huge issue, and it's something we're working on in a lot of different ways. It's a challenge. Government wants it certain ways. They don't want to pay for it often. They want to take the developer, but there's a lot of value in creating in the right spots, alternative transportation modes, and bringing people together in different ways. That I think is really a fun thing that can happen too.

Again, when you do that, you also got to make sure that you're thinking about your weather, you're thinking about how people actually work and live, whether there's enough in the spot. Having a bunch of residential office, but no retail doesn't work, getting that opportunity. And so, that trend is really happening in a significant way of people looking at things in particularly core areas in some of the jurisdictions that I think is great because it allows people to really create neighborhoods.

And we need suburbs, we need ... I live in one, I get it. But we've got to have a mix in an opportunity for different people in different places and life stages. That trend is forward and it's fun to watch.

David:

100%, love it. So last and final question, I love asking everyone this. If you can go back in time to when you just finished law school, what would you tell yourself?

Brian:

That's a great question.

David:

Don't be a lawyer. No, I'm kidding.

Brian:

I think what I would tell myself is enjoy the ride. It's not what you think.

David:

Explain.

Brian:

So I graduated law school to do commercial litigation. I didn't even know what a land use lawyer was. I could have never imagined doing what I'm doing, I thought I was ... I'm very good at court, I like going to court. But I found that I really love getting things done. And like I said, when you drive around at see it, or when I go to a baseball game, when I go to some training games at West Palm Beach, it's like I get goosebumps every single time. It's been open for years. I have season tickets, and I get goosebumps knowing that I had a part of that.

And so, I would say keep your mind open. Look for every opportunity and follow those paths. Don't try to keep into a narrow path. And that's true for everything. I've told my kids that. You know what you want to do, but keep your eyes open. And I would tell myself that, which I mean, it wasn't hard. I've done it. But to remind myself as a young kid, put in the effort, keep your eyes open and enjoy the ride.

David:

Love it, wow. Words of wisdom, love it. So for anyone listening that wants to get in touch with you or work with you potentially, how can they get in touch directly?

Brian:

Often, email's the best way, preferably without a lot of detail because I need to run conflicts. I have 300 lawyers around the state of Florida, so I have to follow bar rules and I'm very careful about that. I'm happy to have some generalized conversations sometimes. If we're talking about specifics, I need to make sure we don't represent the client, even in some other place because of the way that bar rules are.

But an email, certainly a call to my office could happen. No hurting referencing The DoorLoop Podcast to make sure I'll take that a little more ... I'll say, "Oh, this is someone that's not just a random call or a random email." But that's usually the easiest way. I'm pretty neurotic about my emails. I get 500 or 600 a day, but I try to keep up really well and-

David:

Wow.

Brian:

... well, some of them I just file. Some of them I get to delete. And then the ones I need to deal with, if it's a quick, we could set something up, we can work through that. And I've got a team of people, and if I'm looking at it and I'm say, "Look, someone else is better, let's set you up with them." And all of a sudden we'll call you back and we'll work it. This law firm's a very special place because we don't really think about it as my client, my issue, my thing. It's, what do you need? Who's the right person and how do we help make it happen and work together?

And so, if you email me with a quick synopsis, we can try to set something up. We could have a quick call, 15 minutes, see if there's something there or if I can refer to something, I'd be happy to do that.

David:

Awesome. And I see your email is publicly online, so maybe we'll put a link or an image in the bottom of this, but it's B-S-U-I-M-O-U-R @gunster.com. Is that right?

Brian:

That's me.

David:

Awesome.

Brian:

26 years. I've had the same email, the same office phone.

David:

No wonder you get 500 emails a day, you getting spammed all day.

Brian:

Some of it, yeah.

David:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. Awesome. Well, Brian, that wraps it up for today. Thank you so much again for joining us. I really appreciate it.

Brian:

David, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it. I love what you're doing.

David:

Thank you. And for those still tuning in, make sure you go to doorloop.com/podcast to watch the video version of this if you want to see us on video. And we also have doorloop.com/webinars for more other great webinars. Brian, stick around but for everyone else, stay tuned for the next one. Thank you so much. Take care.

Presenter:

Thanks for listening all the way to the end. Don't forget to give us a good rating on whatever platform you're tuning in from. And we'll be back soon with another new episode. We hope to see you there. And until next time, this has been Loop It In.

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