Events

Albert Mendelsohn is the Founder and CEO of CADCO, a residential and commercial real estate development, asset management and investment firm specializing in comprehensive project life cycle services. Our expertise spans acquisition, development, and management of diverse real estate assets, with a focus on problem resolution and value optimization. Al has cultivated a strong presence in the construction and development realm, having built and developed thousands of residential units, medical and biotech facilities, office parks, and specialty projects over a 40-year career. Prior to CADCO, Al founded several companies, held executive leadership roles in private and public companies nationally and abroad, and now builds and acquires real estate portfolios, including apartment complexes across the United States. His strategic vision and expertise have optimized numerous investment opportunities earning him recognition as an expert in real estate development. He studied Civil Engineering and Building Science, graduating from The University of Cape Town while receiving national recognition for academic excellence in Contracting Law. A former competitive athlete, marathon runner, and martial artist, Al also served as a Lieutenant in the South African Army.

Evan Griffith leads the top-producing team in the Boston Marcus & Millichap office. Together with Tony Pepdjonovic they have formed a collaborative investment sales team focusing on the New England market. They are dedicated to being "relationship-oriented" with the crux of the team's focus on multi-family , mixed-use buildings as well as guiding clients through the 1031 exchange process. Evan's team's success can be attributed to keeping tight control over every aspect of each transaction. He is directly involved in each step from preparing a detailed marketing package, qualifying, and vetting buyers, coordinating all inspections, securing financing, and working together with attorneys and escrow agents to ensure a smooth closing. Our team's foremost goal is to exceed the expectations of each client, deliver superior results and solidify strong lifetime relationships. Griffith & Pepdjonovic are known for their honesty and integrity and take pride in their many repeat clients. Evan is very active in the Massachusetts real estate investment community and Sits on the Board of the Massachusetts Housing Coalition (MHC) and City Kids. He is a longtime volunteer with the Achilles Freedom Team of Wounded Veterans (NYC) whose sole focus is to help rehabilitate wounded members of the U.S. Military through marathons and road races. Evan has closed over a Billion Dollars in Real Estate Transactions and his team is in the top 1% of all Commercial Brokers.

Arek immigrated to the US from Syria with his family as a child and his real estate journey began at age 19 while in college. With a goal of not having to pay rent, he purchased a 5-bedroom house on campus and converted it into a 7-bedroom house. Subletting the rooms to friends enabled him to live rent-free while earning a few thousand dollars monthly. During his time as a student, Arek joined the largest rental agency in Boston quickly earning the title of top performing agent. A year later, he cultivated his interest in the peaking Little Rock real estate market, which he learned was a landlord protected state with comparatively high cash flow. In January 2022 after much research and due diligence, Arek purchased two apartment complexes, a 16-unit and another 30-unit building. After turning around these apartment buildings and stabilizing the assets, Arek has gone on to successfully turn around and stabilize 24 complexes in central Arkansas with his current portfolio now exceeding 800 units, many of which are affordable housing. Arek now continues his career in buying affordable housing and turning those communities around. For him building a growing multi-family portfolio has proven to be a safe and conservative asset class that not only provides positive cash flow, but also a safe and secure affordable housing solution for the public.

Jasmine Bingham is currently an Exchange Coordinator at U.S. 1031 Exchange Services, Inc. The company is approaching its 40th year servicing the nation with tax-deferred exchanges for commercial and residential real estate, vacant land, and Delaware Statutory Trusts. Jasmine is a securities analyst and financial writer, by training. She is a graduate of Fordham University, with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Finance. Over almost a decade at Smith Barney, Harris, Upham & Co., Inc., Jasmine performed research, analysis, and financial reporting for multiple sectors in U.S. Equity Research (including paper and forest products; healthcare; energy, semiconductors; closed-end country funds; building materials companies; and homebuilders) A move to Goldman Sachs & Co., Inc., in the early nineties led to Jasmine initiating coverage of top-tier publicly traded manufactured housing companies (including Clayton Homes, Champion Enterprises, Fleetwood Enterprises, and Oakwood Homes), and conventional U.S. homebuilders (including Centex, Kaufman & Broad, Pulte Homes, Ryland Homes, and Del Webb). After five exciting years at Goldman, Jasmine decided to move to Orange County, California, to devote the next twelve years to raising her daughter. Following this not-so-relaxing hiatus from the workplace, Jasmine decided to embark on an entrepreneurial endeavor. Balcony 7 Media and Publishing, Inc. was created to support Jasmine’s passion to improve children’s literacy with rhyming illustrated children’s books, that can twist the tongues of even adults. But that was the whole point: engaging with your children with stories that can tickle you both with smart, sassy, cartoon animals that only talk in rhyme. After the trilogy was published, Jasmine was challenged to write Book 4 in metered rhyme. The challenger was Monte Schultz, at the Writers Conference his father Charles Schulz, originally started in Santa Barbara, CA. Jasmine balked at Monte’s challenge, saying it was impossible. Monte told Jasmine to read The Golden Gate, by Vikram Seth, a novel written entirely in verse. Jasmine fell in love with the book and promptly wrote an Amazon Review entirely in verse. Following up with the prompt writing of Book 4 in metered rhyme over the next few months, which one reviewer called “flawless”. As Editor-in-Chief and Manager, Jasmine nurtured a slew of new authors, published over a dozen books, edited all of them, and ghost-wrote chunks of others. Genres ranged from crime drama, international espionage, cancer memoir, political memoir, civil jury trial law manual (used for CE credits), juvenile fiction, and more children’s books. At that time, the publishing industry was going through monumental challenges: Amazon’s growing wholesale discount; book sellers demand for a return policy; the adoption of Common Core (and subsequent shadow-banning of books without); and the growing volume of digital offerings crowding the ethernet with so much fluff and so little quality. The five-year run was expensive, comparable to the cost of an uber-MBA. What was learned includes building websites and managing the backend; publishing an editorial blog for the company and its authors; managing numerous sites and social media platforms under our umbrella; creating countless blogs, posts, images, metadata and copy for both print and digital spaces. A great run. Finding the next career was difficult. While the Street will forever be in Jasmine’s blood, it remained a passion, to be followed at a safe distance. The pandemic helped steer Jasmine out of California to Sarasota, Florida. The final decision to move was finding a job that saves people taxes every single day—as exchange coordinator for U.S. 1031 Exchange Services. Not only is this niche gratifying, it is also continuously challenging as each deal is unique, and it must be done within a time limit. Jasmine is very attuned to deal complexities and absolute deadlines. This is a great fit. And now, watching our country devolve into an unrecognizable shell of what was once a great nation, Jasmine will channel that passion to the Financial Policy Council. With a promise to engage as needed, full skill sets in place, to help shepherd our country back toward its Constitutional roots.

Ziad Abelnour is Founder, President & CEO of Blackhawk Partners, Inc. a private “family office” in the business of originating, structuring & acting as equity investor in strategic corporate investments Founder & Chairman of the Board of the Financial Policy Council ; a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization designed to give its select group of supporters the opportunity to have direct face-to-face dialogue with the nation’s quintessential power brokers and policymakers

Author of the bestselling book “Economic Warfare: Secrets of Wealth Creation in the Age of Welfare Politics” and of the upcoming book ” Startup Saboteurs: How Incompetence, Ego, and Small Thinking Prevent True Wealth Creation” to be published in Summer 2019.

Mr. Abdelnour has over 30 year experience on Wall Street backing over 125 companies & serial entrepreneurs worth in aggregate over 20 billion dollars in the private equity, high yield bond and distressed debt markets.

He holds a MBA in Finance Summa Cum Laude from the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania & BS in Economics, Summa Cum Laude, from the American University of Beirut

Today, Mr. Abdelnour continues to be featured in hundreds of media channels and publications every year and is widely seen as one of the top business leaders by millions around the world.

He was just recently featured as one of the 500 Most Influential CEOs in the World.  Source: Top 500 Most Influential CEOs Powerlist (2015)”. Richtopia. 24 December 2015 along with one of the Top 10 Disruptors to Watch Out for in 2023 by LA Weekly.