Save Time and Grow Business through Experimentation and Optimization
Trevor Ewen has a passion for helping people automate in the industry they’re in particularly in commercial real estate. He is an experienced Software Engineer and Project Manager. He has overseen full-stack teams in clean energy insurance, finance, and media. Notable engagements include Morgan Stanley, HBO, Bloomberg, Honest Buildings and so much more. He has an MBA from London Business School and an MBA from Columbia Business School.
He is currently the Chief Executive Officer of Southport Technology Group and sourcing with Southport Ventures to buy and grow niche software businesses.
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Brett:
I’m excited about our next guest. He has a passion for helping people automate in the industry they’re in particularly in commercial real estate as we’re talking about today, automating your commercial real estate syndications. He’s an experienced Software Engineer and Project Manager. He has overseen full-stack teams in clean energy insurance, finance, and media. Notable engagements include Morgan Stanley, HBO, Bloomberg, Honest Buildings and so much more. He has an MBA from London Business School and an MBA from Columbia Business School. He’s head of the great state of New Jersey. Please welcome to the show with me, Trevor Ewen. How are you doing, sir?
Trevor:
Thanks for having me, Brett. I’m doing super well.
Brett:
Excellent. For our listeners to get to know you for the first time, would you give us a little bit more about your story and your current focus?
Trevor:
So a lot of what I do put together some of the different topics you talk about. I’ll try and weave it together in a message that sounds kind of simple and relatable. So I’ve been a software engineer pretty much since I got out of undergraduate and have worked in the tech industry as a day job. And also in all my entrepreneurial endeavors, my wife and I started investing in real estate passively. In 2014, a lot of folks started with single-family homes. Eventually, we moved up for scale to commercial partnerships, and also do a fair amount of private lending with that, a lot of the goal of that at the time was to the part aspect of trying to deal with the fact that we lived in the highest cost area to buy housing, and it just didn’t make a lot of sense for us to spend money on it when we wanted flexibility. And yet, we could go to other parts of the country and get great deals on single-family homes, and even commercial real estate. I think the markets tightened up quite a bit. So some of that thesis has changed. But we’re still pretty bullish on some of those other, more affordable markets. And then beyond that, it was a nice way to diversify away from our occupations. You know, she’s in finance, but adjacent to tech, and I’m in tech too. So we want to have something physical, something sustainable in that.
Brett:
Awesome. I love the passion for real estate and the passion for business. So I want to take one step back, though, Trevor, I want to go maybe back to the college days or the high school days. I believe we’ve all been given certain gifts in this life. And these gifts were given to us to be a blessing and help to others. Some people call them strength, some people call them superpowers. So I’m curious, what does maybe one or two of those gifts or strengths that you believe you were given? And how does that help how you help bless people today?
Trevor:
Sure. I’ll probably have a different answer for you in 10 years, but as far as I can tell, right now, a couple of things I’ve got and just naturally had a lot of people told me about them for years, and especially when you’re younger, you kind of ignore that advice, particularly when it comes from older folks who’ve been telling you what to do like your parents or your uncles. But a big one with me was relationships and going deep on relationships, something that I struggled with for a long time to really understand was a huge superpower. And the factor just builds trust, and that obviously came with customers. It came with people I was investing with or bringing more people in on the fundraising side as well. It also factored in with my classmates, especially when I did my master’s degree, but also in undergrad. Another big one is I’m pretty good with boredom. Or maybe boredom is not a good way to put up boring topics. So I can really get into the nitty-gritty of something that most other people find just pretty dry. And a lot of that led me to some great opportunities, especially in technology, where there are so many needs in business software, and sometimes in the drier parts of the operation. And then even in investment, trying to look past the flashy stuff and look forward. There are just really good pockets of value. But you’ve got to get past the photos and take a look at the numbers.
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