President Paula Brahan presided over the meeting. Thanks to Rusty Edwards who gave the invocation and to Bill MacLauchlan who led us in the Pledge of Allegiance. Before prayer Rusty announced that he is taking a position at another church and will be relocating within the next few weeks, therefore he is resigning from our club. He will be missed.
Thanks also to Jonathan Shemper who served as our greeter today.
Mike Ratliff, Sergeant at Arms welcomed today’s visiting Rotarians and visitors. Denny Bubrig is visiting from the NW Austin, TX Rotary club. Ryan Kelly has Steven Utrosky as his guest. Steven is a prospective new member. Mike also noted...
...that this year’s Non-Rotarian of the Year recipient passed away this weekend. He asked for prayers for Richard Potin’s family.
Paula noted that the new Baker and Graham dental office will have a grand opening on August 3rd. Eric Graham invited all Rotarians to the event from 5 pm until 7 pm.
Paula also reminded members to bring extra cash to future meetings and participate in the weekly cash give-away. Today’s winner of $33.50 is Bill MacLauchlan.
Board members were reminded of next Tuesday’s board meeting. We will meet at 11 am to conduct some business and to welcome the District Governor.
Bill McLeod then introduced today’s guest speaker, Elizabeth Randall with Randal Commercial Group, LLC.
Elizabeth noted that the primary function of a real estate investment group is to build and preserve wealth for customers, one property at a time. Through their research and professional consultations they help build commercial real estate portfolios for businesses as well as individuals.
According to Elizabeth the investors come from all areas of the economic picture. Investors include the general public, life insurance companies, syndicates, equity funds, families, groups of investors and a variety of other categories. They seek commercial real estate investments for income primarily, to diversify their portfolio, to control an asset, to have residual value and sometimes for a tax incentive. The job of Randal Commercial Group is to help them maximize return while minimizing risk. She notes that as many as seven various professional areas are almost always involved in the market research of just one deal.
Investors, says Elizabeth, are driven by greed and fear. These are the investor’s bumper pads. Another function of her group is to help their clients follow the numbers and ignore the emotions.
She says the commercial real estate market has changed drastically in the past few years. Americans began pulling away from malls in the 1990’s. Today they’re beginning to pull away from big box stores and into small, more specialized shops. On-line shopping has also been a recent and significant interrupter in the retail market. She envisions a retail store of the future to be a showroom where the public and come and touch and see an item before they purchase it on-line.
Health care property seems to be the most significant player in today’s commercial real estate market. Elizabeth says health care is becoming more “retail” based and less “centrally” based than in the past. Medical care facilities are moving closer to the people who need the services. For those reasons she sees this area of commercial real estate investment as a significant growth factor in the coming years.
Many thanks to Elizabeth for her presentation. If you have questions or need more information she can be contacted by calling 662-234-4043 or by email at erandall@randallcg.com.
Paula asked Ben and Mallory Donald to come forward. Mallory was inducted as our newest member. She will be publishing our newsletter this year. Mallory is employed by Anderson Retail.
With no other business or announcements Paula adjourned the meeting with our motto, “Service Above Self”.