Continuing our series on leaders at the top 100 local real estate companies, we visited the offices of Paul Rogers, managing broker at Inland Real Estate Auctions, Inc, part of the Inland Group of Companies, which is one of the largest companies in Chicago, with about 1,200 employees. |
| Auctioneers, it appears, are less than subtle when asking us to leave. Inland is a group of about 30 independent companies, from banks to brokerage to development; one of its three REITs is publicly traded. Paul is the Harley-riding head of the auction arm, one of the few doing better than usual this year with a 25 to 30% increase in business. Paul notes that it tries to focus on higher prestige properties, like Class A office, retail and industrial. It has also sold land and golf courses at auction. He tells us buyers are getting better deals because there are fewer of them competing. |
| Paul started in real estate at a small firm in Rogers Park just out of college. After attending an auction at O'Hare, he fell in love with the speed, immediately signing up with now-bankrupt auction legend Sheldon Good and Co. He attended Missouri Auction School in 1992, where he spent two weeks learning to ?chant.? (It's like regular school, we assume, but more lenient when haggling for a good grade.) After 10 years at Sheldon Good and seven at Benjamin Sherman, he joined Inland in ?02. He tells us the weirdest thing he's ever auctioned was an operating funeral home, which had seven bidders. We somehow resisted asking if it was a ?live? auction. |
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