HEATHER EWING: The CRE RUNdown
Are you intrigued by Commercial Real Estate? Join Heather Ewing, CCIM each week as she dives into CRE trends, Deals, and Developments throughout Madison, WI. Learn the crucial role of Mindset in CRE and Marathons! Success leaves Clues.
HEATHER EWING: The CRE RUNdown
Ep. 30 Nicholas Mau - Making Your Taxes Work for You
Are you overwhelmed by real estate tax burdens?
Gain unparalleled insights from Nick Mao, a partner at First Point Advisors, as he shares his 17-year journey and expertise in property tax appeals. Learn how Nick's firm collaborates with top firms nationwide to offer seamless, superior service to clients in Florida and Texas. We also discuss the crucial role of referrals and the trust placed in recommendations, reflecting our collective dedication to excellence and a competitive edge in the industry.
Beyond the technicalities, we uncover the secrets behind maintaining a positive mindset and wellness for achieving professional success. Nick and I reveal our daily routines and the importance of self-care, showing how these practices not only enhance business outcomes but also nurture personal relationships. Organizational skills and clear goal-setting are also highlighted, with a focus on expanding our commercial real estate business and preparing for the upcoming appeal season in Florida. Additionally, discover the power of networking through LinkedIn and professional groups like CCIM, which have been instrumental in our personal and professional growth. Tune in for a holistic approach to success in the real estate tax consulting world.
Welcome to Heather Ewing the CRE Rundown I have none other than Nick Mao from beautiful Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Welcome, Nick.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Hey, good morning Heather. How are you?
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Good, it's so good to see you.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, likewise. It's been a little while since we've seen each other in person, but definitely good to catch up.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Exactly the CCIM events. You know, know they're great in so many ways great people, great networking content. It's a sure win absolutely absolutely definitely, and it looks beautiful in florida. It's a little, uh little dark here in wisconsin today yeah, no, it's.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Uh, I'm sorry to hear that. It's dark up there. It's sunny and and and very hot and humid. Down here we got about 90 degree weather, probably 100% humidity. You sweat the second you walk out the door. But hey, I'll take it.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Exactly, definitely. Well, today I wanted to, you know, jump in a little bit, since we know each other but share with the audience of a little bit more about you. You're the tax guru, so if you can get into that a little bit and just help us to get to know you a bit more, yeah, absolutely so happy to do that.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:I really appreciate you having me on the podcast. I've enjoyed watching some of the episodes and seeing you interact with your guests and definitely honored to be a part of your guest list. So, as you mentioned, my name is Nick, I am a CCIM, I am a partner in a company called First Point Advisors, but before that I'm a father and I'm a runner, and I'm a partner in life with my fiance, kristen, who I wouldn't be able to do any of this without. So but in terms of business, first Point Advisors is a real estate tax consulting firm and we specialize in property tax appeals across the country. We're based here in Fort Lauderdale, we have an office in Dallas as well. Country. We're based here in Fort Lauderdale, we have an office in Dallas as well, and what we do essentially is help our clients mitigate or lower their real estate tax burden for their assets. So we focus primarily on commercial assets and the hotels, apartments, office buildings, industrial buildings, land, anything like that and representing our clients before the administrative level whether that's the Value Adjustment Board in Florida or the Board of Equalization or the ARB in any of the different jurisdictions. But we're acting as an advocate for our clients and performing real estate valuations, and our goal is to reduce the market value, or taxable value for our clients so that their real estate tax burden is lower. So we do that.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:I've been in the industry for 17 years, started straight out of school, straight out of Florida State University, started working for a larger consulting firm and underwent a couple of different acquisitions through that business and, in 2016, decided to leave the large consulting world and join my now managing partner, brian DePotter, who I've been working with for my entire career, basically with a a two-year gap in between, and we started First Point Advisors. Well, he started First Point Advisors in 2014. I joined him in 2016. And we've been growing the business ever since, from two now up to 12. And now we're continuing to grow.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:So that's a little bit about what we do. Right, and I would assume you're working with people all over the nation, or do you have a sweet spot that you like to focus on?
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So we're primarily in Florida at the moment and Texas. Those are our two largest areas where we focus.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:But we can handle appeals across the country If it's an area that we can't physically handle with our in-company people in-house people, if you will we have partnerships with firms just like us across the country where I have clients that we manage their assets here in Florida and I partner with someone, say, in North Carolina or in Georgia or in Wisconsin, um, to handle the boots on the ground appeals from that perspective. But we still act as the point of contact for our clients. So we're we're working with the best in market folks that we know through the industry, which is a little bit of a different model than some of the larger consulting firms where you as a client are working solely with their own in-house people and we have wonderful in-house people here in Florida and also in Dallas, but anywhere else that is not a market that we don't have in-house folks or expertise then we will work with those best in market people that we know through the industry. So we do handle appeals all across the country.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:And I think you hit it on the head best in market right. And that's where I think a lot of people, if they're not really familiar with commercial real estate, that they sometimes think, okay, we have to go to the big houses, right. Whether it's okay, we have to go to the big houses right, Whether it's brokerage tax, you name it, but really we get to shop for the best. And to me, I personally like that. We're both runners, we're both a little competitive, right.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:We like to give it 200%.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:And when we refer, when we tie our name, our businesses, to something, it has to be a great representation of that. I know you take that seriously as well. So best in the market. I love that. I think that's perfect.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, absolutely. You hit it on the head right there. And when people make referrals to me, I know that they're doing the same with their clients they're putting their name on the line. So anytime a referral comes to the door not that all my clients don't get special and excellent attention, but there's always a little bit of a little tiny piece that is extra motivation that somebody put their name on the line for recommending me or my firm as the solution for a challenge that they might be having. And so we take that very seriously, just as we do when referring business out to other people as well.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Definitely so. Backing up how did you get into tax right so many people? You know, you hear the old sayings tax man you know, come up and take it away and people. You know, for whatever reason, april 15th comes every year, kind of like Christmas or whichever holiday. You celebrate the same time every year and, alas, you know they're running from it. What drew you to this arena?
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, so, so really with this, with this niche right, this is it's more of a state and local tax, we're not dealing with the federal government or anything like that and I fell into it. You know, I fell into the market and when I was a student at Florida State, I was in the real estate program there and majored in finance and real estate. But the real estate department has been putting on a program called the trends conference the real estate trends conference and it's a big conference that brings back alumni and real estate related people back to the university and the students are afforded an opportunity to go and attend and it's really an economic update session, a networking session and a recruiting session all kind of combined into one, where the students go and they learn from professionals. And there's a gentleman named John Crossman and he's based in Orlando and he's in the retail business and he is an alumni of Florida State and he basically started and ran a part of that called If I Were 21. And it's a session that students go to and professionals go to and answer questions about if I were 21, what would I do differently, or what would I do if I were in your shoes, or what's some advice that I can give to the students, and so it's a really good opportunity to kind of get in front of those professionals and learn a lot about the different jobs, because real estate, there's so many things you can do in real estate. You can be a leasing broker, you can be an appraiser, you can be a tenant representative, you can be a landlord rep, you can be a investment sales. You know on the insurance side, so many different things. So there's a lot to learn.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:And at that event I met a gentleman who was in at that time I believe he was in the Atlanta office of the consulting firm that I started working with, which just happened to be a big four accounting firm. So, even though we're in the tax industry we're real estate tax and we're state and local tax and we're really doing real estate valuation the result is just tax. But met him. The result is just tax, but met him, kept in touch with him and as I became a senior, he reached out to me and told me that the Fort Lauderdale office was hiring. Did I want to interview? I said absolutely, interviewed, was hired, and left school with a job in 2007, right before the GFC.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:So I was very fortunate to have walked out of school with a job there was a lot of people that I that I knew that came out of school and weren't as fortunate and you know, had to sort of change, change their, their direction. So I fell into it. I didn't know that I wanted to do real estate tax appeals but once I have been, you know, as I've continued to grow in my career, it's, you know, really a passionate, you know thing that I love to do and it's fun. I get to build relationships with people. I get to, you know, be a nerd and do analysis and break down properties and look at the challenges that they're having. But then I also get to go and advocate for my clients and the competitive part of me likes to win. So I like to go in and challenge a value and be successful. And it's frustrating when you don't win. But if you didn't get frustrated or you didn't care, then you don't really care about what you're doing, in my opinion.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Opinion exactly I like. They say you're either winning or you're learning oh yeah, early years there's a lot of learning, but that's the thing too I say in this arena, that you learn quickly because there's there's a cost, not only in you know how you feel about it, but also it you don't get paid, so you learn really quick what works, what doesn't, and you also invest the time, energy and resources to learn what you need to or refine your skills, and I think that's the thing with commercial real estate too.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:It's an endless arena of development, of growth personally, professionally, and I like that. You hit on, you know, the nerd part. Right Numbers is great, but then there too, you know you've got the creativity, the relationship. So I'm a very creative person. So that, of course, is something I really focus on in my branding and things of that nature. But something else that you touched on, nick, that I think is really important for people again in any of these categories or asset classes, is to niche, and I always say it's the people that won't make a firm decision right, cut something off and go 200 percent into the niche, are going to suffer. You either decide and decide, you know, go down the path of winning, or when you try to be general, you're just not.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:You're going to spin your wheels or you're not going to have food on your table.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, no, absolutely. I think you're. I think you're absolutely right and you know there's that that saying I'm probably going to butcher. It's a you know master of none or a jack of all trades master of none, but it's, it is. I agree with you, and as a firm, we've made the decision to focus. Our sole focus at this point is the real estate tax appeals. Now, that doesn't mean that as a firm, we're not going to grow into other areas that are complementary in the future, but it means that us as partners, brian and I our expertise is in this field, and so we're currently focused on that and that's our direction.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:We decided to grow this business doing nothing but real estate tax appeals.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:We're licensed brokers, we have the ability to transact and to be involved in transactions, and people have asked me to help them, but I am not a transactional broker. I don't know that market as well as I know the real estate tax appeal market, and there could also be some conflict there in terms of client representing clients. So we've really focused our attention on growing and serving our clients in the real estate tax appeal world and we just feel like if we're doing that, you know to the highest level, that they're getting the best service. And you know that's the number one thing for us is, you know, good, solid client service with great communication and delivering good results. So if you're focused on other things, you're not necessarily going to be able to deliver those great results, because you've got too many balls in the air and you want to be focused on their issues the different arenas and I probably would have been lined up perfect for industrial, because I had 11 years of operations and negotiations domestic, overseas, all these things.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:But I figured if I was leaving one career arena because it just didn't speak to my heart and spirit, I was not going to repeat that right. So that's how I ended up getting into retail and restaurants, which is perfectly me. I always said, god, if I only would have known about this 20 years ago. You can shop professionally, eat professionally at great places, like what a beautiful merriment. It pays to look around, but I love that. You are, you know, part of a group that is helping youth whether it's high school, different grades to understand that there's something like this. I never heard of it and I fell into the arena as well through an earlier friend of I was looking for something different and he's like well, I should talk to my friend. He's in commercial real estate and I would never have connected myself to that, or even you know what I mean.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Like yeah it's.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:You don't hear about it and no one in my family was in sales that type of thing. But I had some different entrepreneurial pursuits and started testing the waters there, so that that opened the door to it. But yeah, what you say, is the mindset required for people in this arena right, like what helps you? We all have those days that are wild, right, and it's like that was a doozy. We also have the days of like you've just you know, really been able to help various clients.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:You've really helped them to transform their business, due to the results, which then affects their personal lives and ripples through. What's the mindset that helps you to stay on that forward path when things get choppy?
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Well, first and foremost I think it's a great question and mindset and, and, and that arena is something that I think is very important to focus on. Personal health and wellness, you know, first and foremost, is one of the most important things to me, because I have a family that I have to be attentive to, I have a staff that I have to be attentive to and be present and be 100 percent on, and a business partner that expects, you know, excellence from me and a business partner that expects, you know, excellence from me and I expect from him as well.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:You know the mindset that I have is a positive and optimistic mindset. I wasn't always that way and it took some work for me to get to be a positive thinker and optimistic thinker and a problem solver first Went through a couple of tough years personally and grew out of those challenges as an adult, and I think it's very important to take care of yourself first. You hear the saying on an airplane to put your mask on first, and then you can help the person next to you, and I firmly believe in that, and a lot of people that don't quite understand it or have a different viewpoint might think that it's selfish. But I think that your personal health and wellness first is important Now. It shouldn't impact the people around you in a negative way. And the way that I handle that is I'm up early, I get up at four o'clock, 430 every day.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:I get my, my coffee in, I get my water in, I get my run or my lift in before the kids are awake, before Kristen's awake Most of the time, unless my ankles are cracking too loud, and she hears me and wakes up. But I try to take care of myself first, and physical fitness has always been something that is important to me and I think the physical fitness piece of myself first and physical fitness has always been something that is important to me and I think the physical fitness piece of it helps my mental fitness. And if I miss a workout or if I miss a run or I'm not up, it's not that I'm disappointed in myself, that I get down on myself or I just don't feel right. And so I make it a very strong point of mine to put myself in a position to succeed the night before and plan and set things out so that there's less friction in the morning. I set my shoes out, I set my clothes out, I get my coffee ready, I have my water ready, so there's not as much friction for me to get up and take care of myself.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:And when I am able to get up and take care of myself and, you know, do my morning routine, it sets me up for success throughout the day. And no matter what business you're in, no matter what industry you're in, no matter if you're a professional or a stay at home mother or father, you know, if you take care of yourself and set yourself up for success, then you're able to be there and open and present for your family, for your friends, for your co-workers. So that is something that I think is very important and helps me to have that positive mindset and the mindset that I can overcome whatever challenge faces me. Because if I can get up at four o'clock in the morning and do something that makes me uncomfortable, like a long run or a heavy lift or jumping in a cold plunge, why can't I send that tough email? Why can't I have that tough conversation? Why can't I represent my client? I can do all that stuff, so, hey.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:I agree completely. And that's where, even before I got back into the marathons, people were like well, what are you training for? And I said for life.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:There you go. I love that.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Because you do, you naturally feel better, you perform better, and I also I agree with that analogy on the airplane too, but I also think of it. We are our greatest assets, because if we're not in a good space To your point, how do you take care of kids? How do you help people? How are you present? How are you showing up? Right? Our actions, whether spoken or unspoken, ripple out like we've all been there. You know, you see certain people. It's like I'm just going to avoid it. You know, like, don't stick your hand in the fire, let them have a little time and absolutely.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:I think it's important with that. So, speaking of running, do you have any uh any races planned, or are you taking a? Little time off for the summer.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:No, no races on the calendar. Um, I I nothing on the calendar that I'm, that I'm running, running towards you know, literally, figurativelyatively, either way, but I am just consistently training, like you said, for life I have a routine that I hold pretty much every week. I run three to four days a week. You know I've been dealing with a couple of little injuries and little things, just, you know, uncomfortable, but I'm getting through them and so it's no, no big deal. As you age, you get a little bit, you know, you get a little bit of injuries and especially, I don't sleep as much as I probably should, which is something that's going to. It's a point of focus for me is to to get myself to sleep a little bit earlier. But yeah, nothing specific. I have a couple of challenges that I want to do this year, as I just turned 40, I want to do a 40 mile challenge and I want to do either a 40 mile hike or a 40 mile run in a 24 hour period.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:So that's something that.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:I'm going to work towards, and I wanted to do it in my birthday month, which is June, but the month got a little bit away from me and it's very, very hot, so I figured I might delay it to where it's a little bit cooler in Florida.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Especially for the run, you know and that's an ultra.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, yeah, I know, I know.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Yeah, that's. That's a big one, but I'm excited to hear which you decide on and when you do. I've also heard of some people, especially as the years accumulate, that they'll tie in relays with different friends and they'll just go to another state, and I was like that's a really fun idea too.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:So I love the physical component for that.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:So I love the physical component for that. And again taking the broader view right. We look at tax, we look at fitness, family, all those different segments. What's your why? What drives you? What's that internal flame? Right?
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, I mean family first and foremost. My kids. You know I grew up in a family where my father and mother were very hard workers. My mom was a stay-at-home mom but she was constantly working to help us and was always volunteering. My dad was in school administration, worked in the university system in Connecticut and then in Florida and you know I grew up just with the sort of the model that hard work was important.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:I want to provide a model and be a mentor and a model to my children, all my children, and provide them a good, healthy life, but provide them a good figure to watch and learn from and, you know, show them that you know you can be successful working hard but also be present with the family. And being present with the family is something that's incredibly important to me. But finding a way to balance that and be incredibly successful in business is always a challenge, but it is doable. It just takes prioritization. It just takes, you know, getting up early and getting things done.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:But it's my family first and foremost is, you know, the most important thing for me and my why and in terms of why I'm in this particular business is because I enjoy building relationships, I enjoy helping clients. I enjoy adding value. We are a value add service to our clients and I love being able to deliver good news to clients that I've delivered on what I was hoping to be able to deliver on and say that we've saved them you know X amount of thousand dollars in their real estate taxes, you know, and tough conversations happen and I deliver bad news sometimes, but you know there's always, like you said, you're learning from those and trying to find ways to get better.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:So, family and you know, just being the best person and role model that I can be and to leave the world in a better place than it was when I got here. If I can make an impact on people's lives, you know, in a positive way, then I've done a little something right.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Well, of course, many things, and I would say that probably leads directly into my question of what living fully means to you. I think you summarized that in a beautiful way.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:I think I tied it all into that.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Yeah, I was gonna say you read my mind, Nick.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:I like this.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Makes it really easy for me. One final question for you, though, and you know you had mentioned about being organized and just to be able to get everything done, which is so true, and it makes me think also about goal setting, right, where we've got about six months of the year remaining, and I was reflecting on it, looking at what I've done so far, what I want to do yet this year, and it really comes down to a crystal clear vision, and I was thinking about that on weekends, right. If you have kind of a fuzzy vision, you get some things done, but you are just not at the same point as if it was clear. It's like, all right, I'm going to go from this to this and knock this out, and then it's. You know, it's like it's always nice to get your to-dos done and then relax and and have kind of that, that fun time with family or friends.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:So what's something you might be focusing on for the remainder of the year?
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah. So growth, you know we're we're focused on, on growing the business. You know we're focused on growing the business, you know, and helping our clients the best that we can. We're in between seasons at this point right now. So a little bit of quick context not to walk you through the entire thing. But in Florida specifically, our season, summer is a little bit of a down season, meaning we're prepping, or preparing for the upcoming appeal season for 2024. Or preparing for the upcoming appeal season for 2024.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:The values, in Florida, specifically, are released in August and our appeals are due in September. So we're really focused right now on, you know, growing our client base and, you know, serving our existing clients to the best of our ability, getting everybody prepared and ready to go for the appeals that are coming up in September. So from a business perspective, that's one of the main things that I'm focused on and from a personal perspective, it's really just, you know, prepping for a wedding. You know Kristen and I just got engaged about a month ago, so you know we're preparing and planning. Just got engaged about a month ago, so you know we're preparing and planning for, you know, our wedding next year and you know we're excited about, excited about all that that holds and for the future of our family together and, and you know, very excited for for that and focused on that as well. So, yeah, a couple, a couple of different things, but, you know, trying to be laser focused.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Exactly. And since this podcast is going to go all throughout the nation, this is your opportunity. You know, put a plug out there who might be a good candidate for your firm. You know what's the best way for them to reach you, to learn about you. All of that good information.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Yeah, absolutely so. A good candidate for our services is any commercial real estate owner. Um, you know, doesn't matter where necessarily you are. Obviously our offices are in in florida and in dallas, um, so we have a physical presence there, but we can assist, um, you know, throughout the throughout the country physical presence there, but we can assist. You know, throughout the country.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Commercial real estate, you know, consists of anything from your apartment complexes, your office buildings, your industrial buildings, hotels, motels, you name it all food groups. We work on it, we handle it and are able to, you know, assist. You know the best way to track what I'm doing is probably LinkedIn. I'm sure you can put the link to track what I'm doing is probably LinkedIn. I'm sure you can put the link my LinkedIn bio in the show notes or link it somewhere. I don't remember it off the top of my head, but Nicholas Mao is my full name and you know happy to connect with people on LinkedIn, try to post a lot about, you know mindset and business and interweave the real estate tax world, uh, in there as well.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:So trying to add value into the linkedin marketplace, um, through that, um you know you do a great job with that and that's how we connected, and then through cci, since yeah, absolutely, or you know and debbie ashland and the florida crew.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:So yeah, yeah, you gotta give, you gotta give beth azor a plug, because I think that's how we met was through interacting on one of her posts, and then you followed me or I followed you, and then we started posting on each other's uh timelines and then we met in in seattle in person right last was that last year.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Yeah, yep. At the CCIM event and that's the fun thing, right Of like, so many of us have all connected through LinkedIn and a lot of us are CCIMs, and then I'll see that one of the events like oh there you are in real life. Yeah, yeah, it adds another layer which is nice.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:It does and I guess I forgot to mention so with CCIM, and I'm sure a lot of your viewers or your audience knows CCIM or are CCIMs, or maybe they're in commercial real estate primarily, I assume, but it's obviously a great organization. I happen to be the Broward chapter, fort Lauderdale district excuse me, president for now my second year and it's a great opportunity to meet people and to put yourself in front of people, and you know if you were uncomfortable, you know, speaking in front of a crowd. Well, two years later, I am certainly not uncomfortable speaking in front of a crowd anymore, because I've done it about 100 times now. So, but yeah, that's you know. Just kind of to wrap it up, you know I'm happy to connect with you know users or LinkedIn users or potential clients at any point in time. You know my office line is I can give that out if anyone has questions, it's 954-906-8066. Happy to help and I'm sure you can put my email and everything in the show notes as well. Happy to connect.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Perfect. Well, Nick, thank you so much for joining me today. I'll include all of your contact information and I'm excited to see your next steps.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:Absolutely Likewise excited to see your next steps and see you in Houston as well.
Heather Ewing, CCIM:Perfect, that sounds great. I'll see you then.
Nicholas Mau, CCIM:All right Take care, bye-bye. Bye.