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INTERVIEW

INTERVIEW

INTERVIEW

INTERVIEW

The Forrest Gump of Real Estate

59 minutes

Season 6

·

Episode 4

In This Conversation

At 27, Russ Flicker walked into Trump Tower expecting an introduction. He walked out having negotiated his own salary — in the room, on the spot, with no idea the meeting was an interview. He'll tell you he negotiated it badly. He also started two weeks later, spent five years there, and eventually inherited the office of the man who ran development. From there: the hospitality development team at Blackstone, then chief investment officer at the Ian Schrager Company. Then, in 2010 — with a 35% RevPAR decline behind the industry and two young children at home — he and two partners launched AWH Partners with no cycle to lean on and everything to prove. More than $2 billion into hotel real estate later, plus a management company of their own, he calls himself the Forrest Gump of real estate: somewhere in the corner of a lot of important photographs. This conversation goes where most investment interviews don't. He says the thing nobody says on a panel about select service. He explains why owning the management company means there's nobody left to blame. And he gives the single best piece of acquisitions advice in the season, which is essentially permission to not buy anything.

Key Topics

The Trump Tower meeting he didn't know was an interview — and walking in the next week to "who the hell are you, and why did he hire you?"

What Blackstone taught him about rigor, and what Ian Schrager taught him about starting from a white sheet of paper

Brand proliferation: "they have undergraduate now. When is middle school coming out?"

In This Episode:

  • The dot-com venture that failed at 25, and the business partner he's now been married to for 25 years

  • Why 2010 — the worst moment in a century to raise money for hotels — turned out to be the right one

  • The honest answer nobody gives on stage — select service absolutely competes with full service, same brand family included

  • Marriott–Starwood, the most generous loyalty program ever built, and the college essay written about gaming it

  • Why Hyatt has the opposite problem from Hilton right now

  • Points-night economics, and why dropping rate at 1pm can make you more money by midnight

  • Why they bought their own management company — "if there's a problem, I can't blame anyone. Ask Russ. I'm at fault."

  • When AWH is deliberately not the right buyer, and why they won't bid

  • Trophy assets, older supply that should come out of the market, and the proliferation of debt letting people hang on

  • "You're not paid to acquire. You're paid to run through our process. If the process says red light, you've done your job."

  • Why the story is what makes anyone believe the numbers — and what his sister, who works in lending, says about the decks she receives

Russ Flicker

Co-Founder & Managing Partner

AWH Partners

LinkedIn Logo and Link

About Our Guest

Russ Flicker has spent more than two decades in hospitality real estate. He likes to call himself the Forrest Gump of the industry: somewhere in the corner of a lot of important photographs.

It started when he was 27. He walked into Trump Tower expecting an introduction and walked out having negotiated his own salary, not realizing until later that the meeting had been an interview. He started two weeks later, stayed five years, and eventually moved into the office of the man who had run development. From there he joined the hospitality development team at Blackstone Real Estate Advisors, then became Chief Investment Officer at the Ian Schrager Company.

In 2010 the industry had just come through a 35% RevPAR decline, and Russ had two young children at home. That year he co-founded AWH Partners with Chad Cooley and Jonathan Rosenfeld. The New York–based firm has since invested more than $2 billion in hospitality real estate, across more than 10,000 keys, and runs its own management company, Spire Hospitality. As Managing Partner, Russ leads the firm's strategic direction and its institutional capital relationships.

Russ holds a J.D. from Duke University School of Law and a BSBA from Washington University in St. Louis. He is president of WashU's Olin Business School Alumni Board and a longtime supporter of its scholarship program.