Customized real estate investment advisory built on a legacy of thought leadership and analytical rigor

About RFA

RFA aims to improve the institutional real estate investment model by providing research-driven, customized and aligned consulting and advisory solutions to investors.

Institutional investors leverage our diverse team’s analytical approach, deep knowledge, and experience in research, consulting, investment management, property operations, and lending.

We focus on identifying investments likely to experience growing demand and the benefits of operational expertise.

Approach

RCLCO Fund Advisors (“RFA“) was formed to address the complex global real estate investment environment facing institutional investors. RFA’s broad background across a wide variety of disciplines—including real estate investment, asset management, lending, urban economics, management consulting, development, and portfolio analysis—makes us uniquely adept at helping investors navigate property markets from both “bottom-up” and “top-down” approaches.

RFA provides customized, aligned, and executable real estate advisory and investment management solutions to institutional investors.

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Strategic Thinking

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Market Knowledge

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Industry Expertise

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Client Focus

History

RCLCO Fund Advisors, LLC (RFA) was formed in 2011 to enable institutional investors to achieve their investment goals by having greater control over their real estate portfolios.

After the Great Financial Crisis, many institutional investors reviewed their approaches to investing in real estate due to disappointing performance, as well as a frustrating lack of transparency and control and very high and misaligned fees. RFA was formed in direct response to requests to provide a rigorous evaluation of the institutional real estate investment model—and then to help clients implement a different approach that relies on:

Investing in real estate according to long-term economic, demographic, technological, and preference trends that impact demand;
Customized, client-specific investment and asset management services, research, and strategy; and
Hands-on assistance in implementing more “direct” types of investments.

RFA builds upon the six decade legacy of our affiliate, Robert Charles Lesser and Co., LLC (RCLCO) and has been an SEC Registered Investment Advisor since 2014. Today, RFA advises on over $100B in real estate equity value, serves clients and investors from multiple countries, and sources, underwrites, and oversees investments across the risk spectrum and a broad range of property types.

Leadership

Taylor Mammen

Chief Executive Officer, RFA

Gadi Kaufmann

Chairman RCLCO & RFA

Scot Bommarito

Senior Research Associate, RFA

Joshua A. Boren

Managing Director, Strategic Initiatives

Peter Botz

Vice President, RFA

Ben Chernus

Vice President, RFA

Debashis Chanda

Principal, RFA

Jessica Diorio

Vice President, RFA

Mike Essig

Vice President, RFA

Scott Haley

Vice President, RFA

Learn more about joining the RFA team

Clients

RFA works exclusively for the investor.

Our clients are institutional investors with diverse missions, investment objectives, systems of governance, and real estate strategies. They include some of the largest pension funds in the world, and family offices that are just beginning to invest in real estate. We serve investors based in the U.S. and from around the world.

Our client have diverse missions, but they have in common an appreciation of the following goals for their real estate investing:

Collaborative and customized advisory
Research-based, demand-driven investing
Retention of some level of control over the investment process, from strategy development to partner selection, and from investment to disposition
Optimizing fees for equity and alignment

RFA Client Types

Services

We customize our services according to client needs, across a spectrum from serving as an end-to-end “outsourced real estate department” to advising on specific, discrete needs.

Our professionals have the skills to provide high-level strategy or policy insights, lead or support sourcing, underwriting, or oversight of joint ventures or property operations, and develop investment vehicles that fill gaps in the capital markets landscape.

We help investors define their “model portfolio” and the infrastructure required
An actionable investment strategy leverages external (market) and internal (organizational) opportunities
Investment strategy planning can range from broad (e.g., a global real estate investment strategy) to focused (e.g., multifamily investment strategy in the Sunbelt)

We help investors chart a path from where they are to where they’d like to be
A pacing plan quantifies target investment activity, relying upon quantitative and qualitative analysis
The plan sets specific investment targets and metrics, informed by the investment strategy

We help investors execute their strategies
We source opportunities from our vast network of managers and operators, brokers and professional service providers
RFA has helped clients commit and invest over $12B in equity in funds, separate accounts, joint ventures, operating companies, and directly into properties

We help investors maintain effective exposure and achieve long-term return targets
Investing is a continuous process: asset management implements the business plan and determines when it’s time to pivot
RFA’s team consists of experienced asset managers with expertise in every property type and multiple disciplines (finance, development, construction management, property management, etc.)

We help investors know how their portfolios are performing, and why
Performance analysis in real estate has historically been limited by data availability and expertise
RFA has developed reporting and analysis systems for institutional investors that provide greater insights in a more timely manner

We help investors access underserved investment opportunities through sponsored vehicles
RFA’s research and broad market coverage give us insights into unique demand-driven opportunities, and where current investment offerings fall short
We only proactively pursue an investment opportunity when we believe we have specific capabilities that add value