Our latest edition of Home Town Heroes comes courtesy of the turbulent city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. At the age of 31 Brandon Rule is a business prodigy. He is a commercial real estate developer with an extremely impressive resume. He has developed $50 million in affordable housing projects in Milwaukee through his company Rule Enterprises and has an additional $180 million in projects currently in his development pipeline.
A few weeks ago Brandon went viral on social media after news broke that the city of Madison, WI recommended that he be awarded a contract to develop a 30,000-square-foot grocery store, 150-unit apartment building and 345-space parking garage on a city-owned lot.
There aren’t too many black commercial real estate developers, and they’re definitely aren’t a lot his age. One of the reasons why there are so few black developers is that there isn’t a lot of exposure given to successful individuals in the industry. Most people think about real estate from an investor’s perspective very few aspire to be big-time commercial developers.
In episode 54 of @earnyourleisure Brandon broke down the ins and outs of commercial real estate development, he explained how affordable housing credits work, he talked about financing and he gave an in-depth look into his journey into becoming an icon in the industry.
