New Chicago Boutique Firm Invests In Undervalued Assets In Overlooked Micromarkets

Despite the drumbeat of negative news about commercial real estate, what those stories often miss are the opportunities available to investors in acquisition mode.

One new firm looking to acquire is Wayland Real Estate Capital. Founded in 2024 by a team of industry veterans, Wayland is a boutique investment firm focused on sub-institutional, growth-oriented and value-enhancement investment opportunities in thriving urban micromarkets and affluent suburbs of Chicago.

“We believe rent demand and growth will be best in submarkets that aren’t in the headlines, and that these other high-demand rent markets are currently being overlooked by many investors,” co-founder Matthew Berry said. 

Berry and co-founders Jason Manaster and Marc Klutznick, who collectively have more than 65 years of industry experience, have already proven their confidence in Chicago’s submarkets is not just empty talk. With their firm not yet six months old, they have closed acquisitions of a boutique mixed-use property in the upscale Chicago suburb of Winnetka and a 17-unit apartment building in Chicago’s trendy Avondale neighborhood, with further acquisitions and ground-up deals pending in other popular neighborhoods.

Bisnow recently spoke with the Wayland leadership team to learn how the new startup came to be, what sets Wayland apart and how they view Chicago CRE.

A New Venture, Years In The Making

Wayland was fast out of the gate with its first successful closing, but the roots of the new company go back generations. All three founders share longstanding ties of both family and friendship.

“Our partnership arises out of family and is built on trust, the most important element of any investment business,” Klutznick said. “Our families have known each other for 40-plus years. We consider ourselves a family that grew up in this business together, just never working in the same place.”

Klutznick said they came to understand one another’s perspectives not only on real estate, but also capital, partnerships, civics and the role of CRE professionals in the business and wealth ecosystems. Their collective experience and shared values form the foundation of their new company, he said.

In October 2022, the principals made their first acquisition before officially forming the firm — 914 Green Bay Road in Winnetka, a 10K SF mixed-use asset in the dynamic Hubbard Woods Design District, 16 miles north of Downtown Chicago. 

Manaster said acquiring the boutique building in an established and vibrant area aligned with their family investment strategy: buy well-built and well-located assets in neighborhoods positioned for steady cash flow and value appreciation. 

The successful closing inspired them to come together as a company, Manaster said. They not only enjoyed working together but found that their varied skills complemented each other as well. 

“We thought, ‘We could do that again, next time not just for our own families,’” Manaster said. 

Overcoming Challenges With A Solid Foundation 

Despite strong momentum, Wayland, like all new businesses, faces challenges. Berry said success as an investment manager “sits on a three-legged stool,” with deal flow, capital and collaborators as the legs. These factors require continual and equal attention to keep Wayland’s business momentum going, he said.

“We need to constantly cultivate a pipeline of superior risk-adjusted opportunities, understand the ever-evolving capital strategies of our investor base and the role of real estate therein, and maintain a deep and varied bench of trusted and competent project collaborators — lenders, managers, contractors, architects, brokers and more," Berry said.

The partners emphasized that Wayland appeals to investors by considering more than just absolute returns when assessing opportunity. Berry said every investment should be a means to an end for Wayland’s partners, and it's important to identify how it serves their holistic investment strategies.

“We ask ourselves whether the opportunity can help fill an underserved investment objective for our own families,” he said. “Would our families have a reason to own this property, its cash flow, its growth potential, and would it help achieve a goal for us and our next generation? If so, it likely serves a similar purpose for others.” 

These same principles have allowed Wayland to partner successfully with another Chicago-based firm, Daniel Management Group. 

A New Joint Venture With DMG Capital

In April, Wayland closed its second deal: the 17-unit 4179 West Belmont in Chicago’s Avondale neighborhood, with DMG Capital, led by Roger Daniel and Robert Wasserman.

“Both groups viewed the investment through a long lens,” Klutznick said.

DMG’s management affiliate was already the property’s manager and leasing agent, so Wayland called upon DMG’s direct knowledge of the property and submarket to help inform its analysis, Manaster said. This trusted insight allowed it to act aggressively when others stayed on the sidelines. 

DMG and Wayland understood something rudimentary about the local multifamily market.

“New renters in the submarket desire high-quality, spacious apartments, and there's not enough product existing or coming online to meet that demand for the foreseeable future,” Klutznick said. 

Each unit at 4179 West Belmont features large floor plans, high-end finishes, in-unit laundry, floor-to-ceiling windows, a built-in fireplace and other amenities that appeal to Avondale’s expanding renter base.

It can be tough to navigate such a challenging industry. Berry said finding trustworthy collaborators can help mitigate investment risk.

“Guidance from a trusted colleague like DMG makes us both more efficient and more confident,” Berry said. “It reduces blind spots, which moderates risk, enhancing risk-adjusted returns.”

For Wayland, the acquisition is the epitome of its investment mandate: Marry tenant demand with a good basis and create a return profile that meets both the risk and reward appetites of its investors.

“Instead of high-octane deals targeting opportunistic returns with a slate of unknowns, our goal is to acquire strong cash yields in neighborhoods with long-term capital appreciation while avoiding outsized and unnecessary risk,” Berry said.

Breaking Through Negative Headwinds Of Chicago CRE 

Wayland is bullish on Chicago’s fundamentals, and despite talk of a volatile CRE market, the firm is finding deals that will hold up over time. 

“We understand its headwinds, which are not insignificant, but the data doesn’t lie,” Berry said. “Chicago has an unbelievable renter class, a monumental shortfall of housing and solid stock with staying power.” 

Wayland believes it can produce consistent returns for its investors without having to rely on factors outside its control, like Federal Reserve interest rate cuts, achieving unrealistically low operation costs, successfully appealing real estate taxes or maintaining significantly above-average population growth, Berry said.

Right now, that means seeking out recently stabilized assets in established micromarkets rather than hoping for a continuation of outsized demand in some of the trendier investment markets like Nashville, Austin or South Florida, he said. 

Carving A Future Legacy 

While the company’s primary focus is its hometown of Chicago, it also sees opportunities in secondary Midwestern markets and select locations further away, like Los Angeles, Klutznick said. 

“We’ll stick to the few markets where we feel we have information asymmetry, where we can be efficient with deal assessment and pursuit, and where we know the team of collaborators needed to execute,” he said.

Berry said that if the company is successful, it’ll prove that pursuing modest returns while tenaciously limiting risk is — for most investors — a superior investment strategy to taking on significantly more risk in hopes of achieving only slightly greater returns. This perspective was formed over decades, bearing witness to successful and unsuccessful real estate transactions, he said.

“We learned a lot from our families in this business,” he said. 

Berry’s mother is Nancy Pacher, a two-time Chicago Tribune Broker of the Year, Bisnow lifetime achievement honoree and Midwest Real Estate News Hall of Fame inductee. Klutznick represents the third generation of the family responsible for iconic mixed-use developments such as Water Tower Place and Old Orchard Shopping Center. 

Wayland now wants to carry on the family tradition by creating a long-lasting brand with the same values that got it started. 

 “They taught us about real estate. But more importantly, we learned how to conduct ourselves in business, manage partners and counterparties, and preserve and protect capital,” Berry said. “We know pursuing the highest nominal returns possible is not a successful long-term strategy. We aspire to be fair, modest and a responsible fiduciary. If we can accomplish those things, the returns will be more than sufficient.”

This article was produced in collaboration between Wayland Real Estate Capital and Studio B. Bisnow news staff was not involved in the production of this content.

Studio B is Bisnow’s in-house content and design studio. To learn more about how Studio B can help your team, reach out to studio@bisnow.com.