Marty Wender

Mr Wender is a master developer operating in San Antonio. He has been rather successful over the years with his more recent development, West Over Hills, attracting clients such as the National Security Administration, Microsoft, Sea World.

West Over Village
He gained the sea world business against much criticism from the development community and his investors as he had to take a loss on the deal. This was acceptable in his opinion as the trade off was increased traffic and ancillary services.

The National Security Agency (NSA) is one of his clients for this particular development. The contact at the NSA bought the property sight-unseen as Microsoft already had a data center there. The credibility and market research of Microsoft won Marty the business.

As the master developer he is responsible for infrastructure and permits. This ensures that the area is developed with a plan in mind and that the utilities are able to manage the load.

He has a philosophy that there are 2 kinds of people in the world, Givers and Takers. He has found in his career that the Givers always do better than the Takers, but unfortunately represent a smaller fraction of the population of business people.

Mr Wender believes that you cannot solve a problem with a negative statement, a throw back to a logic course he took in his undergraduate degree. This view has helped him to solve difficult problems by always looking for the solution instead of complaining about the problem. He promotes this positive approach.

He is a consummate salesman and had a lot of advice to offer about the topic, always pitch toward your clients needs, don't dictate to the market, work harder than everyone else. Always go the extra mile toward impressing your client. Meet their basic human needs as well as the business ones. For instance, he tells a story about a client who really enjoyed a BBQ place nearby but was unable to dine with them before his flight left. Marty personally saw to it that they had ample supply for the flight and all the crew before take off. He smiles and says, "I don't know if I got the deal because of that, but it sure didn't hurt"

He is one of those kind souls that was willing to offer of their time and energy to help the next generation of developers and real estate professionals. For this I am grateful to have made his acquaintance.

The business that he operates while small is good at outsourcing its vital roles to maintain the level of professionalism that his clients and investors expect.

Some challenges he has faced in his resent career are the following, the north side of town, where the development was going was over the recharge zone for the aquifer that feeds San Antonio, the ground while hard, was predominately limestone, which made installing utilities much more costly, and the environmentalists found some endangered species on his proposed development site.

All of this together combined to violate the 11th commandment, "time is the enemy of a real estate deal."

Mayor Garza at the time was trying to direct the market south of the city, and also created many obstacles to Mr Wender's developments in the north.

He began to look west and found the area that would become West Over Hills, an area close to 3 new economic drivers which had gone largely unnoticed by the development community. The Medical Center, USAA moved into the area with 18000 employees and University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) built a new campus as well.

The deal structure he created with his partner is a limited partnership with a pref. return to the equity investor. Marty believes in using assignable contracts to limit personal risk in all of his deals, although he admits that it will be hard to slip this past the banks in today's market.

Mr Wender supports numerous philanthropic initiatives in his area, among which is the issue of dyslexia in school children. He believes in empowering the "differently abled" toward their life goals. Having overcome this challenge himself, he is well aware of the challenges and rewards associated with this learning style.

Marty left us with the advice,"Be a giver, get involved in the community and find a mentor"


Please click play for the photos of Mr Wender and some of his projects