Men's Rowers Place Second in Whitman's Inaugural Real Estate Competition

Five Syracuse University rowers recently competed in the first undergraduate real estate competition in the Whitman School of Management, where they placed second overall on March 27. Groups of students were challenged to produce the "highest and best" redevelopment plan for an existing site that contains a large vacant industrial building and several acres of undeveloped land in nearby Fayetteville, N.Y. The purpose of the competition was to supplement classroom learning with an experiential opportunity for the students.

Eleven teams of undergraduate students were tasked with creating an initial redevelopment plan that was reviewed by a volunteer committee of local real estate professionals that narrowed the entries to the top five who would then provide a detailed presentation for the committee.

The group, titled Regatta Realty, consisted of senior coxswain Joseph Biondolillo '25, juniors Benjamin Campbell-Reide '26 and Sam Fernandez '26, and freshmen Timofey Sitnik '28 and Niki Strauss '28. Each of the top five groups were assigned a mentor who volunteered their time to assist the students. Regatta Realty worked closely with Siho Ham '05, who is a managing director at UBS.

When Whitman made the announcement of the inaugural real estate competition, Biondolillo and Campbell-Reide – both real estate finance majors, knew they wanted to participate.

"When we found out the competition was happening, we were like 'OK, we're going to do this but why not get some younger guys on the team involved?'," Biondolillo said. "So that's where we added Niki [Strauss] and Timo [Sitnik] to the group. They are both in Whitman and I think after the competition they are kind of geared towards a track in real estate as a major."

Fernandez, an advertising major in Syracuse's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, was a huge contributor to the group when it came to putting together the visual presentation.

"We added Sam [Fernandez] to the group because he is good at visual presentations with his advertising major," Biondolillo said. "He was able to help us break down certain demographics that we needed so he was a really good addition to our team."

Regatta Realty presented a plan to develop the 30-acre site into The Grove at Fayetteville, a two-phase, mixed-use development transforming the vacant area into a vibrant community hub complete with a full-service grocery store, along with independent senior housing which would align with the needs of the community in delivering long-term economic, social and environmental value to the village and surrounding area. The project leveraged the national trend of the resilience of a grocery store anchor and the demographic shift that shows that approximately 4 million people will need senior housing in the next five years across the U.S.

To celebrate their hard work and dedication, cash prizes were awarded to each of the finalist teams, including those receiving honorable mention.

The inaugural competition and awards were made possible due to generous donations from both Joe Burton '01 of Core One Industrial and Cooper Horowitz, a leader in the commercial real estate finance industry.

The winning group, The Due Diligents, presented their vision to construct a 200-unit residential apartment building with an adjoining park that will preserve the environmental integrity of the site and the character of the Fayetteville community. Special consideration was given to the necessary zoning changes and the property's designated migratory and diverse species concentration sites.

"I think the overall experience was phenomenal," Biondolillo added. "It's one thing to sit in the classroom working on your financial modeling skills in Excel or using development software like Argus, but at the end of the day when you go in the real world you aren't going to be given a base set of assumptions. So, to be given the opportunity to compete in a real world setting with developers was great."

The group also utilized its Syracuse Rowing alumni network for mentorship and advice as they built their plan for the Whitman competition.

"We reached out to former rower and Whitman grad Ryan Patton '10, who works in capital management at Wheelock Street Capital in Boston," Biondolillo said. "Ryan does a bunch with development in industrial spaces, so Ben [Campbell-Reide] and I have a pretty good relationship with him."
Patton served as an unofficial advisor to the group further developing the relationships built through the Orange rowing community. Campbell-Reide is planning to intern with Patton at Wheelock Street Capital this summer.

For more information on the Whitman School's Real Estate program, visit https://whitman.syracuse.edu/academic-areas/real-estate.

To stay updated on the Syracuse men's rowing team, follow @CuseMRowing on social media.

Syracuse University Athletics

Men's Rowers Place Second in Whitman's Inaugural Real Estate Competition

Players Mentioned

Joseph Biondolillo

Benjamin Campbell-Reide

Sam Fernandez

Timofey Sitnik

Niki Strauss

Related Videos