Jay Sunde says operators should own the building

Jay Sunde and his wife, Danielle, have built an education platform of preschools, daycares, and elementary schools across the Southeast, serving nearly 500 families and employing more than 70 team members. Alongside that educational business, they also acquired the commercial real estate their schools occupy and built a growing portfolio of residential real estate.

The High Stakes of Location in Childcare

For a childcare center, location is not a detail because families choose a school partly on how close it is to home or work. Classrooms are built out to meet specific licensing requirements, making moving expensive and disruptive while causing some families not to follow. That dynamic gives a landlord a strong advantage at lease renewal.

Building Equity in Two Places at Once

When an operator owns both the business and the real estate, the operating company pays rent to an entity the operator also owns. Sunde describes this as building equity in two places at once, where the operating company produces cash flow while the property builds value over time.

This structure creates options at exit, allowing an owner to sell the business and keep the building as a rental asset with a known tenant, or sell both assets together. Having that choice is worth a great deal when the time comes.

Securing the Operating Business First

Sunde is careful not to present real estate acquisition as a blanket rule for every business owner. Purchasing real estate locks up funds that a fresh proprietor might require for wages, maintenance, or expansion during year one. If the business itself is not stable, adding a mortgage adds risk rather than reducing it.

His recommendation to purchasers is to lock down the core enterprise initially, and only chase the real estate once revenues can sustain it. In scenarios where the vendor likewise possesses the property, he advises arranging an extended lease featuring an option to buy, which safeguards the proprietor while providing adequate time to get ready.

Evaluating Property Through a Lenders Eyes

Jay Sunde started out in financial analytics, generating models and estimates for businesses operating within residential and commercial real estate as well as healthcare, before eventually constructing bespoke and investment houses throughout central North Carolina. That background shaped how he evaluates property, looking at a building the way a lender would by asking what it is worth with and without the current tenant inside.

For buyers in location-dependent sectors like childcare, healthcare, and home services with a physical shop, Sunde points out that the lease remains part of the deal whether or not the buyer treats it that way.