Chris Baker, former wide receiver for the New York Jets, has some sage advice for kids in the Jersey City neighborhood where he grew up.
“Follow your dream, but back it up,” he said during an interview last month. “I’m a firm believer that you should go for the goal, but always have a backup plan. Even if you have a long career, it could change after a few years. I think anyone who wants to play in the NFL or NBA should chase the dream, but also have something that you can fall back on.”
This is true for Baker. While pursuing his career, he was lucky enough to find a mentor to help him learn the real estate business. This has allowed him to return to where he grew up in Jersey City as a redeveloper of homes in the Greenville section.
Sports was his passion
Baker grew up near Claremont and Carteret avenues. He was the youngest of five children. He attended Public School 12. He got into sports through the Police Athletic League, and later went on to Marist High School in Bayonne. He did so well in high school that he earned a Division 1 athletic scholarship to play football at Rutgers State University.
Baker started out at Rutgers as a quarterback but switched to wide receiver in 2003.With the Scarlet Knights, Baker caught 56 career passes for 505 yards and two touchdowns. He then went on to play in the National Football League with the San Francisco 49ers and the New York Jets.
“Greenville is coming around, and we want to be ahead of the curve.” – Chris Baker
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“When I was playing, I fortunate enough to be around someone who taught me real estate,” Baker said. “My friend was already doing it.”
So during the summer and other off-season times, Baker delved into the development business.
“I was too young to actually do anything, but I learned,” he said, balancing his hectic college schedule with learning lessons that would give him a career after sports. Since college was only a half hour away from where he grew up, he came home often and hung around the real estate office.
In 2006, the same year he graduated college, Baker made his first real estate investment. Since then, he has done many transactions: acquisitions, consulting, purchasing, selling, property management, full gut rehabs and flips. One of his favorites is mentoring up-and-coming real estate investors.
Baker currently owns several real estate investment companies. He decided to start Baker Empire to brand his family name and create a legacy in the part of the city he grew up in.
“There are a lot of things going on in Jersey City,” he said. “Everybody knows about downtown, but Greenville is coming, too.”
He has his offices in downtown Newark, but said his focus is on Greenville, providing people with quality affordable rentals.
“I’m doing it one house at a time,” he said. “These are mostly two and three family homes that I can buy up on foreclosure and short sales. Most of them are run down. What we do is bring them up to code. We hire a third party that understands how to complete a project.”
These are rental properties that his company is holding and not reselling.
“Greenville is coming around, and we want to be ahead of the curve,” he said. “Downtown will cost an arm and a leg to live there. It’s a different ball game if you moved there 12 or 15 years ago.”
Learned a lot from football
While he learned a lot about real estate while playing football, he also learned things in football that he brought back to his real estate career.
“Football taught me discipline,” he said. “I had a very strict coach. There were things that were required that I didn’t understand coming to college on a scholarship, reasons for things that I learned then, but I didn’t realize were priceless until I matured.”
He said many of the lessons on the gridiron were applicable to business.
“I learned to buckle down and be consistent,” he said.
He also said real estate has its own lessons.
“My main message to anyone getting into real estate rehab is for them not to get caught up in the hype,” Baker said. “People make a rush into it thinking they are going to get a pot of gold. But this is a business, and you need to focus on the craft, and understand business in and out.”
This means he learned to deal with everything from bookkeeping to construction.
“You have to be open to learn,” he said.
Crowd funding for redevelopment projects
One of the challenges for a small development company is getting funding. Banks are often reluctant to invest in smaller projects like his, he said, requiring alternative funding sources.
“I’m using a crowd funding platform rather than traditional banks,” he said.
Crowd funding is a method in which investors give money to a specific project, and get a return on their investments later.
This method often allows him to move ahead more quickly and invest in parts of the community that banks do not support. He usually uses private money to pay for the entire project.
“This has worked well for us and usually works well for investors who are looking for another outlet,” he said. “Once a building is fixed up it gets easier to get a loan from a bank. But when you start with a building that is not in great condition, it would take a long time.”
Al Sullivan may be reached at asullivan@hudsonreporter.com.