#43: The $200K Warehouse Fix That Made $1.2M in 18 Months – Mark Zreika
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Episode Description
In this episode, Steve sits down with Liam Carmody, General Manager of Palise Property, and Mark Zreika, a commercial developer who has worked on projects across Dubai, Qatar, and Australia, including Dubai Airport, Dubai Metro, and Riyadh Metro.
Mark's background is not your typical Australian developer story. He skipped the house-and-granny-flat apprenticeship and went straight into commercial, specifically industrial warehousing, after spotting a gap in the mid-tier market post-COVID. No giant tier-one developers, no small-time flippers, just a space most people weren't filling.
They get into the real mechanics of commercial development: how to find sites before the market catches on, why access and driveway width matter more than gross floor area, how construction loans above 10% change the math, and why the feasibility study most people do first is usually wrong.
What We Cover
- Why Mark chose commercial over residential from day one,
- How one client bought an older eight-unit warehouse for $1.4M, spent $200K on fencing, roller doors, and lease restructuring, and sold it 18 months later for $2.6M.
- The true cost of a construction loan above 10%, and what happens to your margin when a project runs from 18 months to 36.
- Why Mark set up his own construction company after getting burned on communication and cost blowouts from tier-one builders.
- Pre-sales, tier-one versus tier-two lenders, and why the difference between 100% pre-sales required and 25% can make or break a project timeline.
- The childcare development trap: why a DA-approved site is sometimes a warning sign, not a green light.
- How to read a site for access and why a warehouse with a single-lane driveway turns into a body corporate nightmare fast.
- Leaseback deals: when they work, when they're inflating a sale price to cover a below-market yield, and how Palise Property stress-tests the numbers.
- Why Mark always pays subcontractors first and what he thinks about developers who don't.
HOSTED BY:
Steve Palise
Ph: 0403 878 497
Email: steve@paliseproperty.com
LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/steve-palise
Liam Carmody
Email: liam@paliseproperty,com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liam-carmody-06b10172/
CONNECT WITH MARK ZREIKA
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-zreika-6592365b/
Resources
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