Over the last 25 years, Tony Avila has served as an advisor in over 100 home building merger and acquisition transactions. Through the course of his career, he has raised approximately $20 billion in over 75 debt and equity issuances for publicly traded and private home building and land development companies.
Avila founded Builder Advisor Group in 2008 after serving as a home builder investment banker since 1996. His expertise in his field has set him apart as an inspirational leader with a wealth of knowledge to share with future generations of home builders.
Here are some highlights from the episode:
On growing up with a family business
"My father was a pharmacist, we had drugstores. So, you had of course the pharmacy and then they had a lot of retail out front and all kinds of things like an old Rexall drugstore. I started working at my father's pharmacy at age 8. He had several pharmacies that I'd work at, and Saturdays, my grandfather would take me bowling. And then after bowling, it would be straight to the pharmacy to work. And I would work several days. I'd work after school. I saw [my father’s] work ethic. And he instilled that in me."
On setting up future generations for success
"I think about the young people in our organization. My goal is for them. It’s not just the guys who are running the organization and running the company. You know, for me, I'm just handing the reins over. And they can take the reins as much as they like, over time. And our company is a C Corp. It's meant to live forever, and our people within the organization share in the profits from our projects that we work on. […] You're growing up your people, and they'll either grow within our organization, or they will find their best destiny, somewhere beyond here, where we've built a great foundation for them to grow and further their careers."
On what inspires him
"Inspiration is our people. The inspiration that gets me out of bed in the morning, that's the inspiration. I’m going to get in [to work[ and go interact with this incredible, unique set of skilled people. So that's my inspiration for getting out of bed in the morning."
Click to hear from the leaders in the last five podcast episodes, which feature Gregg Nelson and Michael Maples of Trumark Cos.; Doug Yearley, chairman and CEO of Toll Brothers; Rick Severance, president of Wellen Park, Mattamy Homes; Shravan Parsi, CEO of American Ventures; and Spencer Rascoff, former CEO and co-founder of Zillow.
