DAVID GHAVITIAN
INTERNATIONAL REAL ESTATE LAWYER AT YOURDOORSTEP
Iwas sworn officially as a lawyer in October of 2005. At the time, the law firm that I was interning for told me originally, I was only going to stay there for six months but they kept me on the team for years afterwards. It was quite a welcome to the world of law as I became a published author on securities law at the same time! It was a great experience that I cherish to this day as my boss at that firm remains my mentor to this day! He gave me a lot of latitude to work for and look for my own clients so I guess that’s when my entrepreneurial drive was kickstarted.
Soon thereafter, I was directly solicited by the head of this real estate group that owned / managed about 60 million square feet of space at the time. I really had to think about it. Here I was working on my own, and yet I didn’t know if I really wanted to work for somebody else. But I was also curious as to see where this adventure would take me.
At the time, I did a lot of soul searching and met with a client of mine who had a massive real estate portfolio himself. I asked him about this opportunity and he basically told me that with the experience I was going to get there, I would learn so much more and it could only but advance me so much more than if I worked on your own. Just do it. So, I took the leap of faith and started working as in-house counsel soon thereafter.
I was the youngest employee in the whole company. It was a real eye-opening experience for me so as to discover how a well-oiled and respected real estate company works. After working there for several years, I still had that entrepreneurial itch and I decided to start applying for firms, but with only 5-6 years’ experience, it was quite challenging to find something up to my caliber and expectations so that’s when I decided to start working for myself and fulfil my own destiny as opposed to fulfilling someone else’s.
What was one of your first challenges?
The definition of an entrepreneur is someone who starts up a business with a great financial risk. Here I was starting out on my own and I didn’t even have an office! At the time, I had no choice but work out of the old Java U on Monkland Avenue. If I had clients to go see, I would go to them. That was a real added value to my business that I still do to this day! I cant tell you how much they appreciated that!
One day, that very client who gave me that advice had asked me where I was working from and when I told him, he offered to give me a space in a building he was managing in the old port at basically cost. If you don’t ask, you’ll never find those opportunities.
Where do you get your drive from ?
I am the product of Iranian Jewish immigrants who had to leave their familiar settings because of political circumstances. It wasn’t a safe environment for minorities there, so my dad didn’t just immigrate, he had to escape.
I took this all for granted and wasn’t really grateful for my present circumstances until I worked several years ago in Malaysia under the Quebec Investor Program.
All of my clients were investor types and when asked why they wanted to come to Quebec, they would point to their children. These were people who had a net worth of over $2M, yet regardless of their financial situation, they want to make sure that there kids have every opportunity that is given to them.
This is why my practice is heavily accentuated on foreign real estate investors. Our province has so much to offer in terms of education, affordability and opportunity that I wanted to make sure that if my investor clients could come here, I would be at the forefront of not only helping them find such opportunities but to thrive as well.
What do you know now that you wish you knew when you first started ?
Macro patience with micro speed. Everyone is impatient at the macro level. A lot of people tell themselves this is where I want to be in 5 years but what are they doing now to get there? I’m someone who’s squeezing every ounce of the time I have now as I have the skill set and ambition to create opportunities for myself. I’m going to achieve that level of success regardless of how that success is to be defined. Focus more on the now then on the future.
I always knew I wanted to do something to help other people. I was bullied a lot as a kid. I came to realize that no matter what voice or rationale I had, people would never give me the benefit of the doubt or listen to me because of certain stigmas or prejudices they were projecting. I was drawn into being a lawyer to represent and be the voice of those people who wanted to express themselves but couldn’t for some reason or another. I just want my clients to resolve their challenges so they could focus on bigger and better things in life.
What really gets me going are clients that just got started and are building something despite the challenges that they have. I’m growing along with them. That’s the kind of stuff I love. That’s why I enjoy being a real estate lawyer.