Doug Banks, Patrick Sylvester, Leo Sarkisian, Anthony Lamacchia, Colin Young, and Steve Clark

Joe and Kim talk to Doug Banks, Executive Editor of the Boston Business Journal, about the one year anniversary of the Silicon Valley Bank collapse. Patrick Sylvester, senior vice president for Capital Markets for Leader Bank, talks about the Feds next move on interest rates. Leo Sarkisian, executive Director of the Arc of Massachusetts, outlines the workforce crisis facing families with disabilities and possible solutions. Anthony Lamacchia owner of Lamacchia Realty discusses the spring real estate market. Colin Young, deputy editor of the State House News service explains the state attorney general’s lawsuit against the town of Milton. Steve Clark president of the Massachusetts Restaurant Association discussing minimum wage for waiters and waitresses.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
This is the New England Business Reportwith Joe short Sleeve and Kim Carrigan,
a weekly roundup and discussion of thetop business news impacting our New England economy.
Welcome everybody to the New England BusinessReport. It's March the third.
I'm Kim Carrigan along with Joe shortSleeve and wow, here we are Joe
already in March. I can't loveit up, bright and early show number

(00:22):
two. We're on our way,Kim, and you know, of course
folks that are just joining us.But a little bit about the New England
Business Report. We're a weekly hourlong discussion of a region's top business stories
impacting the local economy, and wehave a long list of very influential and
important guests. Kim, we do. Let's take a look at what's coming
up in the first half hour ofthis show, which, by the way,

(00:43):
I think this is a really greatshow coming your way. First,
we're going to be joined by DougBanks. He's the executive editor of the
Boston Business Journal. Doug's going totalk to us about some of the stories
that they've been following. One inparticular, if you can believe it,
Joe a year ago, we werecovering this story big time at Vloomberg will
Valley Bank going under and I wasthe tenth largest bank in the state,

(01:04):
and people were really nervous. Thisis a bank all about entrepreneurs. So
one year later, where do theystand? Yeah? I was surprised to
see that they're still using the samename. They still are Silicuona Valley Bank,
even though they were acquired by FirstCitizens. Correct, Yes, that's
right. But of course they hadthat Wellesley branch and that's where everybody was
a year ago. And I rememberwe were broadcasting that story anticipating a huge

(01:27):
run on the bank. I meanthere were a number of people standing out
there. I remember it interesting.But one year later, where are they?
Yeah, Doug's going to share wherethey're They're there, They're there,
Yes they are. Then Patrick Sylvester, he's a senior vice president capital markets
at Leader Bank. He's going tojoin us today. He's going to talk
to us a little bit about Januaryinflation numbers and what they mean moving forward.

(01:51):
He says that he's also anticipating thatthere will be more hike changes this
year from the Fed, but notreally clear on exactly when those may happen.
It was interesting what he had tosay though, a little bit about
mortgage rates and how they ticked downI guess in December, November and December,
and then they went back up inJanuary and that had a huge impact,

(02:13):
I guess on the marketplace. Finally, in this half hour, Leo
Sarkissian is going to join us.He's the executive director of the ARK of
Massachusetts. Now, this is anorganization that's near and dear to Joe's Hart
and quite frankly an offshoot up atthe North Shore ARC. I am very
close to the folks there. Sobetween the two of us, we've got
this stage pretty well covered. Andthis is an important issue. Yeah,

(02:36):
I mean, this workforce issue isjust really devastating for so many families.
I mean, hundreds of them arewaiting. When COVID hit, of course,
in many of these individuals with disabilitiescouldn't go to group homes anymore and
they lost all their help. Andnow they're trying to get these families that
desperately need this help back into thesystem, so to speak. And a

(02:59):
couple of things have happened. They'vegot hundreds of job openings, the pay
is low, you can make moreat Starbucks and you can make doing this,
and they're trying to change that onBeacon Hills. So there's a lot
to talk about with Leo Sarkissi inthere, you know, Kim, the
only topic came up. And Iwas at the chamber breakfast with Governor Moore
Heally on Tuesday, and one ofthe things she hammered away with the crowd

(03:23):
was what happened to Milton? AndMilton said no to the MBTA Community Act
law which has passed the twenty twentyone and that requires communities with an MBTA
station to allow zoning changes to allowmulti family housing in a certain location.
Well, Milton said, no,first community to do so, by the
way, Yeah, first and only. Yeah. So now the Attorney General

(03:44):
is suing, right. But itwas interesting to be in that room because
she really used this as a launchingpad to talk about because she's kind of
getting hammered on, oh, howcompetitive is Massachusetts? She said, well,
you know what, Guess what,folks, One of the reasons companies
don't come here is because the employeescan't buy a house. So we passed
a law to fix that. Andnow you're pushing back on us, right,
so you know, it's a gooddiscussion. Is a good discussion.

(04:06):
She referred to it as the mtown. Yeah, she didn't even cut
Now, I guess there's another town, Rentham, which is thinking about you
know, the same thing, welltread Lightley, I mean. And it's
an interesting legal argument because normally zoningissues are left to the local government.
Absolutely all right. But then alsotoday we're going to be talking with Stephen

(04:29):
Clark, and he is the presidentof the Massachusetts Restaurant Association. And again,
this is a topic that has beenbubbling up and going on for years
and years at this point, andthat's the whole question of Okay, what
sort of hourly wage should your waiteror waitress make? And they're usually paid
less the minimum wage minum wages fifteen. They're making like sixty six right right,
And most of them want to continuedoing just that because they make it

(04:51):
up in tips. In fact,they make it up and then some in
tips. Oh yeah. But there'san organization out there called Fair Wage,
and they want this change. Theywant everybody across the board to be making
minimum wage. He's going to talkto us about what his membership thinks of
this. They're none too clip please, that's for sure. Yeah, And
I guess they're This issue is comingup not only in legislation on Beacon Hill,

(05:15):
but also as a possibility of aballot question. So anyway, that's
another issue. And I forgot tomention our good old friend Anthony Lomachia Machia
a reality and I guess you saidhe's out on the West coast. He's
yeah, he's been in Vegas thisweek. I feel confident it's all about
work or not. What days inVegas there you go. Yeah, But

(05:41):
anyway, he's going to be talkingto us about the real estate market,
and in particular where we are rightnow, because boom here we are.
We're in March. I mean,the spring market should be you know,
should be banging, should be bangingon all drums, and I don't really
think it is. I think it'skind of like crickets out there still.
It's like, oh boy, allright, that's all up. Time out

(06:04):
to talk to one of our veryimportant partners here on the New England Business
Support That, of course, isthe Boston Business Journal and their executive editor,
Doug Banks. Doug joins us.Now. Doug a story that you
folks have been working on. Isthis one year anniversary of the Silicon Valley
Bank collapse. Kim and I rememberit well. We of course were at

(06:25):
Bloomberg and that story really caught everybodyby surprise. And I can still see
those lines outside the Silicon Valley Bankin Wellesley there, Doug, where are
we a year later? Thanks enough, first of all for having me,
Joe and Kim. Great to behere. And yet this coming week early
March marks the one year anniversary isthe fall of Silicon Valley Bank. At

(06:46):
the time, people have to rememberit was the tenth largest bank in Massachusetts
and over the course of decades herein the state, it was really known
for its sort of aggressive lending approach. The venture capital community to start up
Unity relied on it exclusively. Andwhere we are today, is that Silicon
Valley Bank is you know, stillstill here. They're you know, they're

(07:09):
they got bought last year and uhand the company, First Citizens Bank out
of North Carolina that bought them ismore of a traditional bank, so you
know, the lending requirements are tightcompared to where Silicon Valley Bank would you
know, be much more uh likelyto lend to a startup that didn't really
have a lot of revenue, thatsort of thing, you don't have a

(07:30):
lot of collateral as a startup.So that's really where SEB you know,
that was sort of their secret sauce, but it also made them very fragile
when you know, they had abank run a year ago. But a
year later, we talked to theCEO and our reporter Trajan Warren. You
know, it says that, uh, startups here are rooting for them to
continue, and SEB is back inthe startup community, holding you know,

(07:51):
meetings, holding conferences and trying reallyto be a presence once again. So
they're trying to make a comeback.So Doug, tell me, how does
that entrepreneurial community feel about this bankat this point? Though? So it's
really interesting. We talked to oneentrepreneur who was just about to open an
account one year ago because he hadgotten to know some of the Silicon Valley

(08:11):
bankers and and and just before hewas going to open that account, it
melted. So now he's thinking,you know, he hasn't opened that account
yet. You know, I thinkthere's still a little bit of hesitation,
but people are, you know,more and more willing to give them the
benefit of the doll and they've gotstrong backing now with First Citizens, so
I think that you know, theythey've got a chance. A lot of

(08:33):
that players though a lot of thoseexecutives in those banks have gone to other
banks in the in the community,so you'll, you know, some of
those Silicon Valley bankers that those relationshipstartups had the relationships with, they're now
at other banks. Talking with DougBanks, executive editor of the Boston Business
Journal, on this Sunday morning,March the third, talking about wow,
hard to believe one year since SiliconValley Bank collapsed. Doug, I was

(08:56):
curious though, as as reading yourthe article there in the in the Boston
Business Journal, is all the referenceswere to Silicon Valley Bank and first but
yet First Citizens acquired them. Butso on one hand, so they're not
known as First Citizens. No,they are very very reliant on that SVB
brand and they are keeping the SVBbrand. I mean, Silicon Valley obviously

(09:20):
is known for its tech startup venturecapital community. Boston was the second largest
community for deposits for SVB at thetime it collapsed, and SVB wants to
be known as SVB within First Citizens. So yeah, nobody wants to take
out a startup loan with the FirstCitizens in Boston. I've never heard of
that bank, but yeah, Iknow usually when they go under there so
does their name right right, Touchyfeely Bank SVB, that's for sure.

(09:45):
Hey, let's change gears just alittle bit if we could, and talk
about Governor Healy releasing her Economic DevelopmentBill this last week. Talk to us
a little bit about some of thehighlights. Well, the big yeah,
the big news this past week wasthe refunding of the Life Sciences Initiative.
You may remember daval Patrick when hewas governor. He first announced that life

(10:05):
sciences billion dollar investment, while shere upped that with another billion dollar investment,
not only in life sciences, buta billion dollar investment in clean energy
as well. So the Math LifeSciences Center the Mass Clean Energy Center are
both going to see a billion dollarsover the next ten years. And there's
some you know, there's some interestingaspects to it. Clean tech is going

(10:26):
to have two hundred million dollars incapital expenses, and the original Life Sciences
Bill was you know, half ofthat billion was for capital infrastructure expenses,
and this time around, the Hueyadministration is putting three hundred and fifty million
in tax incentives and one hundred andfifty million in workforce training, no money
for capital, and then the restof that money fifty million in the year

(10:48):
at five hundred million total, wouldbe for operating the Math Life Sciences Center
and all of the programs that it'sdoing. So yeah, really interesting,
Doug. Is there any controversy here? Is there anything that it's you know,
got people saying, wait, whoawhoa whoa, Wait a minute.
No. Last April, we haddone a story that you know, in
which Governor Haley had said she wasgoing to reauthorize the life sciences You know,

(11:11):
she has been out you know something, this Economic Development Plan and saying
that, you know, while weare the leader in life sciences, hands
down, you don't stay at numberone by you know, resting on your
laurel. She's been saying, andthat we have to continue to invest,
we have to continue to compete.And that's one of the things, honestly
that I love about the Heally administrationis they are you can't say they're not

(11:33):
competitive. And so she's she's putin you know the taxpayer's money where her
mouth is and saying if we're goingto compete, we're going to make sure
that life life sciences community is wellfunded by the government, that we're not
going to give it up to otherstates like Texas or North Carolina that are
using their tax money much higher grantthan than we have trying to take our
businesses. All right. He's DougBanks. He's the executive editor of the

(11:56):
Boston Business Journal, and he willbe a regular with us here on the
New England Busines to support Kim andI are going to be right back,
and when we do come back,we're going to talk with Patrick Silvester.
He's a senior vice president of capitalmarkets there at Leader Bank. A lot
to say about what's going on inthe mortgage industry. In just a moment
you are listening to the New EnglandBusiness Report on the Voice of Boston WRKO

(12:20):
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Modern banking with a personal touch.We are very pleased to welcome our next

(14:39):
guest, Patrick Sevester. He isthe senior vice president of Capital Markets at
Leader Bank. Patrick, great tohave you along, Thanks for joining us
this morning. Thank you so much. Kivin Joe, you bet. I
want to start with some inflation numbers. Inflation numbers a little bit higher than
anticipated in January. Talk to usa little bit about that, yeah,
absolutely, so. You know,inflation has been coming down a lot from

(15:03):
peaking at nearly nine percent a coupleof years ago and trending down, you
know, trying to get down toa more normal two percent range and getting
close there. The last few monthshad been continuing to trend in the right
direction. Expectations were for uh continuingdrop in January, but kind of mixed
reading CPI and PPI. Inflation readingscame in a little bit hotter than expected.

(15:28):
PTE now coming in line with expectations, so that the big line with
inflation, you know, come downfrom the high. But the last stretch
has proven kind of challenging to getall the way. All right, we're
talking with the senior vice president ofLeader Bank, senior vice president of Capital
Markets, Patrick Sylvester. I guesson the Sunday morning. So, Patrick,

(15:48):
you know, all eyes have beenon the FED, and of course
the equity markets have been pretty muchgoing crazy, you know, all betting
that the Fed's going to cut andobviously in your business and then the more
business there, this is obviously criticalto you. What do you think give
us your reading on the FED thisyear. Yeah, it's been tough so

(16:08):
far. You know, market expectationswith what the FED has signaled and what
their actions have been, you know, haven't really been in line for the
last six months. You know,the markets have been expecting a bit more
lenient policy from the FED to ratecutting. The FED has continued to signal
that they're very data dependent and needto see inflation numbers come back down in

(16:32):
line. The price stability for theAmerican consumer is their number one priority right
now, and it's just not thereyet. The data for the last six
months or so has been trending inthe right direction, but they're looking for
continued stability in the inflation numbers beforethey can move. So market expectations have
been trending a little bit back closerin line with what the Fed's saying,

(16:56):
but there's still a ways off here. So Patrick, is this sort of
the chicken and the egg here withthe Fed? You know, the Fed's
not moving and yet, like youjust said, inflation is sort of in
that last stretch. Do they haveto work together to make this work?
Yeah, definitely. There's a lotof lag in how the overall economy will

(17:18):
respond and how much time it takesto the FED policies and actions and rates
that they set to really take rootand take full effect in the economy.
I think we're just seeing that it'sjust continuing to take a little bit longer
than everybody would have hoped. Allright, our guest, of course,
is Patrick Silvester, senior vice presidentat Leader Bank, and talk to us
a little bit about you know,we all watch it closely, the jobs

(17:40):
market as it relates to what youdo at Leader Bank. What is so
important about the jobs market and thatlow three point seven percent number, Yeah,
Asluly, I mean, that's huge, you know, making loans.
We want to know that we've gotstrong barwers that will continue to you know,
be able to to repay their loans. So, you know, especially

(18:02):
in our local market, you know, the job market has been so strong,
unemployment rate, you know, threepoint seven percent, as you mentioned,
continuing to remain historically low. Youknow, wage growth has been pretty
strong for the last few years sincethe pandemic, and it's you know,
proving to be a really strong localeconomy. And so what do you anticipate

(18:25):
that's going to be like as theyear continues on. If we see these
inflation numbers not stay you know,dropping down, are we going to continue
to see the job market whole thatway? Yeah, I think inflation might
accuse the unemployment might take up aslight bit. That was definitely one of
the concerns as the FED was raisingrates that unemployment would raise, and we

(18:48):
really haven't seen that, you know, so maybe we're getting the soft landing
that the FED and markets have beenhoping for, certainly on the jobs market,
which with those still low a issuewide employment numbers. Patrick, you
know, just one quick thing beforeyou go here, and it has to
do with the whole idea of bankappraisals in this real estate market. And
I'm wondering about you know, somany people are in there and bidding up

(19:11):
the price and then the house gotto appraise. Is that a problem these
days? Yeah, I mean it'salways a concern. Typically in the spring
it's maybe a little bit more concernas the sale activity starts to heat up
and maybe some bidding wars as youmentioned, We don't see too much of
that for the most part, whereyou know, buyers and tellers are green

(19:32):
on pricing is pretty much in linewith where the market is and appraisals are
coming in to meet that. PatrickSilvester, Leaderbank's Senior vice president of Capital
Markets, thank you so much forjoining us here on New England Business Report.
You know, Kim, there's anotherbusiness topic that really has been getting
a good deal of attention, especiallyin the Boston Globe and the State House
News Service. And this is thisworkforce crisis situation that is facing families with

(19:56):
disabilities across the state. You know, COVID, all these folks with disabilities
that needed like group homes and thingslike this, they were sent home.
In the meantime, the whole workforcebasically evaporated, and these folks are paid
based on the codes that come outof the state, and some of the
wages have been way below what youcan make and you know, well done

(20:17):
at Starbucks. So there's a guy, the executive director of the ARKA Mattas
Choose. It's Leo Sarkisian who thisis his passion. He's trying to fix
this, trying to help these folkswith disabilities get back into these group homes.
But in the meantime, you've gotto get the wages up for the
people who help these families, andthe wages got to come way up.
Leo, welcome to the program.Did I do a good job there?

(20:37):
I mean set up to what's theproblem. I don't even think I need
to speak to explain the problem toour listeners. Oh uh, you know,
yeah, it's really been. Youknow, what's really concerning is we're
part of like this major you know, basically great setting process and because of
that, you know, these dollarscan add up. And between twenty fourteen

(21:00):
and two thousand nineteen, there wasonly a half a percent to two and
a half percent given for this sectorin terms of both our field and related
fields like mental health and whatever forincreases. And that means that affects what
people can pay their employees. Soat a time when minimum wage was going

(21:21):
up to fifteen dollars an hour,there's a debate on that, the rate
or the standard benchmark for the ratesfor direct air staff was fifteen dollars and
fifty two cents an hour. Imean, if you think about that,
that's sort of scary, right,And today the whole goal is to get
the twenty dollars an hour. Andagain that's a media that's an average.

(21:42):
It's what the state governor Heally wantsto do, and we fully support it,
and we have to really help thelegislature understand it and say, okay,
yes, let's move ahead with it. So Lea's let's back up just
a second. Governor Heally in herphysical twenty five five budgets. She is
proposing four hundred and eighty five milliondollars to invest in this way. And

(22:07):
now, as you've just mentioned,the lobbying effort begins up there on Beacon
Hill, right exactly exactly. Remember, it's just about the people with disabilities
or people that need human services.It's about the families too to get to
work. Right. If somebody needsgo a day service or needs in home
assistance, right, if these servicesaren't here, what what do the family

(22:29):
members that are working that need tobe supporting, right, they're loved one.
What happens to them too? Soit's an economic issue for the commonwealth,
not just you know as a subsetof the commonwealth. Is four hundred
and eighty five million dollars enough itis, it'll get us. It's a
step, a huge step in theright direction, because we projected in our

(22:49):
twenty eighteen Workforce Report that we needto get to the meeting of twenty four
dollars an hour by twenty twenty five. And that's so shockingly and we said
that because again it's a median thatmeans whether you work eight days as this
staff person or you work eight years, you're in that median. Right,

(23:11):
So that means not everybody's going toget twenty dollars an hour, right unless
agencies just say, it doesn't matterhow many years you work for me,
I'm just going to give you thatsalary. It doesn't work that way.
Well, Leah, what if thisworks out, I mean, what if
this works out the governor gets heraway? I mean, you folks get
the money that the governor wants toput to this problem, you get to
that median level. Where does thatleave these families? Does this mean that

(23:32):
people are going to start coming backto these open positions, which I understand
that there are hundreds and hundreds ofWell, we've already seen improvement for agencies
that are using their savings or funbalance I call it. Right. There
are already some of them doing that, okay, and they can only do
it for so long, right,So, but they've made a commitment to
do that because it's been so tough, and so we're hoping that'll happen.

(23:56):
You know, if it happens,we'll see for sure some improvement. It'll
be money well spent by the legislature. And again, part of that money
that Kim noted ninety five million ofthat was from the legislature recognizing this issue
in twenty twenty three with their EconomicDevelopment bill. So they invested they had
one hundred and twenty five I thinkmillion that was annualized. I mean every

(24:18):
year. You know, it's ninetyfive million. Isn't just a one year
of money they appropriated, they say, alloted that for annualization for every year.
So we couldn't get to this goalwithout the legislature initially recognizing the problem
too. Sure, So, LEO, if the four hundred and eighty five
million dollars passes, how is thisallocated across the state? So well,

(24:41):
it's and rates are done every twoyears, Kim. But in this case,
the reason they need so much isthey're going to get to the median
for both rates that are typically donelast year that are active already because they
stopped at nineteen sixty five and nineteenthirty five, and that ballpark depending on
if people use their cost adjustment factor. So let's say it's nineteen fifteen hours

(25:02):
just for the sake of having anumber. But then there's this year's and
this year is the big year whenit's over two point four billion dollars in
services in our residential world. We'llget to finally twenty dollars meet. Okay,
that's really I'll give you an examplea few years ago to do this,
to get to a ten percent jump, it cost one hundred and thirty

(25:26):
million in residential supports, both tothe Department Donal Services, which got the
line's share, and two other disabilityagencies. So just to give you an
idea, be a big percentage willbe our the people served with intellectual and
development disabilities. All right, he'sLeo Sarkisian. He's the executive editor of
the Ark of Massachusetts. Will continueto watch this topic as our other major

(25:48):
news outlets in the cities. It'sa critically important issue to these families.
Thanks very much, Leo. Lookingahead, we're going to talk a little
bit about their real estate market andhome sales. Well, home sales they
went, they went up and jamanyway, but apparently that's not gonna stay
that way. Anthony Lomacky Lamachy Reality. He'll tell us why. Kim and
Joe will explore more business news thatimpacts our New England economy when they return.

(26:14):
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Business Report. Joe Shortsleeve along withKim Carrigan into our second half hour here
coming up Banthony Lamachia of Lamachia Reality, followed by Colin Young of the State
House News Service. And we're gonnabe closing out today's program with the conversation
with Stephen Clark at the Massachusetts RestaurantAssociation. But Kim and I like to,
you know, there's some other littlebusiness stories that pop up there that
are actually fund the lottery tickets nowlaunching a Jaws It's a ten dollars scratch

(29:02):
ticket, and I guess it's allin recognition of the fifty years ago they
made that movie. Why is itthat I see people scratching tickets that they're
always winning and I don't win adarn thing. I just can't understand it.
Hey, they've just announced a newbeer hall and an outdoor beer garden
that is expected from Medford this year. It's called Great American Beer Hall,
seventeen thousand square foot beer hall,great big, huge fire pits outside.

(29:26):
It looks like it's going to beso much fun, opening late summer,
early fall. And where is thatthat's going to be in Medford? Okay?
Yeah, on Mystic app it soundslike it's going to be a really
cool place. All right. Thatalso another little story if you're heading to
the Cape this summer, and Ithink a lot of folks are is this
a marga Riedeville resort is going toopen in High Annis this summer? I

(29:47):
guess if you know, they're goingto take over the Cape Cotter Resort and
Spa in High Annis and they're managedby Plymouth based hospitality management company Lynn Chrisis.
Yeah. I think that's when Chris'schriss okay, and they'll be rebranded
as the Margaritaville Resort, Cape Cod. It's a thirty million dollar renovation down

(30:10):
here. What do you think thespecial at the bar will be? All
Right, it's time for our weeklyfeature Ask the Realtor. We're joined by
the founder and CEO of Lamachia Realty, Anthony Lamachia. It's time for our
weekly feature Ask the Realtor, Anthony. This week's question. After a small
dip, our interest rate's about togo up again? Well, it looks

(30:32):
like they. I mean they havegone up in the last three weeks and
they seem to be holding steady inthe low sevens, which is frustrating because
back in December they were down onthe sixes again. There was even a
period that they were in the lowsixes. So there's some frustration out there
with that, and I will tellyou in the last three weeks it has
had an impact on slowing the markettown. It's interesting, Anthony, that
that a one percent move would havesuch an impact. Why is that given

(30:56):
the makeup of this marketplace. Well, when reeds came up, I mean,
that just adds to what everybody's paymentwould be. So you take first,
take a first time buyer. Thinkback to when the three of us
were first time buyers. However manyyears ago, a payment calling up three
four hundred dollars or two three hundreddollars depending upon the size the house.
That's a big deal when you're twentyfive years old. So that takes the

(31:17):
wind out of the sales with thebuyers. The other thing that it does
is it makes the sellers who wantto sell and buy something else say,
wait a second, I was okaywith maybe okay with going from three percent
to six percent, but now Igot to go to seven percent. Nah,
I'll sit still. So that's partof what happens. And you know
we're also at the time of theyear that motivation isn't as high sellers buyers.

(31:41):
I mean the buyers are out there, but the sellers, eh,
I'll wait till spring. I'll waittill spring, which is actually not a
smart thing for them to do.The best time of year at the list
I've said it for years is February. Second best month of the year is
March, because that's when not asmany people are listing, but the buyers
are out there, and if youcan get ahead of that, you're better
off. So Anthony, why thislittle tick up in interest rates? Well,

(32:05):
it looks like and I hope I'mwrong, but it is appearing as
if we are hitting a second roundof inflation, a second wave, and
the same exact thing happened in theearly eighties. Hopefully this won't be as
dramatic, but in the early eighties, they raise rates, they stuffed,
you know, they got inflation togo down, and then months or about
a year later, inflation somewhat wenton a second wave. And we're seeing

(32:30):
some signs of that. So Ihope this is brief. I hope it's
temporary, but I don't know.There's a part of me and then some
of my advisors that feel that thiscould be another year of higher rates.
Anthony and Lochia is our guest Lomachierreality. Of course, there's a regular
visitor here to the New England BusinessReporter answering the real estate question of the
week. You know, Anthony,my daughter lives in Midfield. She has

(32:51):
a house. You know, that'sa little house, but she was thinking
about maybe moving up, maybe gettinga larger house because now she's got the
three kids. And she contacted awell known realtor in town, and the
realtor said this to her, ifyou have to sell a house to buy
a house in this market, forgetit. You can't do it because you
know there's too many buyers out therethat don't have to do that correct Yeah,

(33:15):
right now, despite rates going up, there's still tons of buyers.
The problem we're having, the reasonthe market has slowed down so much,
and when I say slowed down,I mean total amount of sales, not
prices, is the rates going uphas talked to many people from listing.
So when your daughter's shoes, shecould sell her house tomorrow if she prices

(33:36):
it correctly, she could sell ittomorrow, probably for a good price,
and she should. What she shoulddo is get it under contract, push
the closing date off to summer becausethis time of year you can negotiate good
terms when you're the seller, pushthe closing date off till summer, and
then wait till May even June tostrike on another house, because by then
there'll be more inventory and she'll havemore leverage on the buy side. But

(33:58):
to do it all at once,right now, meaning what that realtor was
probably trying to say is, hey, if you want to buy something and
then sell yours, doing it rightnow is tricky, and that's part of
what holds the market back. Whatsellers do. Want to be sellers.
We have a whole page on iton our website, want to be Sellers
dot Com as a page we havewhere I have videos that I talk about
this. What many sellers do isthey go online, they don't see the

(34:22):
house that they would want to moveto, and they go, oh,
I'll just wait, Oh I'll justwait, and they don't realize you're better
off listing when others are not listing, because then your house you got a
hundred buyers after it, and thenmonths later when inventory comes up as we
get into the summer, then it'seasier to find another home. But very
few people are willing to take thatleap, right, that's what causes inventory

(34:44):
to be so low in the winter. No, just no guarantee on the
buy side under agreement. But keepin mind, people can make their sale
subject to seller finding suitable housing.Now, it doesn't mean that every buyer
is going to go for that,but at this time of year, this
is the number one time of yearto get ten twenty offers on your home

(35:05):
this right now, So that's easierto negotiate a contingency at this time of
year than it is in the summer. In the summer there's less less buyers
you can negotiate as well. Rightnow, sellers have leverage. Anthony,
let's change cares. Just to betwe know that this last week you've been
in Vegas. You were there fora big conference. Yes, talk to
us a little bit about what otherrealtors across the nation are saying. Well,

(35:29):
it's interesting that you say that.So, yes, I met the
leading real estate companies of the worldconference. It's a collection of the best
privately held brokerages in America and aroundthe world. So there's companies here from
Switzerland, from Australia. I wason stage yesterday with people from Africa and
everyone is saying that that the housingslowdown is starring. They're all saying,

(35:50):
yeah, it's not better yet,but there's a lot more sellers saying,
hey, I can't keep holding offon listing my home, and we're seeing
the same thing. So at thecurrent moment, statistically, it doesn't look
like things are much better than theywere a year ago. But I think
as we get into summer, we'regoing to see more people list, more
people get on with their lives anddo what they want to do and accept

(36:13):
the fact that listen, two percentratetime happening again. They're not They're not
love to get over that. AnthonyLamachia, founder and CEO of Lamachia Realty,
Thanks so much for being with usthis morning. Thanks for having me,
and welcome back to the New EnglandBusiness Report on this Sunday morning.
I can tell you that I wasat the Chamber Commerce breakfast this past Tuesday

(36:37):
and Governor Moore Heally was there andshe addressed a crowd of some six seven
hundred people there at the West andKim and she was pretty she was pretty
well hot. Maybe it's probably toomuch, but she was very concerned about
what Milton is doing and this hasto do with this whole MBTA Communities Act,
a law passed in twenty twenty onewhich requires communities to reason for multiple

(37:01):
housing and certain spots if they havean MBTA station in their town or their
town is adjacent to one. Anyway, Milton said, guess what, We're
not going to do this. TheAttorney General says, oh, yeah,
And now the Attorney General is suingMilton, and the governor was talking about
let's bring in Colin Young of theState House News Service. He is,
of course now the deputy editor.He's moving up in the ranks. Colin,

(37:22):
thanks for joining us, Thanks verymuch for having me. All right,
give us the latest. What's goingon here with this lawsuit against Milton.
Yeah, this is really you know, I'm looking at this as really
kind of an escalation in the waythat the state is going about trying to
spur housing production. That was reallythe impetus of this MBTA Communities Act that

(37:46):
passed in twenty twenty one, andthe idea behind it is to get cities
and towns in Greater Boston to allowfor more housing production with the hopes of
bringing housing prices down and making itmore affordable. For people to live in
Massachusetts. What's interesting year is thatzoning has for a long long time been

(38:09):
something that local authorities have had powerover. Each city in town has been
able to zone itself, you know, under its own rules and guidelines.
But now the state is stepping inand saying, no, we now have
to mandate that you do certain thingsbecause all of these voluntary or incentivized efforts

(38:32):
just haven't worked, and now thestate has to impose this mandate. So
Attorney General Andrea Campbell this week suitedthe town of Milton for not complying with
the law. The Healy administration hasrevoked a one hundred and forty thousand dollars
grant from the town. Huh,they are, and you know, Milton

(38:52):
is an early town because of theirproximity to Boston. They had to comply
sooner than some of the other citiesand towns that that will ultimately have to
comply. So I think this iskind of a case where, you know,
the state wants to discourage other townsfrom going the same way that Milton
has gone to show you know,if you don't comply here, we really

(39:15):
are going to come down hard onyou. So Colin, They're going to
give them, what a couple acouple of months to make a decision here,
and I know that later this nextweek, Uh, the select board
is going to meet to discuss itagain. I mean, how is Milton
reacting to this? Yeah, soMilton is hoping that they'll be able to
work with the state and and cometo some resolution, Uh, you know,

(39:38):
short of dragging this lawsuit out andand you know, continually punishing the
town. You know, I don'tknow that the state is going to be
terribly receptive to that. M colin, What about you're saying? You know
that the legal issue here is thatcities and towns have always had this this
power authority to do this, andit's not necessarily state function. I mean,

(40:00):
is not a pretty strong legal argument, you know, I think it
will be. I think that's goingto be mostly what the town relies on
in its defense. But the AttorneyGeneral wrote in her lawsuit that even though
zoning has been a local issue foryears and years, she pointed to a
court ruling from this nineteen seventies thatruled that the legislature retains quote supreme power

(40:25):
over zoning. So she says thatthat is what gives the state the ability
to step in and say, youknow, we try to get towns to
increase housing production with incentives. Thathasn't worked, so now we really have
to go with the mandate. RootColin, what's the beef in Milton?
So the issue isn't so much withincreasing housing production, it's more with the

(40:50):
way that the state requires it bedone. The state has very specific rules
on where these multifamily housing zones haveto be have to be within a certain
distance of UH of transit stations.And a big part of the beef in
Milton is that the town got categorizedas a rapid transit town, which which
imposes a sort of higher level ofrequirement on them, and that's because of

(41:15):
the Mattapan trolley line of the MBTAthat that is in Milton. The town
is sort of rejecting that categorization,saying we're not really a rapid transit town.
You know, it's not like wehave green line stops or red line
subway stations. So they are alittle upset also over the fact that they

(41:36):
got put in that higher bucket.Yeah. Well, you know, the
interesting thing is, again I wassaying earlier that I was in a chamber
breakfast and the governor spoke, andyou know, she obviously is getting beat
up by the business community for youknow, Massachusetts not being a competitive place
for companies to locate and and thiswhole issue comes back and basically the governor
says, well, guess what,you know, what companies come here and

(41:57):
and who can There's no houses tobuy and a you could find one,
nobody can afford them. So thisthis issue is front and center for the
business community, absolutely right. It'sone of these real foundational issues. You
know, companies can't attract workers iftheir workers can't find places to live here.
You know, no one's going tosay I want to go take a

(42:19):
job in Massachusetts where I'm not goingto be able to find the house that
I like, I'm not going tobe able to pay for the house that
I can end up getting, youknow, and then I'm going to end
up sitting in traffic trying to getto my job too. Hey, Colin,
we're just about out of time.But let me just ask you real
quickly. Is it true that rentthem is kind of sniffing around this issue?

(42:39):
They are? Yeah, just lastweek rent them, the rental select
Board sent letters to the governor andto their state senator and state representative saying
they're looking for a waiver or somekind of modification. They say that if
they have to go ahead and complywith this law up their deadline is the

(43:00):
end of the year, it wouldbe an increase in the town's population of
as much as thirteen percent without anystate funding or state support to increase the
services that would be required with that. All right, he is at to
see the drip, drip drip.Yeah, right, we'll stay on top
of it. He's Colin Young.He's a deputy editor there at the State

(43:22):
House News Service. Thanks Colin somuch. Pop. Next, we're going
to talk with the president of theMassachusetts Restaurant Association about a topic near and
dear to a lot of people whowork in restaurants, and that's the whole
idea of minimum wage and tips.Should they do away with tips? That
conversation's coming up next. You arelistening to the New England Business Report on

(43:44):
the Voice of Boston w RKO six't eighty. Joe and Kim will be
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That's where Lamachia Realty shines. LamachiaReality dot Com. That's Lamachia Reality
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Com. Happy to welcome Steve Clarkto the program. He is the president
of the Massachusetts Restaurant Association. Steve, it's always good to have the opportunity
to chat with you, Kim andJoe. How you doing good to reconnect?

(46:22):
Absolutely listen. We thought we wouldstart by talking, you know,
sort of the overview of the restaurantindustry here in the state. We certainly
followed very closely over on our otherprogram, just the issues that were associated
with COVID and coming out of thepandemic and what restaurants have had to deal

(46:45):
with. Where do we stand nowas compared to maybe a year ago.
So it's very interesting. We talkabout restaurants a lot, and I always
I don't want to sound the schizophrenicwhen I give my answer, but ultimately
there's there's ups in this downs andthey I can kind of counteract myself with
everything I say because it's really questionablewhere things are going to go. So

(47:07):
to start off positively, consumers arestill spending money in restaurants. It's the
place that they want to spend money. At the same time, costs are
up and consumers overall are reducing theirspend, whether that's credit card interest rates
or other challenges in household budgets.So people might be reducing their restaurants spend

(47:29):
a little bit, but they stillwant to spend in restaurants. So that's
what I mean where it's a littleschizophrenic. A couple other things that are
happening, Restaurants are reopening, sowe actually have more restaurants in Massachusetts today
than we did before the pandemic.So it continues to be opportunity for growth
with people going out and people wantingto dine out. January was not great

(47:51):
in the restaurant industry. I thinkthere was a couple different factors at play.
Obviously, holiday bills always play arole in January. Then you have
fads like January, et cetera.So January was a little bit down.
But it's almost like a switch waspulled on as soon as the clock the
calendar turn of February, because diningis up in February. And you know,

(48:12):
I use this anecdotal story, butmy restaurant in my local town,
well, the last Friday in Januarywas quiet. One week later packed,
same weather, same time, sameeverything, and it was almost just you
know, February came and people wereready to go out. Talking with Steve
Clark, he is the president ofthe Massachusetts Restaurant Association, there's another issue

(48:34):
that's really front and center for youfolks, and this has to do with
the whole idea of phasing out theminimum wage for tipped workers over the next
few years and replacing it with asingle minimum wage for all workers, roughly
going from six bucks an hour tofifteen bucks an hour. And there's a
move I'm Beacon Hill to do thatperhaps two ways, one legislatively or two
by a ballot. Question you yourorganization, the Massachusetts Restaurant Association, is

(49:00):
firmly against this change. Why so, the number one reason we're opposed to
this is the servers and bartenders don'twant it. The servers and bartenders in
Massachusetts, across the Massachusetts restaurant industrymake the highest amount of money in the
operation, and they've reached out tous and they said, don't mess with

(49:20):
our tips. Our tips are howwe pay our mortgage and how we pay
for our families and how we putour kids through school. There are eighty
thousand tipped employees in Massachusetts that havechosen to get into the restaurant industry because
they want to work for tips andthey don't want it to be changed.
So that's why we're opposed to It'sbecause they don't want it. It also
adds significant costs to restaurants. Ifyou think about the number of servers that

(49:43):
get employed in a restaurant, youcan employ three servers for every one hourly
employee. So now you're adding morejobs to the restaurant than making the most
money. And the system works,So why do we need to change it?
Well, and Steve, as acustomer, I shouldn't want it,
I would think because because eventually restaurantsare going to have to pass that cost
on to me. Exactly, ifyou think of what's happening in Washington,

(50:07):
DC right now, which is asa municipality, they did what is trying
to happen here. Almost every restauranthas implemented a twenty percent surcharge across the
board, which means the gratuities havegone down for tipped employees, the cost
has gone up for the consumer,and the cost has gone up for the
restaurant operator. It sounds like allthree segments are losing with that plan.

(50:30):
Steve Clark's our guest. You knowwhat, Steve, But the organization this
one Fair Wage in Massachusetts, whichis in favor of having just a minimum
wage for everybody and doing away withthe tipped wage. Their argument is,
and I'm quoting their president exactly,says sub minimum wage for tipped workers is

(50:52):
a direct legacy of slavery and wascreated after emancipation to allow restaurants to hire
newly freed black people, black womenin particular, not pay them and force
them to live on tips. Howdo you counter that powerful argument? Well,
so, one thing to keep inmind is this is a national activicates

(51:14):
group out of California. They're nota Massachusetts organization. They are received a
lot of influential left wing money todrive their campaign in a number of states.
So it's certainly not a Massachusetts organization. It's a California organization. But
you know what, they have anagenda, and when agenda is being pushed,
reality often takes a back seat.I'm not even sure if that's true.

(51:37):
Tipping actually goes back to the tothe fifteen hundreds and the sixteen hundreds
in England to ensure promptitude back inthe early eighteen hundreds, there was other
situations where it was actually an aristocraticprocess of leading gratuities. So, you
know, they say that that's thecase, I'm not even sure that that's

(51:58):
true. Arc is our guest.He's the president of the Massachusetts Restaurant Association.
Steve. Here we are in Let'ssee, this is March, and
we are thinking about outdoor dining again, and this has certainly been an issue
in the city of Boston. Themayor now saying again that outdoor dining will

(52:21):
exist, but not in the NorthEnd. Talk to us a little bit
about your members and what they're sayingabout outdoor dining and what those folks over
in the North End are going todo well. So there's three hundred and
fifty one cities and towns of Massachusetts, and there's three hundred and fifty and
a half that seemed to be okay, and it seems to be working.
So we'll table the North End forone second and just talk about the overall

(52:45):
conversation on outdoor dining. The vastmajority of people are in favor of it.
Municipalities are in favor of it,restaurant owners are in favor of it,
diners are in favor of it.So it seems to work for everybody.
And I think we're working on withour with our friends in the legislature
in the Governor's office to how dowe make this permanent, where how can
restaurants and municipalities that want to offerout there dining continue to get to a

(53:08):
place that works, make it astreamline process. Operators know what the expectations
are. Municipalities can put their regulationsin place that they need to and it
works for everyone. In terms ofthe North End, you know, I
think we have to have we haveto keep having conversations. You know,
I think we can get to asolution that will ultimately work. It's a

(53:28):
very unique neighborhood. As we know, it's historic. It was designed in
the eighteen hundreds. It goes backa long way. There's a lot of
people competing for space on the sidewalkswith whether it's cars and diners and people
and all these other things that arehappening. I think if we keep having
conversations and keep having respectful dialogue,we can get to a solution that hopefully

(53:52):
works. Steve Clark's our guest presidentof the Massachusetts Restaurant Association. You know,
when we open the conversation, youtalked about how there are more restaurants
in Massachusetts today then then pre COVID, why is that and how has the
restaurant scene changed? So, youknow, one interesting thing is that,

(54:12):
you know, the pandemic really challengedthe restaurant industry. We were probably the
industry that was impacted the most ofevery industry that's out there. A lot
of people made it through the pandemicand then they said, you know what,
I can't do this anymore. Ihave to sell my restaurant. And
now, whether it's it's a financialconsideration or if it's you know, the
next generation of in their family doesn'twant to take it over. We also

(54:36):
have a number of baby boomers thatown restaurants. They are starting to get
age out of the workforce. Soyou're seeing a number of transitions in the
restaurant industry anyway, where we're kindof in that new frontier of our all
right, what happens to longtime restaurantsthat have existed. Is it going to
be a new group that comes in, Is it going to be a family
takeover? Is it going to beselling it to my staff? So restaurateurts

(54:57):
across Massachusetts are going through that situationright now, and I think we're just
seeing that kind of post pandemic analysisof all right, where am I going
to? Where do I see myselffor the next couple of years with owning
this restaurant. You're seeing more andmore technology being brought into the restaurant space.
You're seeing more and more. Onething we thought was delivery and takeout.

(55:19):
They're not going away. We taughtpeople that they could eat at home
while ordering our great product, andthey're doing that. So takeout and delivery
are accounting for twenty twenty five percentof overall sales. So you're seeing redesigns
of dining rooms. How do Imaximize takeout and delivery? You're seeing changes
in the kitchen. How do Iget that delivery and take out out the
door and to my other customers.So it's really quite the evolution. And

(55:42):
people always love the restaurant industry.So where there's crisis, there's opportunity.
And I think a lot of peoplehave seen some of those closings as opportunity
to open up some new places acrossthe state. Well, Steve, I
want to say that I love therestaurant industry, so I'm glad to hear
there's more restaurants. I like tobring it in and I like to go
out. Sore always a jam too. I mean, I think I wonder
what the problem is. I mean, I don't see any problems, certainly

(56:06):
in my town. Yeah, youknow, I think everyone thinks about Friday
night, and Friday night's always bumpingin Saturday, sometimes Thursday. I think
sometimes people forget about the Tuesday afternoonof the Wednesday afternoon where you know,
something the light breaks and the ownerhas to go in and fix it,
and you know, we're we're onlywe're only generating revenue if everything is working
great. Fourteen twenty eight hours aweek, you know, fourteen meal periods,

(56:30):
two meal periods a day. There'sa lot of time in a restaurant
when and everyone's see it at thesame time. You know, they all
want to get a reservation at sixthirty on Friday night. So if we
can spread it out, it'd beeven better. Steve Clark, he's the
president of the Massachusetts Restaurant Association.We're so glad you could join us this
morning. Thanks Steve, Thank youfor having me on. Glad to hear
you guys back on the radio.All right, Kim, time to talk

(56:51):
about next week's program. A specialguest. We're gonna have Chris Anderson.
He is, of course, thepresident of the Massachusetts High Technology Council.
He's going to join us to talkabout the health of the sector and where
they're going because you remember this wholebit about lab space and they built it
everywhere. Now apparently, well Iguess what, we don't need as much
as we we'd empty. Huh.All right? Also joining us is going

(57:13):
to be Dexter Ang Now, he'sthe CEO of Pyson Technology. His company
has developed the world's first AI infusedcognitive performance app and wearable What does that
mean, Well, we're going tothere's gonna be a quiz on this.
I hope this is an over ourhead. Actually, this technology is incredible
and we're going to learn all aboutit. And of course they're right here

(57:34):
in New England. I'm Kid Kerriganalong with Joe Shorts, like, hey,
we're so glad that you joined usthis Sunday and we hope you'll join
us again next week