Downtown Cleveland's new young hero -- Chaim Schochet (to buy, money)

[costello_musicman]

Check out this "behind the scenes" man who has been using his family money to buy Downtown Cleveland skyscrapers, and who has the passion and dedication for understanding and improving urban spaces:

The most important guy you've never heard of: Chaim Schochet, 25, builds downtown empire | cleveland.com

Ask why Optima is focused on a "second-tier" or "third-tier" market like Cleveland, and Schochet is quick to argue.

"I'll give you a two-tier answer to that," he said. "One is that some people like to call these secondary markets, but in these markets your returns are better. Your ability to make money is better.

"The second part of that answer is that I would probably argue with a lot of those investors that call this is a secondary market," he said. "In my short few years that I've spent here, I think I've seen a lot of transformation. I don't know which one of those, as you say, top-tier markets has as much investment going into their downtown as downtown Cleveland."

[Traveler87]

Interesting stuff. Still skeptical about folks like this, but who knows what his company could do.