About Us

Cypress Group is a vertically integrated, highly experienced real estate development firm focused on residential projects of up to one hundred units in Northern California.

We are different because we work with clients at any stage of the development process: acquiring raw land, creating the development pro forma, designing and entitling the project, assisting with the creation of an LLC or other appropriate legal entity, building the project as general contractor, managing the completed project or selling the property. We are a licensed General Contractor, licensed Real Estate Broker, certified Property Manager and experienced developer and designer. We can perform any of these services as a stand alone service but think that we are best able to deliver higher value at a lower cost when we combine some or all of these services.

We deliver value to our clients and differentiate ourselves from the competition in the following ways:

Experience
There can be no substitute for experience. Since 1954, when our father and grandfather started working as a carpenter and purchased a fourplex apartment in Santa Clara, we have been active ourselves in the world of real estate and construction in Silicon Valley. Please review “Recent Projects” to see our pride in craftsmanship and “Services” to determine how we might help you accomplish your goals in real estate.

Vertical Integration
Another, more common sense name for this is “the right hand knows what the left hand is doing.” Real estate and construction can be complex and daunting.The ability to bring the diverse skill sets of a developer, designer, general contractor, real estate broker, and property manager to bear on a project from the beginning is invaluable. Far too often in a fragmented approach we see that costs have spiraled out of control and opportunities to improve the project have been missed.

Partnership
Each project is unique to some degree, with its own strengths and challenges. We like to analyze each project on its own merits and then structure our services and compensation accordingly. We are well capitalized and are willing to invest our capitalized fees and/or additional capital when appropriate.

Innovation
We constantly evaluate new designs, environmental considerations, construction techniques and financial options and the risk/reward trade-off inherent in those opportunities. We are well versed, for example, in Green Building – including a wide variety of cost-effective green construction techniques, as well as the underlying science and the various certification programs. We carry the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Accredited Professsional designation and are active members of the US Green Building Council.

Integrity
Nothing takes longer to make or is more quickly lost than a reputation for straight forward dealing.

Focus
We refuse to accept jobs where we won’t be able to deliver a superior result. We believe our competitive advantage is limited to housing up to 40 dwelling units per acre in the geographic region to include Santa Clara County and Santa Cruz County. For example, that eliminates podium style housing which is significantly more complex to design and build than townhomes or walk-up apartments. Also, we will typically accept property management assignments only where gross revenue is in excess of $350,000 per year or if the property management function is part of a larger package to include helping to purchase the property as a broker or a significant renovation as general contractor.

Results
We pride ourselves on getting results for our clients – whether by meeting a development schedule, construction cost estimate, or property management budget.