About Barrett Linburg

My story

I got into the apartment business in 2005. My first deal came in 2013: eight units in the Oak Lawn neighborhood of Dallas. It sold a year and a day later. And it worked.

Seth Bame and I built Savoy from there. Seth writes about the operating side at sethbame.com.

In 2020 Savoy took on eight old apartment buildings in North Oak Cliff. 185 apartments, about 40% occupied. The seller lived in Tokyo and had never seen them.

The day after closing there was a murder in front of one of the buildings. One of our cameras caught it. The gang unit told us to stay away. The city attorney threatened to demolish a building we wanted to renovate.

We did not stay away.

The team gut-renovated those eight buildings first. That got rid of a lot of the crime and the blight, and it made new construction possible on the blocks around them. Each deal de-risked the next one and re-priced the last one. I call it a flywheel. Every new dollar that goes into the neighborhood makes the first dollar more valuable.

One of the new buildings, Burnett Lofts, is named for Dick Burnett, my great-grandfather. He owned the Dallas Eagles and the baseball stadium that stood down the street 75 years ago.

Work

Today Savoy is three companies under one roof. Savoy Equity Partners invests. Savoy General Contractors builds and renovates. Savoy Residential manages. All Texas, all apartments.

We didn't plan on the construction company. A third-party general contractor on two jobs of more than $20 million each turned out to have no insurance. Within one hour he was fired. We hired a construction lead, stood up Savoy GC and finished the buildings ourselves. It was a blessing in disguise.

Seth and I run Savoy on AI more than most companies our size. We keep the company's knowledge in one place that AI can read. About 20 of our leaders use Claude every day with that context loaded. Seth built the operating system that pulls about ten of our software systems onto one screen. We deliberately keep AI away from residents, vendors and subcontractors. We'd rather give our people superpowers. I walked through all of it on the AI for CRE Podcast.

Opportunity Zones, OZ HQ and X

OZ is a trade. The government names the low-income areas where it wants investment. An investor with a capital gain gets special tax treatment for making a long-term, patient investment there.

I found the program by accident in 2020, when an attorney mentioned that a group of buildings was in an opportunity zone. I said, "Cool, what's an opportunity zone?" I have spent every year since doing these deals and explaining them. That has meant three trips to Washington and a standing monthly call with the Texas Governor's economic development office while the state chose its map for the program's second round.

The one thing I say every time: the OZ benefits don't save a bad deal and suddenly make it good. Pick the building first.

If you want to learn how it works, I edit OZ HQ, a free reference site written by someone who does the deals.

I was a lurker on Twitter until 2021. Then I started posting OZ tax mechanics and renovation photos. Doors started opening that probably shouldn't have opened for a guy like me. Posting about a weird part of the tax code has led to meetings with Sen. John Cornyn and HUD Secretary Scott Turner. Today more than 170,000 people follow @DallasAptGP. It's still wild to me.

Personal life

I live in Dallas with my wife and our two daughters. Most of the rest of our family is here too, and there are a lot of us.

Curious what I'm focused on right now? See what I'm working on now.

For podcast hosts, conference organizers and press

These are the subjects I know best:

• Opportunity Zones: how the tax benefits work, what changes in OZ 2.0, and what makes a deal worth doing
• Concentrating investment in one neighborhood instead of spreading it across a map
• Texas workforce housing and the public facility corporation structure
• Renovating first and building second
• Why a developer might want its own contractor and its own manager
• Using AI inside an operating company without putting it in front of customers

A short bio you can copy:

Barrett Linburg is co-founder and Co-CEO of Savoy Companies, a Dallas-based apartment firm spanning investment (Savoy Equity Partners), construction (Savoy General Contractors) and property management (Savoy Residential). He is best known for one of the most concentrated Opportunity Zone strategies in the country, in the North Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas. Savoy has raised $95 million of Opportunity Zone equity across 25 Texas apartment projects. Barrett has worked with the City of Dallas, the Texas Governor's economic development office and federal offices on OZ 2.0, including meetings with Sen. John Cornyn and HUD Secretary Scott Turner. He writes about Opportunity Zone tax mechanics for more than 170,000 followers on X (@DallasAptGP) and edits the OZ education site oz-hq.com.

Past appearances are under Podcasts & Press and Speaking. To reach me, use the contact page.

I also keep profiles on X, LinkedIn, savoytx.com and OZ HQ.