Anita Verma-Lallian grows billion-dollar real estate portfolio
By Sam Stern – Editorial intern, Phoenix Business Journal
Nov 2, 2023
Anita Verma-Lallian knew from an early age that she wanted to be an entrepreneur.
Today, she is one of the top real estate consultants in Arizona, breaking down barriers as a female pioneer in a primarily male-dominated real estate landscape. The accomplishments have far surpassed her expectations.
The CEO and founder of Arizona Land Consulting and Camelback Productions began her journey in the land and real estate business working with her father, Kuldip Verma, at real estate firm Vermaland.
"My family has been in the real estate business for many years and my dad started his company Vermaland in the 90s," Verma-Lallian said. "And so I've been working with him ever since I can remember, maybe even eight years old. I was helping him with different things for his businesses, and then even in high school, various commercial property that I would help him with leasing and things like that. So, I've been exposed to real estate really from a young age."
After 10 years of success working alongside her father at Vermaland, Verma-Lallian transitioned into her current role as founder and CEO of Arizona Land Consulting — right before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Founded in 2019, Verma-Lallian's company serves as a concierge service that helps investors, developers and others find properties that are suited for their exact needs. With the values of properties experiencing large growth post-pandemic, Verma-Lallian saw her consulting business skyrocket.
"After Covid, the real estate market just kind of went crazy in Phoenix and we experienced just this insane growth and a lot of the properties we had bought in 2019 were going for even five times as much as we bought them for," Verma-Lallian said. "A lot of people then started to pay attention to what we were doing, and we grew our investor base, very suddenly. Now, I think at this point, we have value as investors ... I would say our portfolios are valued at well over a billion dollars at this point."
Verma-Lallian's track record has helped countless real estate investors achieve above average returns, and she continues to play a crucial role in ushering various industries into the Valley including semiconductors, industrial, renewable energy, electric cars and more.
In order to shed light onto these many industries, Verna recently created her own film production company called Camelback Productions, where she hopes to bring change and start conversations.
Can you describe the business model for Arizona Land Consulting?Buying land can be a very overwhelming process, along with being a cost prohibitive process, because some of the sites are millions and millions of dollars. If you don't know what you're doing, and if you're not familiar with how it works, it happens all the time where people buy properties that can't be developed and it ends up not being what they think it is. So what we do is we can provide a concierge service to investors, developers, whoever it is, and help them find properties that best suit their needs. It's providing a white glove service to people that are looking to buy land, whether it's for investment or development.
With the Arizona housing market and real estate market constantly changing, what do the next five years look like for you personally and for your company? I think it's going to be a period of immense growth. Phoenix has been one of the fastest growing cities for many years now. I don't see that slowing down, and I think there's a lot of exciting opportunities that exist. I think we are going to attract more companies as well. So I feel very good about where we're positioned. As far as Arizona Land Consulting goes, I think we're going to continue to buy more sites that are bigger and bigger, and hopefully assembling larger and larger projects. At some point, we are also going to entertain the idea of development on some of our projects. We've kind of stayed away from that, more or less, but I think in the future, I do see that becoming a part of our business model as well.
What does it feel like to be a female trailblazer in a male dominated real estate industry? It feels amazing. You know, if someone would have told me that I would be where I'm at right now, I don't think I would've believed it. For me, it gives me a lot of pride. I have a daughter, and so for me, it feels so great that she can see that you can go into any industry. Whether it's male dominated, or you're the underdog, you can still work hard and be diligent and become a pioneer or leader in that industry. I think one of the things we focus on at Arizona Land Consulting is trying to empower female investors to invest. It's been amazing to educate females on what's happening in Arizona and how to get involved with real estate, so that's been a really big part of what I do as well.
After being in the industry for as long as you have, is it still fun? Oh my gosh, yes! I could not love anything more than real estate. When you put these deals together and you see them come to fruition and move forward, or close on a property or sell one, there's literally nothing like it. It's one of the best feelings in the world. So to me, it's so much fun, and I think that's what makes it possible for me to keep growing. I don't view work as something I don't like ... I love it. I look forward to Mondays because I'm just excited about what's going to happen each week. It's just something that I've done for so long that even when it's not exactly how you wanted, you can still pivot and position yourself for the future opportunities that are coming. All phases of it are super fun, enjoyable, and I couldn't love it anymore.
Anita Verma-Lallian
Age: 41
Hometown: Phoenix, AZ
Education: Master of Business Administration at University of Southern California and Bachelor's degree in business administration, marketing/finance from University of Arizona
Title: CEO/Founder
Companies: Arizona Land Consulting, Camelback Productions
Ideal business meeting spot: For me now, I prefer to meet people for dinner, lunch or coffee in a more casual, intimate setting. I personally think you build relationships better that way. I go to all of the usuals like The Henry, Chelsea's Kitchen, Press Coffee, Cartel and all the hot spots in the Scottsdale area.
Source: Phoenix Business Journal