Conlon&Co

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Business & Finance Magazine 01/07/2007 - Most Influential US-Irish Business Leaders 2007 - Sean Conlon is the chairman and co-founder of Connaught Real Estate Finance LLC, which provides mezzanine financing for large residential development projects.

Sean Conlon is the chairman and co-founder of Connaught Real Estate Finance LLC, which provides mezzanine financing for large residential development projects. The company currently has over $100m under management throughout the US. He is also co-owner of Van and Conlon, a developer of vacation homes in the Midwest.

Conlon attended the College of Marketing and Design in Dublin. He moved to London and worked as a credit analyst for Middle East Bank, before emigrating to the US in 1990. He landed work quickly, but initially as a janitor, cleaning the hallways of an apartment building owned by a distant cousin. However by 1993, he was setting annual records among Chicago realtors with sales in excess of $150m, while working for Koenig and Strey, where he was the leading salesman three years in a row.

In January 2000, Conlon, Frank Parkinson, and a third partner, Tim O’Neill, joined forces to open Sussex and Reilly (the maiden names of Parkinson’s and Conlon’s mothers, respectively) an Illinois based property brokerage firm. It hit the ground running with a strategy that combined turnkey services with competitive commissions. The partners made a point of launching their company on the technological vanguard: they issued laptops and palm pilots to their sales team and developed a website that was ahead of its time in providing virtual tours and online scheduling. The company’s first year sales volume was about $350m. Today, it has over 300 employees and annual brokerage sales volume in excess of $1.3bn.

Other ventures for Conlon and included the formation of Conlon & Co (USA) to provide property consulting and financial services. In 2004, in partnership with Daniel Fowler, he acquired Near North National Title, a national property title company established in 1988 which handles over $5.5bn in property transactions annually across the US.

In less than a decade, Conlon has become recognised as one of the top property experts in the country, and is frequently featured on CNN and CNBC as well as in the New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal discussing market trends within the global property sector.

In 2006, he featured in the 60-minute RTÉ television documentary Made in America that highlighted successful emigrants from Ireland and their triumphant business successes. The documentary highlighted Conlon’s story of an aggressive work ethic, ambition and astonishing accomplishments.

In May of this year, Conlon announced a joint venture with Investor First, the successful Dublin-based property investment and development company. The partnership, to be called Conlon & Co (Ireland), aims to team Conlon’s expertise in the US market with the investment and development firm. The new business will originate structure and deliver off-market US property opportunities to Irish private client companies and individual high-net-worth investors.