Internship Description
Joseph Anello ’20 interned with Merton Capital Partners, a venture firm that pools large philanthropic capital to invest in nonprofits focused on high impact needs in the United States. Joseph assisted in all aspects of developing the Housing Philanthropy Fund, identifying, targeting, and reaching out to the largest housing developer families and philanthropists and researching large philanthropic deployments of other large venture philanthropy organizations globally.
I worked on the launch of an Affordable Housing Fund. I wholeheartedly believe that Columbia should allocate student resources to the shortage of reasonably priced homes for low- and moderate-income Americans. Now with COVID-19, there has never been more of a need for more capital to be brought into this space. Merton needed capital to bring into its fund to help capitalize these affordable housing developments.
The majority of my time was spent prospecting and putting together presentations for investor and investment management calls. There was one project where I was able to apply my basic understanding of real estate development to help us figure out a capital structure that would work for philanthropic investors. I did utilize soft skills that I picked up at Columbia like managing conflict and how best to manage expectations and communicate dissatisfaction. It was also my first lesson in remote teamwork! I think the best thing I could do was apply skills learned in my first semester leadership class, which in my opinion, boiled down to dealing with meetings and suggestions with a "yes, and" response. I think that a basic understanding of capital raising and investor concerns was paramount in this role, which I picked up in my previous positions.
The team at Merton did not have a background in the sector and therefore did not have a clear roadmap. Lack of experience in the sector also meant that they were not able to provide guidance on complex real estate modeling or underwriting projects. This was unfortunate because we were all convinced that this was such a powerful idea that could really make a difference. While I had some exposure to the public welfare private capital landscape before business school, this experience taught me to screen opportunities more robustly in the future.
On a sunnier note, this experience taught me to really envision the end use of the types of financing I am working on. Whether it be a state teachers retirement fund or providing shelter for a low-income individual, my work can be very important in this sense. I really wish there was more focus on this as opposed to arguing over fees and egos in the workplace. Rarely are we discussing what we are actually doing in the world, in the world of finance. I will watch out for this in the future as I look for more fulfillment in my positions.