Long before the COVID pandemic forced elementary school students to learn online, two childhood best friends and recent college grads decided to harness the Internet to help underserved students with their school work. Stephen Chen and Neeraj Kapoor founded Learn to Be in 2008 and began connecting kids with free online tutoring. “We thought it was really, really impactful,” Neeraj said. “And we also knew we were only helping a handful of kids. We knew there were millions of others around the U.S. who needed this support and that there were millions of people like us who could provide the support.” The organization now serves more than 7,000 students. Kids & Community Partners recently made a five-year, $3.2 million investment to help it continue to scale and connect the millions of in-need students with millions of willing volunteers. Here’s how it works: A parent or guardian signs up a student via Learn to Be’s online form. The student is then matched with a pre-vetted tutor from Learn to Be’s volunteer pool. The tutor and student then meet regularly via the organization’s virtual classroom. Learn to Be students see an average test score increase of 15.8 percent and a GPA increase […]

Long before the COVID pandemic forced elementary school students to learn online, two childhood best friends and recent college grads decided to harness the Internet to help underserved students with their school work. Stephen Chen and Neeraj Kapoor founded Learn to Be in 2008 and began connecting kids with free online tutoring. “We thought it was really, really impactful,” Neeraj said. “And we also knew we were only helping a handful of kids. We knew there were millions of others around the U.S. who needed this support and that there were millions of people like us who could provide the support.” The organization now serves more than 7,000 students. Kids & Community Partners recently made a five-year, $3.2 million investment to help it continue to scale and connect the millions of in-need students with millions of willing volunteers. Here’s how it works: A parent or guardian signs up a student via Learn to Be’s online form. The student is then matched with a pre-vetted tutor from Learn to Be’s volunteer pool. The tutor and student then meet regularly via the organization’s virtual classroom. Learn to Be students see an average test score increase of 15.8 percent and a GPA increase […]

JULY 6, 2022 – The Connor Group sold Terracina in Denver, the second largest property sale in the company’s 30-year history. The disposition marks the company’s first sale in the Denver market and its fifth sale this year. Financial details of last week’s transaction are not being disclosed. “We first identified the Denver market as a desirable location in 2016 due to the unprecedented demand,” managing partner Larry Connor said. “Terracina checked all of the boxes for us – it’s a Class A property in an A location. And thanks to our people following our proven processes and systems, we delivered investor returns more than three times what we originally projected.” The Dayton-based real estate investment firm purchased the 386-unit property in 2018. At acquisition, Terracina was part of a $618 million transactional day record, which included four new acquisitions and six refinance closings in a single day. With this closing, The Connor Group delivered an average 66% IRR on 2022 property sales, with $9.4 million in proceeds going towards Kids & Community Partners, The Connor Group’s non-profit arm. “We believe organizations like ours who have been extremely successful have both the opportunity and the obligation to give back,” Connor […]

JUNE 16, 2022 – Exponential growth from 2020 to 2021 placed The Connor Group on the Top 100 Companies list compiled by the Dayton Business Journal. The Dayton-based real estate investment firm closed $2.95 billion in transactions in 2021 and is the highest-ranked real estate firm on this exclusive list at No. 13 overall. The list ranks companies by percentage change in revenue growth during the 2020 to 2021 timeframe. “We had a record-setting year in 2021 with $2.95 billion in transactions and $443 million in earnings,” founder and managing partner Larry Connor said. “We’ve seen unprecedented demand across the country for apartments, and we see the next 12 to 24 months as the best buying opportunity in more than a decade.” The recognition comes amid massive expansion at The Connor Group, both locally and nationwide. Currently, construction is underway in Dayton with a 22,000-square-foot office addition. The new building will add approximately 30 to 40 jobs over the next five years. Simultaneously, the company is in the midst of its next five-year strategic plan and anticipates adding Phoenix, AZ, as its 17th market. “We’re looking to double our transactional activity from $2.5 billion a year to $5 billion per […]

June 8, 2022 – Enrollment is underway for the Greater Dayton School, Ohio’s first private non-religious elementary school exclusively dedicated to under-resourced students. The innovative educational model will cater to the whole child and, according to its founders, set the bar for a national model that provides students access to all the resources they need to succeed. The school is slated to open Aug. 1, 2022, and serve 100 students in PreK through third grade during its first year at a temporary location. The school aims to serve under-resourced students living in every corner of the Greater Dayton community. Applications are currently being accepted online. “It has genuinely transformative potential,” said founding principal A.J. Stich. “We have the opportunity to do things differently. The end product is a super innovative model, individualizing the education experience for every kid, and it’s going to be incredibly impactful.” Greater Dayton School teachers are among the country’s best and most dedicated educators and were actively recruited nationwide, and the school continues to hire. Currently, staff has been teaching a free after-school reading and math tutoring program for 40 students in the community. The Greater Dayton School estimates investing $300,000 in each child’s education over […]

June 1, 2022 – The Connor Group closed a $162 million sale in Nashville today with the sale of Elliston 23. The transaction is the third-largest property sale in the company’s 30-year history. The Dayton-based real estate investment firm purchased the 331-unit property in 2014. Today’s disposition highlights the unprecedented investor demand in the Nashville market for quality mid-rise apartment communities. “In our opinion, there is tremendous opportunity for future growth in the Nashville market,” managing partner Larry Connor said. “We’ve continued to invest in the market for the last nine years and expect to be here long-term.” Since 2013, the company has expanded its Nashville portfolio to include a pair of luxury apartment communities in the Murfreesboro submarket. Currently, The Connor Group operates 432 of its nearly 13,000 units in the Nashville area. Today, The Connor Group set another record, closing $398.8 million in property sales and acquisitions within one week. On its four property sales in 2022, the average IRR is a staggering 51.34%. After just five months, the company has closed or placed under agreement $1.85 billion in transactions and is on pace for another record-setting year. “We tend to do exceptionally well in disruptive markets,” Connor […]

April 28, 2022 – The Connor Group acquired Sonterra Blue last week, its third acquisition in the San Antonio market within the last 12-months. The 342-unit property is located in the Stone Oak submarket. Financial details of the transaction are not being disclosed. “Whenever we enter a market, we are always thinking long-term,” founder and managing partner Larry Connor said. “Over the last year, San Antonio has proven to be a market where we consistently find great buying opportunities that fit our business model.” The company first entered the San Antonio market in May of 2021 with the acquisition of Reserve at Canyon Creek. The Connor Group now owns and operates nearly 1,000 units in the market in less than one year. With the closing of Sonterra Blue, the Dayton-based real estate investment firm has closed or placed under agreement more than $1 billion in transactions this year. “In our opinion, the recent market volatility has created opportunity,” Connor said. “While other companies may be running to the sidelines, we’re all in. Over our 30-year history, we’ve proven to be successful in any market. It comes back to following our proven processes and systems.” The property is located in the […]

DAYTON, OH – Ax-1 pilot Larry Connor returned home to Ohio Wednesday after successfully completing the first fully-private astronaut mission to the International Space Station. The founder and managing partner of The Connor Group was welcomed home by about 100 associates, friends and family outside of the Dayton-based real estate investment firm. Connor successfully splashed down off the coast of Florida Monday, April 25, at 1:06 p.m. During his 17-day mission in space, Connor worked alongside former NASA astronaut Michael López-Alegría (commander of Ax-1) and mission specialists Eytan Stibbe of Israel, and Canadian Mark Pathy. The surprise welcome home comes after nearly three weeks of quarantine and more than two weeks on the ISS. While there, he conducted live broadcasts with school children. He also partnered with renowned medical experts at the Mayo and Cleveland Clinics on four different experiments to study the heart, brain, spine and aging. Connor said the work he did in space was truly a collaborative effort and one he couldn’t have conducted without support on the ground. “At the end of the day, it’s not really about us when we’re up there. It’s about everyone else who made that happen. Was it not for you […]

April 26, 2022 –  The Connor Group sold L2 Uptown Apartments this month, its seventh transaction of the year. The Dayton-based real-estate investment firm acquired the property in May 2020 and, after 23-months, provided investor returns nearly five times larger than original projections. Financial details of the transactions are not being disclosed. These exceptional returns directly resulted from Connor Group’s disciplined approach to buying and selling amid volatile market conditions. The company purchased L2 Uptown in the early months of the pandemic. The Connor Group expedited the L2 Uptown closing, executing the acquisition in less than six weeks. To put this in perspective, most multi-family real-estate purchase and sale agreements close in 60 to 90 days. “L2 Uptown provided us a unique opportunity to enter a submarket we had been interested in for quite some time,” managing partner Larry Connor said. “While the majority of companies were running to the sidelines, we were all in.” The operations team on the front lines also played a critical role in delivering returns five times larger than projected. They successfully positioned the property for sale during unprecedented market conditions. Bader Diamond Funds flawless execution as the purchaser contributed to the success of the […]

Dayton, Ohio – Real estate and technology entrepreneur Larry Connor successfully piloted the historic Ax-1 mission to outer space Friday, the first fully private mission to the International Space Station. The launch makes him the first person in history to reach space and the deepest parts of the ocean within one year. “I’ve always encouraged others to dream big, aim high and set impossible goals,” Connor said. “Nothing is impossible unless you think it is impossible. Both of these feats are great challenges that came with great responsibility.” Connor is the founder and managing partner of The Connor Group, a Dayton-based company that has grown from $0 to $3.5 billion in assets since 1992. He’s also founded The Connor Group Kids and Community Partners, a non-profit activist investing group poised to do more than $500 million of non-profit work over the next decade. Last April, Connor completed three dives in just five days to the deepest ocean depths in the Mariana Trench. The three explorations took Connor to the Challenger Deep, Sirena Deep and a seamount in the Mariana Trench, located in the Western Pacific Ocean near Guam. Now the Dayton businessman docked at the International Space Station for an […]