Sentral had a very busy April. 

Founded in 2019 by ICONIQ Capital — the family office for tech leaders like Mark Zuckerberg — the apartment operator has grown from managing 10 assets to 43 active communities, overseeing more than 30 owners and 13,000 units.

It's now moving into its next phase, with Sentral, DivCore and ICONIQ forming a new residential investment platform called Sentral Strategic Partners to invest $2.5 billion in select multifamily projects, according to a press release shared with Multifamily Dive.

But that’s not all. Also in April, Denver-based Sentral added Nitesh Gandhi, former CEO of residential hospitality firm Locale, as chief commercial officer, as well as Sares Regis alum Jenelle Shapiro as vice president of marketing, per a release.

As CCO, Gandhi will be tasked with thinking about revenue, sales and distribution for the short-, medium- and long-term. “That was an important hire for us, as we continue to grow that business and our network of Sentral customers,” Elliot Albert, vice president of real estate, told Multifamily Dive. “Think about it as bringing this package of residents and guests across our network and just optimizing revenue, sales and distribution.”

Sentral’s network now stretches to Charlotte, North Carolina, after the firm added three communities, encompassing 900 units, from development firm Space Craft to its management portfolio, according to an April press release shared with Multifamily Dive. The Joinery and Inkwell properties have been completed, while Oxbow is under construction.

Here, Albert talks with Multifamily Dive about Sentral’s furnished model, short-term rental challenges and its expansion plans.

This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

MULTIFAMILY DIVE: How does your model work?

ELLIOT ALBERT: The platform is designed to manage class A apartment buildings, where we can improve NOI by implementing services, things like activating the building. It’s turning on the assets and not about having soulless or empty amenity spaces or a lobby. 

We managed furnished, flexible-length-of-stay units within our portfolio ourselves. So we distribute those units ourselves. We don't outsource that function. If 10% of the units are furnished, that same team is operating both the short-term and the long-term within a singular asset. 

Tell me how you mix short- and long-term rental options.

Half of our buildings have flexible, furnished apartments. Within that, we furnish anywhere between 5% to, in some cases, a majority of the units. It really depends on what you're allowed to do right from a zoning perspective and where we see market demand and and really a premium on a NOI basis and a value basis compared to traditional multifamily. 

These products are important. They're tools in our toolbox. But we use them as appropriate based on demand and relative value creation for the owner. It’s an important tool for us, and we're continuing to expand in pockets. Like Charlotte, for example, we’ll have a number of furnished short-term units, given the scale, flexibility and demand we see.

What are the challenges in the short-term rental space?

In our space, at least on the short-term rental side, it's hard to scale. You don't operate the full building. So we've been very dedicated and focused on full-building operations, creating the right portfolio of assets and partners, investing in great assets and creating additional enterprise value that way. As we continue to build a moat in this residential hospitality intersection, we will continue to scale at a level we're comfortable with.

How is Sentral Strategic Partners positioning the firm for future growth?

Up until this point, Sentral has been really a third-party operator manager. As we've been growing the platform outside of ICONIQ, this gives us some skin in the game in specific opportunities for acquisition or co-investment.

We've proven out value creation with our partners. And now it's creating alignment and taking advantage of interesting opportunities that we collectively see between us, DivCore and ICONIQ.

What prompted the move into Charlotte?

We've generally focused on tier-one markets throughout the country and the Sun Belt for obvious reasons. There's been a lot of class A supply delivered and there’s flexibility, while we still see healthy demand growth. 

What are your expansion plans beyond Charlotte?

We're really focused on one building or opportunity at a time. What we're doing, if it were easy, I think everyone would do it. So we want to make sure we're proving out our promise and building case studies with each owner and each market we add. So, we’re really trying to stay disciplined and focused. 

We're already in 23 cities. We want to be really focused on tier-one markets in the U.S. Eventually, we'll look internationally. Right now, we're focused on one building, one month at a time.

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