Stay Tranquilo - The Developer Solving America’s Childcare Crisis — Pablo Barreiro (FORTEC)

Episode Date: October 15, 2025

On this Cafecito y Croquetas episode, we sit down with Pablo Barreiro, Chairman of FORTEC Modern Real Estate—recently recognized by the South Florida Business Journal for rapid growth—to talk about a mission that’s bigger than buildings: fixing America’s childcare deserts through early-education real estate.Pablo shares how his path from broker (plus a law degree) led to launching a preschool-focused development platform during 2020—and why the team has already delivered 32 schools across 12 states, with a plan to build 70–80 more in the next 36 months. We dig into the economics (why 1.5–2 acres often go to multifamily instead), how adding schools raises the value of surrounding projects, why keeping rents efficient can help temper tuition, and how 30–40 local jobs per school fuel community impact. We also cover teacher pipeline quality, competition improving outcomes, FORTEC’s “For Cares” philanthropy, and Pablo’s advice for young leaders: operate with urgency, be candid, and solve problems locally.Chapters00:00 Intro & SFBJ recognition02:05 Pablo’s story: broker ➝ developer (+law background)06:20 Why preschools get overlooked in land use08:45 Childcare deserts & affordability (demand vs supply)12:30 Teacher quality, training, and retention15:40 Pairing schools with multifamily & retail18:10 Scaling plan: fund strategy & national rollout21:25 Local partners: GCs, architects, attorneys24:10 Philanthropy: “For Cares” and giving materials a second life27:30 Advice to young builders & founders: urgency + candorIf you’re a developer, operator, or city leader exploring early-education projects—or a parent who cares about access and quality—this one’s for you.🔔 Subscribe for more conversations at the intersection of community, business, and impact.#realestate #miamirealestate #realestatecompany #miami #growth #entrepreneurship #chairman #business #tedtalk #businesspodcast #developer #childcare #schools Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Good morning and welcome to Cafecito and Croquettas. Today we're joined by Pablo de Fortec. Pablo, thank you so much for being a part of this and joining us. Your company was nominated as one of the fastest growing companies in the South Florida Business Journal. And I definitely want to touch on that. But before we start, please tell the people about yourself where you're from and what you do. Well, first and foremost, thank you for having me. Really appreciate the opportunity.

I love this place. It's really cool, by the way, Andrew. So yes, my name is Pablo Barreiro. I have been here in the US for 26 years. I have been doing real estate all my life. I start as a commercial real estate broker as soon as I step in the United States and I got my license.

But my idea always was to get to the point that I could become a successful developer. So part of that journey also goes beyond the years and finish my law degree. With that both skills, the low part, and the sales part, I was able to do more deals, understand the risk of every deal, underwrite them good. And one of the things that, you know, in 2018, I will say,

I encountered while I was doing a purchase in Hollywood, a property that basically was a preschool. And we are doing the underwriting, like doing all all our deals. And I found that this space is very interesting. And nobody was looking into that. So I said to my current partner, Martin, this is a wonderful opportunity. I think we should start working on this because there is a really big meeting communities.

And not other developers are doing it. So we purchased that building. And that was before even we opened this company that only focused on early education developments and properties. And we said, this is wonderful. We talked to that tenant, they were going to expand across the nation. And by doing more underwriting, we identified there is a bunch of tenants and operators in the nation that want to expand and grow.

And they need the help from companies like us, like Fortec, in order to have all the financial sources to open schools, development. We have a construction team on our team and we are able to do it across the United States so by talking to more more tenants and more operators we found out that they really need our help and not only that we find out that communities need this in a big way our two first projects that we did were in 2020 during COVID right so one of the

question we when we with my partner was is this gonna sound is something that this is really going to work what everything stops, right? You are in your house, your kids are in your house, and you don't know what the world is going to become at this point, right? It's at the beginning of the COVID. Our first two deal, we did it on June 2020. And I remember to this day one thing, one of the first things that opened, it was church, and we went there,

And the priest asked the question. He said, this question is only for the kids. And he said, who wants to go back to school? And all the kids raised their hands. And I'm sitting at mass. I'm hearing this. And I'm like, if this is not a sign of God, nothing is. We need to do this because community needed.

So we start from there. Right now we did 32 schools across 12 states. and we want to continue growing because 51% of America live under what is called childcare desert, which basically means there is free seats, free times of demand for every seat of supply that these operators are doing right now. So we believe that this is helping communities, is creating jobs, and that's why we open for tech. Oh, that's amazing.

And obviously in 2020 is what, obviously in 2020 is what? you opened up, right? But this has been an issue going on for way longer than 2020, right? Why do you think it took so long for people? You mentioned how much demand there was, but the supply wasn't matching. What do you think was part of the reason why some of these projects didn't exist before? I think part of the reason is one of the reason for sure is not having enough real estate developers into this space, right?

And I agree with you. This issue comes, you know, from a long time. getting to that point, it's telling you that it has been for years. And the situation is a lot of, you know, in order to do a preschool or a location space, you need to have at least 1.5 acres to 2 acres of land, right? But in 1.5 acres to 2 acres of land, you can build a lot of multifamily. You can build a lot of office spaces. So the traditional real estate developers will go that route.

retail, office, multifamily, every time. And the fact that it has been a trend of, you know, we can build more, we can get more profits, this space has been forgotten for many years. So I think when, you know, when you're looking at that, basically developers are following the traditional path and somebody has to do it, you know, the untraditional way. Because if not, you can build all the houses. that you want, all the multifamily, you can have everything. But if you don't have preschools, where these families,

like the parents need to leave their kid with somebody, right, in order to go and work and pay for this multifamily or pay for these offices. I think that was forgotten along the way. And that's why we said, okay, this is our opportunity to jump. And that's why I said, like, everybody that wants to jump, I encourage them. Because I think, you know, not only us can really do a lot if other industrial developers jump in.

Yeah, no, that's for sure. And when we had our call last week, right, before we were chatting here, one of the things that we had mentioned, right, was the level of competition for these schools, right? Where the more competition you create, it's going to improve the quality of the schools as well, right? And I think that's something that we've seen, especially down here in South Florida, there hasn't really been a sense of urgency, I guess, to say, improving the quality of these schools. How does this formula help improve the quality? I agree. I think more

competition means more quality and also helps, I think we discuss that call about tuition, right? One of the biggest question is a tuition is getting too expensive. But there is a reason for it. I mean, if you have that demand and not enough supply,

all these preschools are going to be, or schools are going to be like, okay, I can raise my tuition because, you know, still have applications, so let's keep racing until the point that maybe we don't have weightless anymore or to the point that they want. But by having more schools, more parents have more choices, right? And then there's a competition also intuition. And if we have great schools, then parents can pick between really good schools. Right. Because the other thing that I think is important is that when we open a school has to be something really great for the community.

And also, create jobs. So we create more jobs, helping reducing the tuition because of the competition, and parents will have more choices. I think that's a great formula to have. But again, we need more about that sense of your urgency that you will say, okay, instead of building too much multifamily, maybe we need to build a multifamily, but next to the multi-family, we want to build a school or a preschool.

So let's do, maybe cities can help me. I'm saying, okay, you want this amount of multifamily, maybe you need to put a school there. Like an infrastructure that the city needs. Yeah, and that was actually leading perfectly into my next question, talking about the infrastructure. You speak about the fact that a lot of multifamily homes are being built, retail is being built, and that's the priority across, you know,

not only South Florida, but the United States, and it comes down to what's profitable, right? But is there a way? and if so, what is that way that as you're building this multifamily infrastructure offices where schools are incorporated as part of these plans that go into building multifamily? Because you could build the infrastructure to create places to live, which is necessary, especially here in Miami, where we've seen this boom of traffic coming into South Florida. But what are we doing to build schools as part of this infrastructure?

You see condos popping up everywhere, right? But what are we doing to supplement that with, with education. Yeah, I think it takes a village. Right. So we need the developers. We need the zoning attorneys. We need the city to work on that.

Because it could be profitable, the business that we do. But maybe sometimes, and maybe in most cases, it's not as profitable, maybe as a multifamily project, right? Depending on circumstances. But again, it's an important information. infrastructure. And the fact that this infrastructure can be profitable, because when we're talking infrastructure sometimes, like buses and public transportation, or things that maybe a developer could do, maybe these are costs. They don't have any profit, right? If we need to, you know,

make a bigger sidewalk or make a two-lane street instead of a one-lane street, there's really no benefit out of it. It's just helping the city to accommodate the infrastructure. Well, this is something that will bring you profit. So you're helping the infrastructure of the city, and also you're getting a profit out of it. I mean, I don't think there is much infrastructure that do that. I mean, I could be wrong. So I think that's important part of the equation,

not to maximize what you can do in that land, but if you treat it as an infrastructure that you need it and then creates a profit, I think if a lot of developers see that, they're going to say, oh, maybe I should add a school into this project. And I think also it will bring you more profitable in your main project. Because if you are building a big multifamily with a big retail and then you have a great school that the parent can really walk to and leave their kid.

Exactly. I mean, I think that will even make you a better product in itself. So, again, there is a lot of dynamics I get it's not that easy. Of course. But I think it's really important and I think has a benefit, which I think it could help. Absolutely. And one of the other things that you brought up was the employment aspect, right? Teachers, the overall operation of a school and the opportunity that that provides by putting more schools.

But do you see that there are enough teachers, right? You hear a lot of it out there that there's less and less teachers out there. So how do you kind of counteract that where you're providing opportunities for kids to go to school? which there's a ton of demand for that, but is there enough demand of teachers? And if not, how do we bring more teachers into the fold? Yeah, I think it's an issue in not only in preschool and in schools, the teacher, because there's,

right, teachers also has to be good teachers, right? It's not only being a teacher in itself. And that takes a lot of resources, and of course a lot of time for that teacher also to get their degree, their certification, et cetera. But I believe if you have good schools, I mean, if you see here in Florida, for example, the good schools have really good teachers.

I mean, there is my daughter go to a school and they do, once a year they do what they call back to school night. And you meet all the teachers and they go through all the program, right? They're great teachers. I think once you give them the resources, and also, of course, salaries and, of course, what makes them want that job, right? I think you will have it. It's going to take time.

Of course. There is, like I said, a degree, a certification, and, of course, it's going to take time. But I think if you bring a school and the product is good, you can do that. Now, the question is how that also increased the cost of the education in itself. Right, of course. Right, because by paying more salaries, of course, tuition has to increase. Now, the way that we can try to help on that when as real estate developers is trying to maintain the rent as low as possible. Right.

Right. I don't know if that will be all the help that they need, but at least we can say, okay, if we built an efficient product and the rent is good, at least they will have more money to bring better teachers, which will help to resolve that issue. Absolutely. Yeah, I think, I mean, we've seen it in Miami. My mom's been a teacher for 27 years now, and I've seen it all. She was public school, private school, still in private school, or parochial school. But it's this constant ebb and flow of, you know, the teachers are happy with what the infrastructure is,

but then parents are asking for a specific teacher over another teacher, right? And it's, you don't want to run into that problem because it should be consistent across the board. And you want, hey, no matter where my kid goes to school, no matter who my teacher is, it's going to be the right person for it. And especially in early education, right? It's one of the most important times for these kids, brain development, so many facets that go into reading, writing, all these things that are crucial for the rest of your life, that this is the moment to make sure that you have the right teachers in place and the right

infrastructure in place. What have you seen with the schools that you've worked with as far as early childhood development that has led to success down the line for these kids? Well, I was talking with a, an operator says something that is really great. I was talking to them and he said, look, the teachers are the product that we give. And they need to be all good across the board.

So, you know, if a parent asked for a teacher specifically, we're failing our job because, oh, hopefully, oh, by lack, I'm going to have this great teacher this year. Well, next year, maybe not. So the idea is that when the owner of an operator brand understands that and say, all my teachers has to be good, what they need in order to become good teachers, right? And what that definition means, it changes. But I think once the CEO of that company understand that and put resources on that,

that's going to help a lot. Because if you have good teachers, then, okay, I don't want them to leave. because if a turnover cost me money, I need to hire somebody else. I need to be sure that they're a good teacher. So let me increase the salary or let me give them more benefit. They're going to find ways.

But I think part of this is saying, okay, how I can make my teachers good across the board. And you can see that in schools because once you go to a school and you see repeatedly that all the teachers like you're meeting are really good teachers, you understand that that doesn't come by luck. Of course.

That comes from the top. And I think once they do that, they have a great curriculum, they have good teachers. I think that's part of the solution. Now, of course, there is different aspect to it and the application and how many teachers apply and how they're trained and how they're good. Some of these schools have a lot of resources and they can train them really good to these teachers. Some of them maybe don't have the resources. And that's something also that, you know, as a community we need to work on and say, okay, how these schools can have more resources.

But I think once it comes from the top, like this operator was telling me and he really focused on, okay, every teacher has to learn the curriculum and they do a good training for how he explained, and then he's sure before even that teacher steps onto the class that they know the curriculum, that they can explain it, and that they're really good teachers, and that they really can teach this same curriculum to all the kids in the preschool.

So if all the teachers can do that, then you have a standard that is really good. Absolutely. So I think that's one way they do it. But, you know, I understand it's a complex situation. It's not that easy. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah.

Easier said than done. Correct. So what's the path moving forward for you? Obviously, you've been able to develop multiple schools at this point, but what's the five, ten years? plan for you and what do you see as the vision moving forward? So right now what we do is we open a fund because we believe that we need to help as much as we can and our idea is to do around 70 to 80 schools in the next 36 months. All in South Florida or throughout?

No, across the United States. So that's part of the plan. I think also is, you know, it's trying to make as much schools possible. so we can reduce that gap between the supply and demand that the United States has right now. It's a market that is going to grow in the next 10 years, around 50%, from around $60 billion to $91, $92 billion. But that's why they need help from companies like us

that will build this infrastructure. Having in mind that we will try to keep the rent as low as we can, So the tuition is not affected, and maybe they will have tuition even less than in other places. So for us as a company, we want to still grow, and we will start across the United States because we see that that's important right now, especially with all, you know, bringing jobs to the communities. we bring around 30 to 40 new jobs in every preschool that we make. So, you know, it's a big number when you calculate it by 80 or schools across the United States. So that's our plan in the next five years.

Absolutely. Amazing work and props to you guys to continue to push that initiative. But I do have a question for you off of that, right? You're not just focused on South Florida, right? It's all of the United States. What's some of the challenges when dealing with? different markets, right? Every city is different. The people that live there are different. Their desires are different. So how do you work from market to market, right? I'm sure Miami is

very different than maybe a city in Texas or the northeast or the Midwest. How do you work with that? The infrastructure is the same. So when an operator wants a building, typically is the same everywhere with maybe minimal changes, but like you are saying, the community is different. Right. And I think it's basically when we apply for an approval or a zoning approval for a preschool or a school, the community has a lot to say to it because it's really important. It's the kids in their community. Absolutely.

So what we try to focus first is getting an operator that really understands the community that we're in. that's I think it's a big part of our underwriting. And the other part of it is working with local, you know, GCs, local architects, local lawyers, even though we have, you know, our in-house team that will go and talk to them, we really want to do this local.

Why? Because this is a community project. Preschool is a community project. The community is going to be talking about it. You know, and I think it's important that we, understand that and we do it exactly how the community would like it because it will be a success for the operator. And also they would like when we go again and maybe we do another one in two three years or maybe sooner in that community. So that's the way we like to do it. And we have

success on that. Once you, you know, you start talking to the local people, local GC, local architects, local lawyers, they understand, okay, you know, these guys are trying to do it good. And so they help us. And, you know, we create something that will work. You know, it's a learning curve because, like you were saying, it's different. Every state is different. And it's one of the blessings, too, because I travel to see properties, and it makes me understand America more.

Like, you know, you hear all this noise about, you know, what is the United States? stay from people in the south or people in the north. But when you travel across the country, you kind of understand what everything is, you know, why everybody's saying what they're saying. And I like that because it gets me a sense of, you know, humble, I guess, in the opinions, by not being isolated in just, okay, what I learned from South Florida.

Absolutely. So I think that's also something that is really good for our company, because we have that in mind when we are in different states, we understand that we cannot do maybe things that we do in our states. Absolutely. Yeah, perspective, right? That's where you're able to garner whenever you're able to visit all these places, meet with all these people, see all the different needs that everybody has.

But at the end of the day, it's all united over the same initiative, right? It's providing education where necessary and one necessary. And I think that's the crucial part of what you're doing, the infrastructure that you're building and being able to provide the resources when, like, as you mentioned early on, maybe it wasn't a priority for a lot of people. So I have to ask you, what got you into this? Like, what's the purpose and the why behind all of this? Well, I guess the first thing is that that property that I mentioned when we came across was in Hollywood. And it was one preschool that my daughter attended.

Okay. So when I was, when we were doing the underwriting and we find out that, you know, this is a great space and nobody was doing it, I think the first time was like, you know, this is where my daughter attended.

So I want to be very mindful about, okay, if we're going to acquire this, has to be a good product, and we have to be, you know, it has to be something really good. And the more we get into that, we understand that, again, communities need it.

And when you treat it like it's a community project, it's fulfilling, right? I think that's the answer to it because it's really good. I mean, look, I did multifamily before, I did office, and I do retail too. I mean, I love the tenants that I had. Of course. But if, you know, a tattoo parlor came in and then five years they leave because they want a pair space, you know, that's part of the business. Right. But a preschool is they get in, they're helping families, they don't want to get out, right? It's a long-term relationship with the community. It's a different type of tenant. And I think that's very fulfilling because now you want them to stay there for 20 minutes.

You don't want them to leave. You don't want any tenant to leave. Of course. But this in particular, because the families are going to the place every day, they feel part of it. I mean, I ask you, you have a teacher, a mother that is a teacher. You know, does she love to transfer? Like, if the head of the school say, oh, we're moving the child school to another place. No, absolutely not.

As it is, she's been in the same classroom that she's been in. The actual room itself for 24 of the 27 years that she's been there. And it was this year when she moved. So imagine she moved from here to here. And it was like, oh, my God, I got to move my stuff out of the room. They love to be in that place because of also the memories, right? The kids have been growing there. You know, as a parent, when you go to the teacher that has been there,

maybe teaching, you know, 30 years and you go to the same class that you were there and now your kid is there, that's an amazing feeling. Absolutely. And I think that's the long-term relationship. And that's why it's for us fulfilling because we believe that are going to be there for a long time. And they are going to be in the community for a long time. They're going to create the impact on the community.

And what better thing to have unfulfilling as a real estate developer that you're creating a product that's going to stay for a long time in that community, creating jobs, you know, basically building the future of that community. Absolutely. So I think that's what it takes. That's what I love about what we're doing. And that's why, you know, I'm so passionate about it. Absolutely. That's amazing. And would you say that's also what motivates you every day, right? It's not easy for, you know, for everybody to just to do something like this, right? But when, I'm sure times are tough and there's levels of confusion out there, what is it that you lean on to motivate you and keep you going through this process?

Let me tell you an example that happened in my office one day. So we were underwriting a deal, and our VP of Finance cam, and he said, you know, things that maybe that deal was not worth it to do. Okay? Our VP of real estate was pushing for it, and then I stopped and I say, guys, our idea is to put all the supply to meet the demand. That's our focus. So if it's a 1% difference for the investor, we will explain it. But we will do it because our objective is to try to build as much as we can. So the demand is not as huge in comparison to the supply.

So I think that's what it shows about being passionate and what it keeps me going. Because at one point, you will face problems in that particular project or deal. Now, there are problems that are really not solvable, right? And maybe there are things that the difference for investors is really huge and maybe you cannot do anything. But we will be very aggressive in sense of if we find a way to do it, then we should find a way. That's our job as a company. Our team really understand that. Okay, we need to find a way to do this unless basically is unsolvable.

And that shows that we will get into communities, we build a good product, and even though it will not be the perfect scenario, we will still do it. Why? Because that's our objective. And that's how I think we, you know, when problems come in and arise, I always, you know, remember that and say, look, we need to push this forward because this is a solution for communities. And the team gets it, and we try.

So that's what it pushes in the bad times when, you know, things happen. Right. They happen. Yeah. It's inevitable. It's not about if, it's about when. Correct. In every deal.

Exactly. Every project. So, yeah, that's what that is what we are passionate about at Fortec. That's amazing. So philanthropy is a very big part of what you do at Fortec in your personal life. Talk to me a little bit about the work that you do for the community and how important that is to you. Yes. So the first school that we did was in Palm Beach.

And we go there to the school. It was basically a mom and pop school that has been there for 30 years. For some reason, the lady left all the stuff that she had on that school. Books, materials, everything that you can imagine. That will be in a preschool. So I am sitting there. And then the new school that was coming in didn't want anything. I'm like, this is good stuff, right?

This is not like books that are destroyed or something like. This is really nice books. So I'm like, okay, what we're going to do with this? And the first thing, you know, we start looking at it and we start saying, we need to give this away to people that really need it. We all this brought to a wonderful organization and we're like, okay, we're doing, we are doing this, schools. We're going to receive a lot of materials and also we're helping it.

Let's build something from here for kids. And we learned over the years there is a lot of different organizations, not only in the U.S., but in different countries, that need our help in reference to how we can help these kids to get either better education, sometimes food, sometimes these materials. And every time we try to find new organizations, or we can maybe sometimes it's only money that we need. give them because they run a good program and if there is no way we can step in from

them and say okay here's the money how we can help we got it more also if we came across with these materials we will give them away and we will take the cost of that and you know provide them so other other kids can use them when they are good materials and they're good shape but I think our purpose is also again helping these communities and there is a lot of kids like I said not only in the US, but around the world, that they need our help in some way or somehow. And we will try to find these organizations that do good, help them in financial sources, or help them with materials. And if we need other things like maybe education or anything

that we can bridge that gap, we will try to do it so we can help in that way. We are a focus, of course, in organizations that help basically care. kids. It's all about this early education aspect of it. So kids and all regarding that, kids, education, stuff like that. So, you know, we have different situations and we have met wonderful organizations. And once, you know, we see and we identify that it's something that aligns with what we're doing, we definitely will help in any way we can. Absolutely. And is it a foundation that you guys have? Or how does it? operate? So the name that we call it is Forteccares. Okay. Right now works not as

ONG, but really as our company trying to help. Got it. Okay. And then part of our team, Gabriela who is here, will also be in contact with the organizations and then we will provide either financial sources or whatever they need. So, you know, if you're an organization, use this opportunity, feel free to contact us. And we will review that and try to help in the ways that we can. That's awesome. Well, I have one last question for you that I would love to ask. And a big part of this conversation and this episode is to provide as much value not only to the community,

but also the next generation of future leaders, especially down here in South Florida. If you could say one thing that you would recommend to a young, aspiring, you know, business person, a future leader, what would be the level of advice that you would give them for success? I think the first thing would be have a sense of urgency. That's something that is, I think, is very important when everything that you want to do,

I mean, especially at the beginning, just treat it as, okay, I need to do this now and make it work as much as I can't. Because I think that's something that would really, really like from people that has a lot of, you know, companies, resources, financial sources. When they see that you have that sense of urgency, they like it. And they will want to work with you. So, you know, that's as soon as you start, you're trying to find your way, right? And having that sense of urgency, I'm pretty sure it's going to open doors that you even know what,

what that will take you, but you will be surprised. And the more people will open that doors for you, I think the more you will learn at that point and say what path do you want to take. And that I think is essential. And I think once you start your career path, if you don't lose that sense of urgency and you try to resolve these issues as fast as you can,

I think that will give you a very good, advantage of somebody else that is not doing that. The other thing is just, you know, knowledge in being very, very candid with or your clients or investors or whatever you, you know, you work with because, you know, people has been in business. They understand what thing goes wrong or they're going right or so by giving that news upfront and understanding and finding a solution, not just saying, oh, this is the issue and then you stay.

By being part of, you know, having that service of urgency and finding that solution and being candid, I think that it will just take you above a lot of competition that you may have by just doing that. So I will suggest that because I think here in South Florida will take you, you know, a very good path. Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for the time today. If there's any final comments that you would love to make, please. But thank you again for the time today. Thank you very much, Andrew, for having me. Like I said, it's a really cool place. Really cool what you're doing for here, the entrepreneurs in Miami. So I really appreciate that and the opportunity about

talking Fortex and what we do. Absolutely, yeah. We're definitely going to have to do another episode, I think in the future because there's still plenty to talk about. But thank you again for your time. And congrats on all the success that you've had with Foretech. Thank you very much. No problem. Thank you, guys.