He’s an 82-year-old Trump supporter in liberal Seattle. She’s 32 and styles herself an environmentalist. He’s a blunt-spoken legend in the local real estate scene. She’s eager to put her stamp on the family business she’ll likely take over.
They’re the Seligs — Martin and Jordan — and on a rainy August morning, the two are sitting in purple velvet chairs around a black marble conference table in their downtown Seattle office, surrounded by glossy posters of the half-dozen developments they’re planning or already building.
One has Jordan’s fingerprints all over it. It’s a giant glass box steps from Amazon.com Inc. headquarters that will be the greenest office building of its size in the world. The 15-story tower collects rainwater for flushing and irrigation, has large windows to maximize natural light and comes with $1 million worth of solar panels to generate more energy than it consumes.
The Seligs are breaking ground on the project this month. But Martin makes clear it’s not something he would have considered himself.
“There’s no way in hell that I would do a building like” that, he said, explaining that the environmentally friendly design will make construction 10% more expensive per square foot. Jordan sees it more as an obligation: “How could I not be interested in the environment?”
This type of generational divide is typical across the U.S., where millennials are far more likely to support efforts to combat climate change and find a way to make money from it. But in Seattle, it’s taking on added significance, as the father-daughter team embarks on an ambitious real estate play in one of America’s fastest growing big cities.
The Seligs are banking on more than green cred to fill their new buildings. They also have a 36-story tower that’ll house WeWork and its co-living offshoot WeLive; a modern remake of a historic Federal Reserve building; an office-and-retail complex close to where the city’s National Hockey League expansion team will play; and a pair of developments on the city’s waterfront, which is getting a $724 million makeover.
The older Selig is quick to wave off any suggestion that there’s much of a strategy behind the building binge other than his confidence in Seattle’s economy. But, if it works out, it stands to bolster his $1.1 billion fortune and further alter the skyline he’s spent the last six decades helping create. He’s also reluctant to talk much about retiring.
“Am I going to sit home and watch TV?” he said. “When I get tired of it, I’ll quit.”
Martin recently completed a seven-year process drafting his trust and estate plan. If Jordan doesn’t end up taking over, Martin has set up a company to make sure the business continues operating in his absence.