Michael Brennan

Founder, CEO, Brennan Investment Group

This Chicago investor made an early bet that logistics space — not offices — would anchor the next real estate cycle.

That approach has propelled Brennan Investment Group, founded in 2010, into one of Chicago’s most aggressive private warehouse buyers and developers.

In Rolling Meadows, Brennan undertook a roughly $100 million conversion of a distressed suburban office campus into industrial use. The project paired office distress with airport-adjacent logistics demand, testing whether obsolete office assets could be repurposed.

Brennan has continued to transact, amid rising interest rates that have slowed velocity across the sector. Most recently, the firm paid $77 million for a 13-property portfolio of suburban Chicago and Milwaukee industrial buildings previously owned by Investcorp and Farallon.

Brennan has paired its contrarian plays with more traditional acquisitions. The firm quadrupled its investment in an Elk Grove Village technology park within four years, bought a Lombard industrial park for $76 million in 2024 after previously taking a loss selling an office complex in Lombard and last year secured refinancing on a large O’Hare-area industrial portfolio even as capital markets tightened.

Brennan has also sold land to data center developers, including a $37 million deal in Elk Grove, capturing value from infrastructu