Todd Bancroft

President, CEO, Draper & Kramer

In late 2025, Draper & Kramer acquired the Eleven33 apartment complex in Oak Park for $88 million, a deal Bancroft framed as a textbook under-replacement-cost acquisition in a submarket with limited new supply.

For now, he’s sitting on development sites until the math works again.

“In Oak Park, there’s no potential for a new building there. Right now we’re buyers. I think that you will get back to new development,” Bancroft said.

Bancroft became the president and CEO of Draper & Kramer in 2018 and quickly began refocusing the firm around what he viewed as its core competency: multifamily ownership, finance and advisory work.

That discipline has defined Bancroft’s tenure at the 130-year-old firm. After benefiting from the pandemic-era refinancing boom, Bancroft moved early to pull back from residential mortgage origination as rates rose, exiting the business in 2023 after what he has described as a once-in-a-generation profit window.

There were other reasons to pull back, too: in early 2025, Draper & Kramer agreed to a five-year ban on mortgage lending and paid a fine to resolve a federal redlining case tied to past practices, a reputational setback that reinforced Bancroft’s push to simplify the business.

Draper also wound down condo association management and other ancillary businesses that generated activity but little margin, consolidating legacy apartment holdings into a multifamily fund.

— Sam Lounsberry