Alex Beheshti

Alex Beheshti helps Altus Group clients and the multi-family real estate sector deal with their challenges as he overcomes his own.

Beheshti serves as a senior consultant and registered professional planner with Altus’ economic consulting division in Toronto.

Several media outlets and other organizations seek his views and insights, both on air and in print, on a regular basis, while Beheshti finds enjoyment in educating the public on real estate matters. He has become known for producing comprehensive reports on multi-residential matters for various organizations.

But in his youth, he was diagnosed with having both a gifted intellect alongside a learning disability related to writing.

“Alex has had to spend much effort to build up his writing ability to effectively communicate in a medium that is very challenging for him but still central to the passionate work that he does,” said a colleague who nominated him for his Next Gen Award.

Beheshti provides expert advisory services in areas related to development charge reviews, fiscal impact analysis, economic impact studies, employment conversion assessments, housing-need analysis, and other areas that intersect urban planning and land economics. He focuses primarily on project-based work, in addition to keeping an eye on regulatory changes from the municipal to the federal level to keep clients and peers informed.

“Through his work, Alex helps clients navigate uncertainty around planning policy changes by providing them with the tools and information they need to succeed,” said the nominator.

Beheshti joined Altus in 2019 after taking a circuitous route to his commercial real estate career path.

After graduating from McMaster University with an honours degree in economics and political science, became a management associate in procurement at Gerdau before changing industries to become a project manager at Exact Media. After realizing his passion for housing and policy, in 2018 he reinvented himself a third time by moving into the field of urban planning in his late 20s.

Before joining Altus, he worked as a planning assistant for York Region and as a research assistant for reknown researcher and senior fellow Frank Clayton at the Centre for Urban Research and Land Development (CUR) based at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU), where he also obtained a degree in urban and regional Planning. When an Altus executive called Clayton looking for bright young talent, he recommended Beheshti, launching his tenure with the company.

“Alex has always been a restless person, driven to find his passion and calling,” said the nominator. “Having changed job careers from first the steel industry to marketing analytics, and then again to urban planning, Alex has learned how to be adaptive and excel at change.

“Alex is passionate about sharing his knowledge with others and enjoys mentoring younger staff to help them better develop their skills in planning policy, economic analysis, and data science.”

After starting with Altus as a senior analyst, Beheshti moved his way up to senior consultant. While serving the company, he serves the industry as a member of the Ontario Professional Planners Institute’s government relations committee. OPPI is an advocacy group and also accredits the province’s registered professional planners.

“When we get legislation that affects homebuilding or redevelopment in general, I’m there advocating on behalf of private planners,” said Beheshti in an interview with Connect. “It’s a difficult position, because not a lot of private planners tend to volunteer with the organization. And so, there’s always a complaint among us private planners.

“But if you want to change an organization, you have to do the work. I also do a lot of general advocacy work with various housing advocates when they need information or perspective.”

Ray Wong, vice-president of data solutions and client delivery at Altus, said Beheshti’s greatest quality is his desire to ask questions. His unconventional approach to market intelligence has sparked valuable discussions and educated clients.

He also helps identify emerging trends.

“He likes to look at the key issues,” said Wong. “He likes to be innovative with different ideas – not just things that have happened in the past, but: How can things be improved going forward? So, it’s a combination of having the data and the intellect to go behind the numbers to come up with that trend, or that insight or that solution in the market.”

While sparking a discussion, Beheshti makes people think and look at real estate matters in different ways, enabling the industry to find more solutions in the future.

“It also helps educate the people and helps educate our clients on the market,” said Wong of Beheshti’s approach. “There’s less surprises. Any time you get a person that is smart, that wants to get to the root causes of the issues, it’s a great person to have on the team.”

Beheshti’s approach also helps Altus improve its standing as a market intelligence leader.

“We’re also calling out things that that we anticipate to happen, or that might happen in the future,” said Wong. “So, it helps the overall profile and reputation of the company.

“And I think to a certain extent, it makes us better.”