Founder and President Emeritus – Sumar Enterprises, Inc. and Sumar Realty, Inc,
Founder – Sumar Property Management
Advisory Board Member – Better World Properties, LLC
Larry is a native of Springfield Ohio and the second of eight children from a family with solid Midwestern values and a strong family foundation. Larry earned his B.S. from Ohio State University. He was honorably discharged as a Lieutenant Commander in the United States Navy. Out of college, he secured engineering positions with Collins Radio and Texas Instruments (TI). At TI, Larry was part of the team responsible for placing the infrared interferometer spectrometer on the Mariner 2 spacecraft to monitor humidity, temperature and atmospheric conditions on Mars. In the 1970’s Larry went back to school and earned his M.B.A with an emphasis on finance and real estate from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. He enjoyed a brief stint as operations auditor for Portland Cement and then went to work for a real estate developer disposing of real estate assets. From there, a real estate career was born. These assets were sold to Realty International. From 1976-1981, Larry served as President of Realty International/ Key Summit Management where he held total responsibility for 22,000+ apartment units under his direction. 15,000 of those units were insured by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He personally established six regional apartment management offices located throughout the United States.
Larry co-founded Westmark Management in 1981 to successfully complete a three-year assignment to turnaround a distressed 10,000 unit federally insured apartment portfolio. That same year, he founded Sumar Realty Corporation to perform fee-based renovation and apartment property management services including servicing Houston bank apartment property portfolios incident to their foreclosure and resale. Under Larry’s guidance as Founder and CEO, Sumar Realty has managed retail, multi-family, office and industrial space in excess of 10.7 million square feet in 11 states. Through Sumar’s construction subsidiary, Westbrook Construction Inc., Larry guided complete reconstruction on four Hurricane Ike damaged apartment complexes and finished a $15M rehabilitation of Houston House Apartments, a 396-unit high-rise complex in downtown Houston. As part owner of Houston House Apartments. He divested this showcase property in 2014. In addition to major multi-family renovations, Westbrook Construction has built new apartments, townhomes and small office buildings.
Larry has been a member of the Houston Apartment Association (HAA) since 1984 and an active member with the Legislative Committee. In 2005, he was elected President of HAA, the same year that Houston provided 37,000+ apartments for Hurricane Katrina evacuees from New Orleans. Sumar Realty provided 300 of those units under the City of Houston/FEMA voucher system. Larry was inducted into the Houston Apartment Association Hall of Fame in 2013 and remains active in multi-family legislation at both the state and local levels. Sumar Realty Corporation specializes in investment, improvement and effective property management of A, B and C class multi-family properties. In 2017, Sumar Property Management merged with Better World Properties to bring unparalleled apartment property management and investment expertise and a Better World to the apartment investment community.
In his free moments, Larry continues to master his golf game, dabbles in the wine and olive industries and spends time with his wife of 22 years, Suzy Hill, a well-known and highly respected veteran of the multi-family industry in her own right, and their children and grandchildren.
