Celebrating 75 Issues of Innovation In Real Estate
by Carole VanSickle Ellis
When Robert “Bob” Rakowski thinks about the day he first began laying the groundwork for REI INK, the first thing the publisher recalls is how many people immediately informed him that a monthly, national, print real estate magazine was destined for failure. “They told me, ‘Print is dead,’” he laughed. “Well, it turned out nothing was further from the truth. In fact, that is why I named the magazine REI INK, because I knew from the start that printing, in ink, is very important for our industry and very much alive.” 75 issues later (and still counting), REI INK is, in Rakowski’s words, “very much alive.”
Rakowski, who describes himself as a “behind-the-scenes guy,” was commissioned as an armor officer in the U.S. Army in 1984, and he credits his military experience for much of his publishing success.
“One of the first things they drill into you in the military, day after day, is a leader takes none of the credit and all of the blame. I take that to work with me every day, and I share the credit for every beautiful issue of the magazine with everybody: our president, Suzanne Andresen; our graphic designer, Kevin Fullerton, and his team; every one of our writers and editorial staff, our printer, and our clients,” he explained. “There is no room for egos in this business.”
Andresen, who joined the REI INK team just months after the inaugural issue, shares Rakowski’s drive and passion for excellence. “My goal is to always exceed the expectations and commitments we make to our clients and strive to help them grow as we grow as a company as well,” she said. “I want every reader in our audience, every client, and every investor to have confidence we have their best interests at heart, that we operate with a unified, collective approach to success.”
Early in the life of the publication, Andresen put that focus on growth and success to work, pioneering two additional opportunities designed to serve serious real estate investors. “We built our acquisition portal, called Highest & Best, which helps expedite the transfer of assets so investors can buy and sell more properties, and we also rolled out the REI Referral Network, which is designed to connect agents and brokers with real estate investors all over the country,” she said. “It all goes toward our goal of providing solid information to the industry and helping build a foundation upon which investors can create generational wealth.”
Today, Andresen also co-hosts an REI INK-sponsored podcast, “Uncontested Investing,” along with industry leader RCN Capital’s Nate Zielinski.
Taking the Time to Get Things Right
When Rakowski started REI INK, he knew from the beginning he wanted to serve full-time, professional real estate investors. “That sector is surprisingly underserved,” he commented. “It is an important, advanced audience, and you can find a lot of magazines teaching beginning investors how to install carpeting and cabinets, but there is no other magazine that is serving the sophisticated editorial needs of a full-time, professional, investing readership.”
To that end, Rakowski opted to run the publication using a “traditional” journalistic format, wherein the publication is the end product rather than simply serving as a platform for generating leads for upsells.
“We do not make money by selling our readers coaching or hosting big, live sales events,” Rakowski said. “We operate as a traditional magazine wherein we rely strictly on our ability to provide solid educational content from accredited resources and expert authors in order to sell magazines and advertising in the publication. If we are not providing good content, then we simply do not stay in business.”
Andresen and Rakowski both emphasized that in addition to labeling sponsored content in the magazine as such, they also make it a policy to never accept sponsorships for podcast guests or magazine cover features.
“You cannot buy our cover,” Andresen said proudly. “All of our editorial is earned, based on merit, and, in the case of the cover and other feature stories, professionally produced. Being featured in these areas is always free.”
Rakowski added, “All of our stories are written by industry executives or professional industry analysts and reporters. Other than the letter from the publisher, I don’t write the stories because I believe our readership wants to read the opinions and insights held by CEOs and other C-suite executives in the industry more than they want to hear from me. I am an old-school publisher, and proud of it!” He concluded, “I believe in letting the leaders in the industry educate our readers.”
Setting a Gold Standard in Customer Service
Another way in which Rakowski and Andresen believe they are keeping “old school” traditions in real estate alive is in the way they prioritize and handle customer service for both readers and clients. Rakowski and Andresen both worked in the real estate content and service spaces prior to starting the magazine, and, Rakowski said, he knew from early in his career that he would be able to “provide something a little bit better than the other options out there.” He continued, “Our focus from day one has always been on providing quality content and excellent customer service. It is amazing how far that will get you.”
Rakowski recalled a time when a client submitted ad content that included an incorrect telephone number. Although it was the client’s error, the magazine refunded the company’s money for that ad because, as the publisher put it, “If you are not going to make any money on that ad, I’m not going to make any money on it either.” Was that a good business decision? According to Rakowski, it was not just a good decision; it was the only option. “If you treat people right, they will treat you right,” he said. “They are still our clients today, so I think it was pretty obviously the right call.”
The gold standard extends to the production elements of REI INK as well. Kevin Fullerton, the magazine’s chief graphic designer and principal/creative director at Kansas City-based Springboard Creative, has been with the publication from the very first issue. “I read every article when we are designing and laying out the magazine,” Fullerton said. “It is so important to pull the right images and make sure that everything fits from beginning to end of each story.”
Fullerton said he has learned a great deal from working on REI INK and using his detail-oriented approach. “A couple of years ago, I bought our building [where Springboard Creative offices are housed]. I knew it would be worth the money to do it and how to add value to the building once I had acquired it thanks to all I’ve learned by working on the magazine,” he explained.
Today, in addition to serving as a home base for Fullerton’s company, the building hosts two renters as well.
“I felt like I could buy the building because I had been educated by REI INK as far as all the things I needed to do to make sure I could make it a success,” Fullerton said. “I was able to make the purchase with confidence that I was not making an emotional decision on the basis of wanting to own a building but, instead, making a smart business decision.”
Staying True to the Vision
When it comes to REI INK, Rakowski said there is no room for discord in real estate. “Everyone on both sides of the aisle is investing in real estate and can improve their lives and their financial health by doing so. We do not offer opinions on anyone’s personal politics, and we do not get embroiled in controversy because real estate investing should not be controversial,” he said. “There is no reason to alienate half of the population from some of the best educational content and reporting in the industry by doing that.”
Andresen calls this “2020 forward vision,” meaning the entire REI INK team prioritizes accurate, objective reporting, analysis, and forecasting instead of following external influences and perceived trends.
“As the industry changes, we adjust our issue themes and our content to reflect not only what is happening in the present but what we see — and what our contributors see — on the horizon,” she said.
“REI INK is so entrenched in the real estate space. We see things; we have the insight to make sound forecasts, and, so far, we have hit it on the money.”
Sidebar 1
Building Out the Magazine to Build Up Investors
In addition to the monthly print/digital magazine, REI INK offers additional resources to help investors on all scales make the most of every transaction:
The REI INK Digital Update
A weekly, digital newsletter covering the latest news, industry events, investor sentiment studies, acquisition opportunities, product and platform reviews, data & statistics, market reports, and more.
Sign up at REI-INK.com.
The “Uncontested Investing” Podcast
Hosted by Suzanne Andresen, president of REI INK, and Nate Zielinski, senior partnerships coordinator at RCN Capital, the hosts describe the “Uncontested Investing Podcast” as “your no-frills real estate podcast…designed for small to medium investors looking to scale their business.”
New episodes debut weekly on Tuesday. Subscribe at REI-INK.com/podcast.
The REI Referral Network
REI INK’s referral platform connects agents and brokers with investors in real estate. The REI Referral Network was designed to link together real estate professionals with fluent knowledge of their local real estate investment markets and investors looking for experts to assist in acquisitions, dispositions, and everything in between.
Learn more at REI-Referralnetwork.com.
Highest and Best Real Estate
Highest-and-Best Real Estate offers exclusive access to off-market access along with news and updates from REI INK. New assets are listed on Tuesdays, and certain “Second Chance Assets” are available for seven days only.
Sign up and view assets at Highest-And-Best.com.
Sidebar 2
Real Estate, Publishing & the Evolving Role of Artificial Intelligence
When Bob Rakowski started REI INK, he did so at a time when many industry experts were predicting that the next decade would herald the final nail in the coffin of print journalism. Contrary to all expectations, print journalism has experienced a resurgence since the first issue of REI INK hit newsstands in early 2019. Today, print magazine publications are once again gaining ground even as newspapers continue to struggle to hold onto offline readers. This is likely because, according to trade publication PrintMonthly, 65% of readers believe they “gain a deeper understanding of a story through print media” and 51% of readers report “trusting print media above all other sources.”
One element of retaining that trust, Rakowski insists, is demanding that content be produced by living, breathing authors rather than artificial intelligence (AI). Although the magazine has experimented (with full disclosure in every instance) with AI-generated content, the editorial team has unanimously elected to forego all machine-generated content in the publication.
“Honestly, please do not ever submit an AI-generated story to me,” Rakowski laughed, admitting the magazine has featured a great deal of coverage of AI’s role in real estate in recent years but insisting machine learning does not belong in sophisticated content.
“AI is not good for the publishing industry because it removes the heart from your written stories,” Rakowski explained. “There is no personal touch, no refinement, and it hurts the industry when we publish this sort of material to a readership that knows real estate is fundamentally based in relationships. If you do not take the time to put thought into your stories because something else is writing them, then you are not providing our readership with the information and education they depend on our publication to provide.”
Rakowski’s stance on AI in written content has proven prescient, as so many of his positions have, in 2025. This past June, more than 70 best-selling authors released an open letter to the “big five” publishing houses in the United States — Penguin, Random House, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Hachette Book Group, and Macmillan — requesting the publishers boycott all content produced by machine-powered book-generating hubs. The authors cited concerns revolving around copyright infringement, “cheap” writing, intellectual property theft, and a lack of safeguards protecting authors from being “AI-generated out of existence.”
Rakowski’s take on the topic is more pragmatic than this but echoes these concerns.
“It just isn’t good content, and I don’t publish poorly written, poorly researched, or plagiarized material,” he said. “I want stories with soul, with ‘mojo,’ and with personal investment from the author into the topic, the research, and the written words. That’s what makes our magazine stand out in the industry, and it is what has kept us going strong for 75 issues so far.”
