Luke Brugnara

Luke Brugnara
Luke Brugnara, 1996
Born	(1963-10-18) October 18, 1963 (age 53)
Other names	"Lucky Luke"
Occupation	Commercial real estate investor and developer and president of Brugnara Corporation
Known for	Has purchased and developed over $2 billion of commercial real estate in San Francisco and Las Vegas since 1992.

Luke Dominic Brugnara ,(born October 18, 1963), also known as "Lucky Luke", is a San Francisco-Las Vegas commercial real estate investor and developer and president of Brugnara Corporation. Brugnara has purchased and developed over $2 billion of commercial real estate in San Francisco and Las Vegas since 1992.

Brugnara was born in the Sunset District of San Francisco, the son of a "juvenile hall manager". He went to school at St. Ignatius College Preparatory, a private preparatory Jesuit school. During his schooling years, he was interested in sports such as track, eventually becoming good enough "in the 400 meters to run for San Diego State." Brugnara was a competitive flycaster during his teenage years and set several national accuracy flycasting records in the American Casting Association which still stand today.

Brugnara earned a bachelor's degree in Communications and a master's degree in Finance in 1988, graduating from San Diego State University. Thereafter he attended San Francisco Law School. Soon after, he began working in the real estate business at a "private mortgage banking firm". Working at the firm helped him to figure out a method to succeed in real estate, which he enacted in 1992 by purchasing "a $12.5 million first TD on a property in downtown San Francisco through bankruptcy court from American Savings for only $1.5 million". Brugnara also "was able to purchase four more high-rise office buildings in 1993 after taking out a $3 million mortgage on the property". By 1999, those four extra properties had been sold for over $130 million, which Brugnara used to make larger purchases. Brugnara's high-rise office building purchases in San Francisco included: the Kress Building, 939 Market Street, 814 Mission Street, the Bulletin Building, the Westinghouse Electric Building, 171 Second Street, 450 Pacific, Fritz Plaza, 735 Market Street, 140 Sansome Street, the Royal Insurance Building, 201 Sansome Street, the Pacific Bank Building, 351 California Street, the Medico-Dental Building, 490 Post Street. Brugnara also contracted to purchase the Chevron Building at a steep discount during this buying binge. Because he had purchased more than "one million square feet" of high-rise office buildings during that time without partners, he "became the largest 100% fee owner of real estate in downtown San Francisco" and accumulated "a net worth of over a quarter of a billion dollars" ($250 million).