CHICAGO— BlueRoad Ventures , a new asset management and investment company in Chicago chaired by Richard Portillo , the founder of Portillo's , the iconic chain of hot dog restaurants, has just made its first big real estate buy. It has acquired a $139 million national net lease portfolio, consisting of 48 assets across 18 states, from Chicago-based Brauvin Net Lease . The mostly retail portfolio includes a host of well-known brand names such as Burger King , CVS , Steak N' Shake , Walgreens , Applebee's and many others. “We have two silos of capital,” managing partner Tim Farrell tells GlobeSt.com. One is for stable core assets like these that already generate solid cash flow, and the other is for value-add properties. The company plans to use both silos to make office and retail investments. It also has a private equity arm and provides accounting and other financial services for its clients and investors, which include a number of family offices. BlueRoad started up in September, he adds, and “although we are a new company per se , all of our principals have been in the business for many years.” The partners found this off-market portfolio through their relationships with the people at Brauvin, a group for whom they had a lot of esteem. The Chicago-based law firm Much Shelist represented BlueRoad in the transaction. “As we studied this portfolio we grew comfortable with both the diversity of its tenant profile and the diversity of its locations,” he says. The roughly one million square foot collection is heavily weighted toward properties in the South and Midwest, including ten in IL that range from a Burger King at 11740 S. Rte. 59 in southwest suburban Plainfield, to a Steak N' Shake at 2121 N. Willow Rd. in north suburban Glenview. But the largest building is a 39,580 square foot Price Chopper at 29 Sunderland Rd, in Worcester, MA, and a number are in western states such as CA, AZ and CO. “If something happens in California, it's not going to impact an entirely different tenant in New England,” says Farrell. He can't provide any details on how the group will follow-up this first deal. BlueRoad, he says, is an opportunistic buyer driven by the needs of its private investors and does not feel compelled to hit pre-conceived targets. “That's the beauty of our partnership.”