Our Team

Sam Spencer is CEO and Managing Director of CEI-Boulos Capital Management, a real estate investment fund management company focused on delivering both competitive financial returns and social impact. The company serves banks, family offices, and other institutional investors, and has a national scope. CEI-Boulos is a joint venture between CEI, a community development finance institution, and The Boulos Company, an integrated commercial real estate firm.

The company’s first Opportunity Zone fund is the Woodforest CEI-Boulos Opportunity Fund. The fund invests in high-impact commercial real estate projects across the seventeen-state Community Reinvestment Act footprint of its sole investor, Woodforest National Bank, with the goal of ensuring that these investments benefit the economically distressed communities in which the projects are located. In 2020, the Woodforest CEI-Boulos Opportunity Fund was recognized by Forbes and the Sorenson Impact Center as one of the “The Forbes OZ 20: Top Opportunity Zone Catalysts,” and one of the ten most innovative and impact focused Opportunity Zone funds in the country. In 2021, the fund was the winner in the Societal and Community Impact Innovation category of the Banking Administration Institute (BAI) Global Innovation Awards.

With the demonstrated success of the Woodforest CEI-Boulos Opportunity Fund, CEI-Boulos has since launched two more funds in 2022 with NBT Bank and Allivate Impact Capital.

Spencer was previously Senior Vice President for Investments at CEI Capital Management, of the nation’s leading allocator of federal New Markets Tax Credits. Spencer has also been an entrepreneur in the energy field and a real estate developer. He served on the Clinton White House staff for four years, including as Special Assistant to Vice President Al Gore. For eight years he served as Democratic National Committeeman for Maine. He is a board member of Maine Coast Heritage Trust, a leading state-wide land trust, where he serves as the Chair of the Public Policy Committee, on the Executive Committee, the Lands Committee, the Governance Committee, the DEIJ Working Group, and on the board of an affiliated LLC. He has also previously served as president of the board of Opportunity Maine, an education policy non-profit, and as president of the Portland Development Corporation, the city’s economic development and loan authority, and on the board of Maine and Company, a non-profit focused on state business attraction. As a high school student, he served as Head Page of the U.S. Senate. He received a BA degree cum laude in government from Harvard College and MBA degree from Harvard Business School.