Dottid’s 2020 Broker Awards Q&A
In light of this year, Dottid wanted to spotlight Brokers that have gone above and beyond, despite the unprecedented events that have impacted our traditional work routines. So for the first annual Dottid Broker Awards, we are excited to feature Stephanie Gustafson from Paladin Partners as this year’s Newcomer of the Year and Travis Moore from Dogwood Commercial as our Top Producer. Meet our award winners below:
Newcomer of the Year: Stephanie Gustafson — Paladin Partners
Q: What are you most looking forward to in 2021?
SG: Hitting my goals. I set new goals each year and it is so fun seeing them come to life, professionally and personally. I’ve also been known to set my husband’s goals for him, or up his a bit (or an additional 50% higher..). Gustafson’s are firm believers in constantly growing and bettering ourselves. It helps keep each day feeling like an adventure and gives it more of a purpose.
Q: What is your superpower?
SG: Positive Mindset. It’s a great day to have a great day every single day — if something good is going to happen, it’s going to happen to me. Life is too short to not love each day, and I make that my priority. Everything is figure-outable, being kind will never need an apology, and good people love working with good people. I put a lot of stock in that I am really fun to work with — Brokers, Landlords, and Tenants are never irritated about having to interact with me. It’s important to like what we do, there is no point in being a jerk…nobody likes it, not even you.
Q: What trends are you seeing in Commercial Real Estate currently?
SG: Industrial Industrial Industrial — growing growing growing. The office footprint for some are shrinking, but then again the office footprint for others are growing, retail needs a reboot, but also entrepreneurs are still opening up retail locations. I personally like what I have deemed the “retail mullet”, retail in the front warehouse in the back. E-commerce/Instagram based businesses use this version a lot. It’s kind of a double whammy. I think customer service on the Landlord's side is becoming a big deciding factor for Tenants. Especially with Covid and everyone having to rejigger business plans to make everything work…the quality of the Landlord and their reputation has become increasingly important. The Dallas Design District is in the housing market PSF price, so it is quickly moving to Brookhollow, so what use to be sketchy with junkyard dogs is turning into some pretty dope warehouses with unique and quality Tenancy.
I also think transparency in the transaction is becoming a big thing. I see a lot more PSF prices quoted on CoStar, as well as OPEX online as well. Where a lot of landlords use to hide their rates and change them depending on the Tenant…with Gen Z and Millennials getting into the business and beginning to be decision-makers there is a lot more technology motivated aspects of the business compared to the good ol’ boy make me an offer mentality.
Q: How have you overcome obstacles or adversities in your career?
SG: Ohhhh. Here we go! Obstacles and adversities are my jam!! Growing up with a single mama in free housing until the 5th grade in my home town of Sand Springs, OK, and having my college counselor tell me “people from my kind of family don’t go to college” to a guy in college telling me I’ll never amount to anything because “I don’t care about what kind of pen I use”…it’s truly just another person or challenge I get to say “Hold my beer” to when I kick another goal’s ass. If you don’t have obstacles and adversities in your career or life you probably aren’t doing anything. It’s like going to the gym and walking around looking at all of the shiny metal on the weights or the buttons on the machines. No — you gotta get in there — you gotta dig — you gotta pump some iron — get your heart rate up — feel like you’re going to vomit — get those results girl!! (or boy). I go against them head-on, ready for battle, there is NOTHING I cannot do — everything can be figured out — and if I don’t know something, I KNOW I know someone who knows the answer or the way to get me to the answer. By the way, this is the 2nd year we have provided Christmas for the kids and families who currently live where I grew up, I am the first and only person in my immediate family to graduate college and have a Cartier pen…go after what you want. Period.
Q: What are you most looking forward to in 2021?
TM: I’m looking forward to greeting people how we used to greet people — and interacting with others the same ways we used to interact, prior to the start of the pandemic. I am someone who likes being face to face. I’ve got to be around people — it’s one of the reasons I entered this business. In person interactions are crucial in Commercial Real Estate, so I am excited to see what this will look like in 2021. I know that we will learn from the challenges of the past 9–10 months and establish some kind of “new normal”.
Q: What is your superpower?
TM: I don’t know if this is really considered a superpower, but I’ll gladly challenge anybody to a friendly competition of Name That Tune. Very rarely do I lose a competition of Name That Tune.
Q: What trends are you seeing in Commercial Real Estate currently?
TM: The most intriguing trend right now is the continued exodus from the coasts towards Texas. Hewlett Packard just announced that they’re relocating their headquarters to Houston, and Elon Musk is underway in building in Central and South Texas. I think current and future economic policy is going to continue to attract businesses to Texas because of many different economic advantages.
Q: How have you overcome obstacles or adversities in your career?
TM: Persistence. We are a small business, and as we’ve worked with a number of clients over the years, we’ve learned that being persistent is very important. This is a volume-based business. Naturally, there’s an element of failure that exists in our industry, but failure isn’t always a bad thing. We would be remiss if we did not treat our failures as a constructive tool to learn and grow from. You will lose a deal here and there, but there is always plenty of opportunity beyond the failure you’ve just experienced. This is something we preach internally every single day, and something that we’ll continue to reinforce inside our organization into perpetuity.
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