News
All in the Family
October 7, 2010
| JLL managing international director Carl Ewert and his wife, Trisha, biz dev SVP at Old Republic National Title, make up one of the ultimate power couples in Dallas CRE. While they claim they’re not trying to take over the world, they’ve clearly influenced a whole family (14 of them to be precise) into CRE careers. | |
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| We caught up with Carl and Trisha at their Victory condo (Carl’s second office) to talk about the family business. The pair’s five children are either in the industry or have a spouse involved in CRE, with three in the DFW area and two in Austin. “I love being in the industry with Carl. I can bounce ideas off of him and he gets it,” Trisha tells us. Carl says it certainly makes entertaining clients a lot easier, too, because she speaks the same language. Carl says their children (and even kids’ friends) were likely influenced by the independence the industry provides. “They witnessed how the industry allows you to be whatever you want to be. It’s not an eight-to-five job, but it gives you a lot of freedom to do what you want and work on what you want,” he tells us. | |
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| The Ewert real estate clan at a recent family gathering includes Peloton Commercial Real Estate’s Barbara Houlihan (Carl’s sister), First American Title’s (in Austin) Kelley Murphy (daughter), Carl and Trisha, Group One Realtors’ Molly Holley (daughter) and JLL’s Stephen Holley (son-in-law). On the back row, we have two sons-in-law: Corgan’s Mitch Paradise and Bo Bezdek Builders' Bryan Murphy (in Austin); Transwestern’s Travis Ewert (son), Fannie Mae’s Shea Houlihan (nephew), Stillwater Capital’s Aaron Sherman(son), two more nephews with NorthMarq Capital’s Seth Parker, and HFF’s Austin Brooks. Mitch tells us the family doesn’t sit around every Sunday night and talk about deals, but the mentoring within the extended family does provide new perspectives. | |
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| We snapped Mitch, director of biz dev for Corgan, who moved from managing projects to coaching fellow architects on how to bring in the business and get new clients. “He’s really good at it,” his mother-in-law tells us, adding that he helped bring in the new Parkland project. More bragging rights for Corgan: Mitch says it’s the only firm in town that hasn’t had layoffs in the last two years. He says the diversity of Corgan’s projects—from the airport terminals to DISD projects keeps the A-team working until the private sector resurges. How did he make the love connection with Ewert daughter, Jennifer? The pair went to junior high together—and were even each other’s first kiss— but it wasn’t until they met again at Texas A&M that the flames were rekindled. | |
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| Carl specializes in the Greater Downtown area and even helped sell the land where their condo sits in Victory Park. He played an integral role for the team that relocated Comerica (pictured) from Detroit to downtown Dallas in 2008. He was also part of the engagement team hired by Deloitte to do a nationwide search for a location to build an education campus for the firm. Deloitte bought 100 acres on H. Ross Perot’s Circle T Ranch in Westlake, and the campus is under construction now with completion targeted for mid next year. He and Trisha recently returned from a two-week safari to Africa. They shot lots of game, but with a Canon. They tell us they survived a charging rhino, narrowly escaped a 14-foot crocodile, and a midnight tent visit from a 12-ton elephant. They were probably just trying to network. |
