Close Up With Sandy Benak

Granite's Sandy Benak is leasing 1.4M SF across Houston, and just came off the best year in her 30-year career. It’s a far cry from her girlhood dream of dancing on Broadway, but she couldn’t be more thrilled.

Sandy tells us she had no thoughts of going into real estate when her father set up an interview with Duddlesten. She cold called for two years straight (no one told her you were supposed to hate it, and she actually kind of enjoyed it for the first year) before she got a leasing gig in 1985. Her first assignment was 10500 Richmond, and she  launched her brokerage career with a 10k SF lease (which she worked with Mike Boehler).

Sandy is CCIM’s 2014 prez—above, she’s with past president Grandbridge’s David Schwarz at its holiday party. Some of Sandy’s favorite deals have been ones she worked really hard on, like inking 8k SF for The Houston Post in Loop Central. (She had seen in the paper it would need new office space, so she sat in its lobby until someone talked to her.) And some of her favorites have been because of the client, like a small lease she did at 333 North Belt (she married the guy). Now she’s handling Sugar Land Creek I and II, 24 Greenway Plaza, 3355 West Alabama, and Granite Tower 290.

There’s one thing on Sandy’s professional bucket list, leasing a Downtown tower. (She repped the Lyric Centre for 60 days, but that doesn’t count, and she wouldn't want to do it without her Granite colleagues; she, Scott, and Steve have been a team since '92.) Outside of work, she reads a ton—usually action like Harlan Coben or Ken Follett books—and watches a lot of her kids’ volleyball and baseball games. Above, one of Sandy's all-time favorite pictures of her with her family (hubby Dan, son Andrew, and daughter Kearby).