Only a small number of women focus solely on commercial real estate brokerage in Wilmington.

Of that group, Terry Espy and Lynn Harris are two experienced examples, brokering commercial deals at separate companies over the past two decades.

Harris, a broker with Century 21 Sweyer & Associates, is a Certified Commercial Investment Member (CCIM). That means she’s completed advanced coursework in financial and market analysis and demonstrated extensive experience in the commercial real estate industry, according to the CCIM Institute.

But at a recent conference for Realtors in Florida that she attended with her residential Realtor husband, Don Harris, some people automatically assumed that of the two, she was the residential Realtor, a field with far more females involved.

“My husband and I are the odd couple. I’m strictly commercial, and he is strictly residential,” Lynn Harris said recently, during a conversation on the topic of female commercial brokers with Espy at Espy’s office in downtown Wilmington.

Harris’ husband is president of the Wilmington Regional Association of Realtors and a Realtor with the Keith Beatty Team at Intracoastal Realty.

“It’s just a stereotype,” Lynn Harris said, “and Wilmington is small enough that maybe the women don’t feel like there would be enough business if they do just commercial or either they don’t get out there and do the networking.”

Espy, president of commercial development and real estate brokerage firm MoMentum Companies, and Harris said relationships are critical.

“Men have this good-old-boy network and get out there and go drink a beer with somebody after work and do the networking thing and have the relationships,” Harris said, “and that’s what this business is all about is the relationships.”

That’s not to say there aren’t any networking opportunities for women. The region has a much larger pool of women who work in some capacity in the real estate industry other than brokerage, including bankers, attorneys and related positions. And some primarily residential Realtors also complete commercial transactions.

Both Harris and Espy are members of Cape Fear CREW, the local chapter of the national Commercial Real Estate Women organization. Five years ago, attorney Dana Pellizzari joined with Harris and two other industry professionals, Jennifer Presnell and Beth Quinn, to launch Cape Fear CREW, according to a Greater Wilmington Business Journal story in 2010.

Cape Fear CREW aims to advance the success of women in the commercial real estate industry, according to the group’s website, providing opportunities to network locally, nationally and soon, internationally.

Brokerage was the only area that showed a decrease in the percentage, based on respondents’ estimates, of female commercial real estate professionals nationwide – from 36 percent in 2000 compared to 29 percent in 2015, according to the CREW Network 2105 Benchmark Study Report on women in commercial real estate.

The research was based on 2,182 respondents, 22 percent of whom were men. The report also measured overall success and satisfaction.

“In 2010, both men and women identified stagnating promotional opportunities as critical barriers to career success. The latest study data shows that more persistent issues like lack of mentorship and concern regarding work/ life balance continue to be ranked highly as barriers to success across genders today – and increasingly so among men,” the report stated.

Both Espy and Harris said they are willing to help mentor.

Espy tells the story of a successful residential Realtor who was referring a potential restaurant client to Espy and was then surprised when Espy offered to be a co-broker in the transaction if the residential Realtor was interested in learning more about the commercial side.

“I think it’s our responsibility if there are people who are serious about it,” Espy said.

But for men and women, Espy said, “It’s not a part-time job. They expect you to deal 24/7. People say, ‘Oh, you guys get weekends off.’ No, we don’t. That’s when they [clients] get some time to go look at office properties or whatever.”

At times, it seems like female brokers have to go the extra square foot.

“We have to produce. We have to show that we can do it. It’s not about, ‘You’re my friend. I’m going to ask you to list this.’ This is, ‘You prove to me what you’ve done,’ and then the calls come in,” Espy said.

Agreeing, Harris added, “Right, to be taken seriously. I got a very good reception, though, when I got into the business [in the fall of 1997] from the other commercial brokers, the men that I knew.”

They recommended that she become a CCIM “from the get-go, admittedly to be taken seriously ... and so many people still assume that I started on the residential side and then changed over.”

But Harris’ background was in the business world, in computer programming for clients that included businesses and government agencies.

“It was not unusual for me to be at a different business every day. I have clients today – in fact I met with one yesterday that was one of my programming customers and so those relationships I built a long time ago,”
Harris said. “Now that I’m into my 20th year, probably 90 percent of my business is repeat or referral.”

Compensations seems to be the same from the experience of Harris and Espy, with set percentages on commissions and other fees.

In August, Harris, working with Deedy Vincent, a residential and commercial broker with The Mitchell-Lewis Group of Intracoastal Realty, helped a client find an office property in what became a $4.4 million deal. Espy has recently been involved in brokering high-profle transactions in downtown Wilmington, including the lease of space for a new brewery-restaurant on Castle Street.

Espy said that although she feels female commercial brokers often have to “over-deliver” when working on transactions to prove their worth, it’s also part of her nature.

“I met with two female business owners last week, one about relocating the other one possibly opening her second and third locations and I think the difference is I sit there and I want to get to know the reason why,” Espy said.

“I want to understand them … you want to know what is your vision, why are you doing this. I think that for me, that’s where the relationship lies. They know you have their best interests at heart. It becomes a friendship, first, for me.”