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INSIDERS

By Angela Enright |

Thomas E. and J. Philip Brosseau



The Brothers in Real Estate



Tom and Philip Brosseau are easy to talk to. Anything you want to know about Tom, Phil is glad to answer. And anything you want to know about Phil, Tom is happy to oblige.

Both attended Highland Park High School and graduated from Texas Tech University, and both worked summers at Ben Carpenter’s ranch in what is now the heart of Las Colinas. It’s there that most of the similarities end. They are brothers in real estate, but each has carved a distinctive niche in that topsy-turvy world and has made a name for himself.

Tom, 33, single and the eldest, is president of the young and successful Swearingen-Brosseau Development Co. He’s responsible for initiating, evaluating and approving all prospective projects. His forte, however, is neighborhod shopping centers like Duck Creek in Garland, Lexington Place in Piano or Meridian Plaza in Arlington. To date, the project that he says has caused him the most sleepless nights is the renovation of Lovers West shopping center. “Our properties have the very highest rents on Lovers Lane, and they’re rents that make people choke sometimes,” Tom says. “We have the highest rents outside the Galleria and NorthPark. We decided to invest millions of dollars over there and gamble that we indeed had a Rodeo Drive.”

Phil says Tom’s way of presenting challenging projects to potential investors reminds him of Rudolph Valentino. Tom grimaces at the joke, but Phil laughs and says, “I think it’s his confidence. He knows his ability and doesn’t overstate it. There’s a certain flair he has that impresses people and that they’re attracted to.”

Phil, 32, is the top office space broker and site locator for The Swearingen Co., which is a branch of Swearin-gen-Brosseau. He’s married and has four children. Tom says of Phil, “He’s extremely knowledgeable and well-respected. I’d say he is one of the young lions in the real estate community.” Phil cut his teeth on deals he made in Las Coli-nas-including development of the Las Colinas Inn and Conference Center for Southland Real Estate Resources. He counts the $20 million land transaction for Swearingen that he orchestrated between the Trammell Crow Co. and the Young Co. as one of the pivotal deals in his career.

Both brothers have a special place in their hearts for Ben Carpenter and Las Colinas. Phil recalls the time he left his hay-baling chores early on Friday and Carpenter hunted him down at a friend’s Park Cities’ pool and practically dragged him back to the ranch. Tom recalls that he took a nap against a post while he was supposed to be working. When he woke up, Carpenter was staring at him. Carpenter then put Tom in charge of dipping condensation out of air conditioner ducts with a teacup so none of his friends (who had to finish the hard work) would speak to him.

Tom says it’s the excitement, the competition and the “chance for the big gain” that attract them to real estate. “All the people who are successful in the real estate business are risk-takers-being brokers and having no guaranteed income, or being developers and having to take the chance of going belly-up. But they’re willing to take the risk and willing to manage the risk, so to speak, to gain the bigger reward.”

Tricia Smith



The Consensus Maker



Whenever anyone has a question about Southwest Dallas County or Oak Cliff, it’s inevitable that they’ll be told to ask Tricia Smith for the answer. There’s just something about the fact that she’s been an Oak Cliff homeowner for 20 years, a member of that community’s chamber of commerce, a member of the Dallas Park and Recreation Board and a member of the Dallas Planning and Zoning Commission that makes bankers, lawyers and real estate developers trust her opinions.

And Smith has an uncanny ability to walk and talk as easily with Dallas sophisticates as she does with the country folks in DeSoto or Duncanville. Maybe it’s because she can see the necessity of combining the old ways and new ways of doing business.

A perfect example of that understanding is reflected in the work she did for Allied Bancshares Inc. as its regional marketing officer. With her extensive social and political contacts, she represented the Houston-based company in key community positions in Dallas. She admits she likes the notion of working for a big company and moving in elite social circles. But she left all that early this summer to take an equity position with Red Bird Bank, an independent bank in Oak Cliff, which had courted her for over a year.

Besides the chance to make more money, Smith says she chose the new position because it meant being in top management, having a closer identity with the Oak Cliff community and being closer to clients for whom she had been doing consultant work. Her goal at Red Bird Bank is to help it move from being a $50 million to a $100 million bank. She hopes to do that by establishing a more sophisticated work atmosphere, while still maintaining the bank’s reputation for personal service.

Another of her long-range goals is to continue to fight the poor image that Oak Cliff has among many Dallasites. One way she does it is by sporting an “I Love Oak Cliff” bumper sticker on her Cadillac.

She says some of the misconceptions that people have about Oak Cliff are that it has a high crime rate and that all its citizens are black. “We are sitting in the second lowest crime district in the city of Dallas, according to police statistics,” she says enthusiastically. “And the black and white relationships are good and strong out here. We work together, go to church together, go to the grocery store together and play together.”

But Smith says it’s the city’s planning and zoning commission that has taught her the most about Dallas. That job requires about two days a week of her time. “But I’m glad I’m doing it. It’s a heavy commitment. The planning commission has really taught me about what makes a city tick. It’s the nuts and bolts. It hurts on some of those votes that you have to make in cases with a lot of homeowner opposition. But you just have to read and listen and then make a decision based on the best information that you have.”

Smith, 44, says she’s notcounting out the possibility ofrunning for a position on theDallas City Council in two orthree years. And if she doesn’tdecide to run herself, you canbet that there will be a lot ofsupporters throwing her namein the ring for her.

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