While serving in an administrative role at some of the largest commercial real estate brokerages, Xochitl Reyes got a firsthand look at how property deals were done with huge companies such as Microsoft and Tesla — and the substantial commissions paid to brokers who represent them.
That knowledge and experience made Reyes hungry to become a broker herself, but it wasn't easy. She didn't have the network of peers and friends to help her break into the business or the resources needed to become a broker paid on commission. Also, she said, it was hard to find other female Mexican Americans in commercial real estate to ask for help.
"I've been in the industry for almost eight years, and I've never seen myself," Reyes said in an interview. "I see it in property management, I see it in accounting, I see it in administrative support, I see it in reception, security, janitorial, but never in positions of power. I come from poverty. I didn't have those connections and resources."
Ultimately, she said, it was people who did not look like her, a trio of connected, white men with powerful positions in the industry, who mentored her and helped her become a broker. Her experience showed that mentors these days don't have to have a college or family connection, or a similar economic background — they just need an appreciation for a protege's professional potential.
"The opportunities that I have access to today are because of the men that believed in me and decided to take a risk, to take a chance on me," Reyes said. "And I feel very fortunate because I also have a lot of privilege and am college educated. I was born in the United States, overcame a lot of things. And so I just want everybody to have that same opportunity, despite where they come from."
Women finding a mentor in the industry isn't very easy, according to Commercial Real Estate Women Network, or CREW. The lack of a company mentor or sponsor is one of the top three reasons women in commercial real estate gave as a barrier to their advancement, according to CREW Network’s most recent benchmark in 2020.
In a survey released last month, 56% of respondents said they had access to a mentor or sponsor in the past two years, but "the number was significantly lower for people of color — only 21% had a mentor or sponsor in the last two years," CREW said in the report.
Move to Texas
Born in East Lansing, Michigan, to a single teenage mother, Reyes moved to the Dallas-Fort Worth area in 2010 after graduating from Michigan State University. She did volunteer work to start building a network and slept on her cousin's living room floor while earning $10 an hour at the local YMCA.
Later, while working at a gym in Dallas, Reyes decided she wanted to start a career in commercial real estate after meeting a real estate broker there. He encouraged Reyes to start by getting a role in real estate marketing and, while doing that, to pursue brokerage.
"The man worked maybe 10, 15, 20 hours a week," she said. "He made a killing. He provided for his aging immigrant parents and supported his siblings in their endeavors." That appealed to her, "because my biggest motivator is helping my family escape poverty."
She eventually landed administrative and brokerage coordinator positions at Henry S. Miller Brokerage, Cushman & Wakefield and Colliers, but she said she was not given a chance to become a full-fledged broker.
"And for almost eight years, I begged and pleaded for an opportunity," she said. "There was never a transition path to go from administrative marketing coordinator into brokerage."
She saw firsthand the commissions tenant representatives could make while doing an administrative job at major brokerage firms. "I was the one doing the invoicing and seeing $350,000 commission checks, seeing everybody doing really well," but she said she was "not ever getting a piece of the pie."
Women at various commercial real estate firms helped Reyes along her trek to become a broker. She said they include Vada Hayes, a client services specialist at Colliers; Jihane Boury, a senior vice president at CBRE; Tiffany Angelle, an executive vice president at JLL; and Lizzie Blake, a senior vice president at Colliers.
Way Forward Emerges
But the clearest way into broker work emerged thanks to real estate executives James Ray and Richard Byrd, whom Reyes met when she moved to Dallas. They urged her to sign up for their CRE Analyst program, a two-month, fast-track training course with instruction on leases, purchase-and-sale agreements, loans, joint ventures, valuation, industry norms and, most important, she said, networking.
"What James and Richard helped me realize was that in order to transition into that path, we have to better prepare you," she said. "You have to be trained."
After finishing the course, she ran into fellow CRE Analyst alum Jon Altschuler, founder of Altschuler and Co., or ALT+Co. When Reyes somewhat jokingly asked Altschuler if he was hiring at the time, he said he would make her a job offer. She started at ALT+Co. in January 2021, and the support she's received from him since then has been invaluable, Reyes said.
"Our conversation is very much coaching point, coaching point, coaching point," she said. He's "always correcting me, giving me leads, putting me on deals that I would otherwise never be able to source on my own, teaching me how to be a professional," she said. "And so without James and Richard and Jon, I would still be an admin at some big company."
Next year, she said, she plans to launch a nonprofit group called #diversifyCRE to ramp up the conversation about the need for more people of color and to provide support to those looking to do what she does for a living.
"It's been really hard to talk about diversity because sometimes it rubs people the wrong way," Reyes said. "If you say white people, white men, that's a very sensitive term. People get very easily offended. And so I just hope that by sharing my life experiences, the beauty of diversity, and why there should be more opportunities for kids with similar backgrounds as me or worse, why they should also have access to this amazing industry and in influencing development and communities," that it helps others.
Reyes adds that she plans on being a broker for a long time.
"I'm having so much fun," Reyes said. "I hated sitting behind a computer when I was an admin. My license plate literally says XO hearts CRE because I just love the industry that much, and I don't see myself getting out of it anytime soon."