News
“Eric Nesbitt named 2009 DMCAR Broker of the Year”,
Denver Business Journal, February 24 – March 4, 2010,
written by Marty Schechter on behalf of DMCAR
For Eric Nesbitt, a quiet kid from the south side of Chicago, it’s always been about the challenge. Growing up in a middle class Chicago neighborhood, he didn’t go without, but he clearly set his sights on a professional career that would present challenges and opportunities.
From a law firm in Chicago, to his role as general counsel for Team USA Basketball through its two Olympic runs, Nesbitt has always taken a quality experience and found a way to apply it to the next challenge.
Today, an accomplished commercial real estate broker who heads his boutique firm, The Nesbitt Group, LLC and the Law Offices of Eric L. Nesbitt, P.C., his motivation and quest to take the next step have helped him earn the title of 2009 Broker of the Year from Denver Metro Commercial Association of REALTORS® (DMCAR).
The Association chose to honor Nesbitt, 44, for an 18-year career that has been filled with unique professional experiences and his leadership of the organization during arguably, some of the most difficult market conditions and association challenges in recent history.
“I’m extremely grateful for the opportunities that DMCAR has presented to me and for allowing me to grow and lead,” said Nesbitt reflecting on his recently completed role as DMCAR President. “Getting our board and our membership together on the formation of a new membership option, the Commercial Association of Brokers (DMCAB), is something that I’m very proud to have accomplished during my time as president. It’s an important step for our local brokerage professionals and it helped to create a dialogue both at the state and national association level. Ultimately, this is going to be good for everyone involved.”
For Nesbitt, he set his goals early in life taking advantage of some very long family road trips across the country that exposed him to diverse communities and a world of opportunities that he knew he wanted to explore.
“I knew in about the 4th or 5th grade that I wanted to be an attorney,” said Nesbitt. “My mom and dad would take us on these long cars trips to California in the summer time and I’d see the way that people lived in communities like Beverly Hills. I told my mom and dad, I’m going to be an attorney.”
Coupled with setting lofty goals, he also learned the value of hard work and the rewards at an early age.
“I remember getting to go to at least three or four White Sox games a summer for free because I had good grades in school,” Nesbitt recalls. “Bill Veeck, the owner of the White Sox at the time, had a program that rewarded students for having good grades or perfect attendance and I would always get a chance to go.”
After staying close to home for his undergraduate degree at the University of Illinois, Nesbitt set his sights on law school at UCLA.
“My memories of that area from our vacations were very vivid,” he said. “It was a place to be, a great program at UCLA, a wonderful opportunity to do something big. And in the end, it did what it was supposed to do, it changed my perspective on life.”
Following law school, Nesbitt returned home to Chicago where he passed the bar and began working as an associate for a local law firm. After five years working in litigation and real estate law, Nesbitt’s UCLA law school friend Ron Sally, whose own law career was on the fast track with the Denver Nuggets and Ascent Sports, called to ask him about his interest in a position with USA Basketball in Colorado.
“My first question to Ron was, ‘where the hell is Colorado Springs?’, recalled Nesbitt. “After several weeks passed, I called Ron back and ultimately got an opportunity to interview with the president of USA Basketball who offered me the job.”
While the pay may not have been as good as he would have liked, the benefits clearly helped him make the decision to take on “a dream job working for the Dream Team,” said Nesbitt, referring to the team that would represent the country and win the Gold Medal in the 1996 Olympic games in Atlanta and the 2000 games in Sydney, Australia.
“I remember sitting on planes in cities and countries all over the world playing cards with Charles Barkley, John Stockton, Karl Malone, Hakeem Olajuwon, Reggie Miller, Scottie Pippen – guys I watched on TV – I was getting a chance to be a part of this unbelievable experience with them,” said Nesbitt.
After five years, it was time to take what he had learned at USA Basketball and explore his next career step. He evaluated his options back in Chicago, and in his new Colorado home as well, before agreeing to take the next step in his career with Jones Lang LaSalle.
He jumped into commercial real estate and the tenant representation side of the business in 2001 and became a quick study. But the studying quickly turned to planning and he wrote a business plan for The Nesbitt Group which he founded in 2004.
“I hung my shingle and I’ve been running ever since,” he said.
In 2006, Nesbitt passed the Colorado Bar exam and began to fill a void for his real estate services through his namesake law firm.
“In all honesty, I’ve always planned to be where I am today,” he said. “I practice law with my sights set on my own practice. I wanted to learn, get trial experience, work on real estate transactions, work on labor and business practice issues. The skill sets work well together.”
As for his involvement and leadership in DMCAR, it was a process that evolved as a result of his desire to network and be a part of an industry leadership group.
After throwing his hat into the DMCAR board ring in 2005, he quickly rose to prominence and earned the opportunity to serve as president of the organization in 2009.
“I clearly had some anxiety,” he recalls. “But I believed in the organization, my fellow board members, our professional staff and, most important, our members. Together, I believe we’ve moved the organization where it needed to go.”
On the business front, he continues to explore the new opportunities as well. In 2009, The Nesbitt Group became an affiliate of KW Commercial which he believes will be a good model and business development leader for his real estate practice.
While all of his challenges have brought him joy, none is greater than his role as dad to 3-year-old Marcus and 1-year-old Ian. Together with wife Kathy, the director of human relations and labor relations attorney for Kaiser Permantente, he knows that his challenges and rewards will continue to come through in the years ahead.
