Every year, Midwest Real Estate News publishes its Commercial Real Estate Hall of Fame issue, spotlighting the careers of the most successful CRE professionals in the Midwest. This year, we are also running those profiles online. Today, we highlight the success story of Susan Lines, senior vice president with the Akron, Ohio, office of CBRE.
A top performer: Susan Lines has become one of Akron’s top brokers, even though she left the business for years to raise three kids. And now, one of those kids has followed her into the trade. The next generation of Lines family members is ready to sell real estate, too.
The bio: Lines came to northeast Ohio in 1981 in the operations department of a retail jewelry company. She moved to a larger jewelry company in Akron in 1986, where she went to work in the real estate department. She learned how to read retail leases, and began to negotiate terms and conditions for stores. But she retired in the early 1990s to raise her three daughters.
In 2002, she went back to the work as a licensed commercial agent with Mogen Real Estate Company. During the next 10 years, she learned the brokerage business, and exceeded expectations for a new broker in the business. She became one of the top brokers in the Akron area, and in 2005 won her broker’s license.
She joined CBRE in 2011. In 2013 Susan was recognized as a Top 10 Producer in the CBRE Cleveland/Akron Office. She’s now executive vice president.
Big deals: Lines has closed several big deals during her career. This includes the transaction she closed for Yellow Freight in Akron, selling a 271,150-square-foot building on 15 acres, and the transaction she closed on behalf of Rohrer Investment Properties, selling a 388,615-square-foot, four-building portfolio.
The real estate gene: In 2014, Susan’s daughter Zada Lines joined CBRE’s Akron office as an associate in CBRE’s Office Specialty Brokerage Group, where she works collaboratively with her mother and CBRE Vice President Gary Rickel.
Zada Lines was recently included in Crain’s Cleveland Business – Twenty in their 20s class of 2017 and the Greater Akron Chamber’s 30 for the Future for 2017. In 2015, she was the 2015 CBRE Rookie of the Year in the Cleveland/Akron market.
A commitment to her industry: Susan Lines has been a member of CREW (Commercial Real Estate Women Network) Greater Akron since 2009, and served on the board and in a stint as president for about three years.
Lines currently serves as treasurer for the Court Appointed Special Advocate Board Volunteer Association, Inc. The association is tasked to ensuring that the local CASA program provides a thoroughly trained and well supported CASA volunteer to every child in Summit County who needs one.
She’s also a former member of the Bath Township Trustees Advisory Council and the Bath Park Board. Bath is a township in Summit County, near Akron.