When looking for ways to expand its business and find new avenues to serve clients around the Region and beyond, Latitude Commercial launched its property management division. Headed by Director of Property Management Ryne Pishkur, the division started in 2018 with a staff of 1 1/2 – himself and Meghan Delacruz, then the office manager who did bookkeeping as an additional responsibility.
When Pishkur started the division in June 2018, Latitude managed four properties and a total of 69,000 square feet of space. By the end of the year, that jumped up to six properties and 144,000 square feet. In 2019, business started to boom, and Pishkur reached 11 properties and 223,000 square feet – a 54% increase.
“To be honest, I had very few expectations about how it would go,” Pishkur said. “A couple months in, I was second guessing the choice a bit; things were fairly slow. Then we started making progress and securing some contracts. With that experience and confidence, things just started to grow and grow for us.”
Now, Latitude has up to 43 properties and a total of 1,082,207 square feet managed with properties in Lake, Porter, Vigo, and Hendricks counties in Indiana, as well as Cook and Kane counties in Illinois. One key to that growth, especially early on, was the strong reputation Latitude had already established with their brokerage services.
“We were really able to leverage the existing relationships that we’d already created,” Pishkur said. “If you’ve done leasing at a property in Valpo before or you know a landlord to help make an introduction, that’s a lot easier than relying completely on cold calls.”
Another big difference maker for the division’s growth was Delacruz becoming Latitude’s Director of Finance, where she now spends most of her time bookkeeping for the company’s property management clients.
“She’s tremendous. We wouldn’t have been able to grow at the rate we did without her shifting her focus to property management,” Pishkur said. “She oversees the bookkeeping, is great with numbers, and is super organized. She’s got her own systems in place that help us stay coordinated. She’s been a team player every step of the way. There’s no chance we got to where we are without her help.”
Pishkur also brought aboard another full-time property manager in 2021, an assistant property manager in 2022, and is welcoming a third full-time manager this October.
“It’s been a lot of fun, and we’re fortunate to have found people who are a good fit,” he said. “Our team works very closely together in all aspects of managing our properties. It’s not just one person handling everything for a property; it’s a lot of shared work, a lot of collaboration. It’s important that we have people that are willing to collaborate and are real team players.”
A couple of years ago, Pishkur was asked where he’d like the division to be in five years. Hitting two million square feet managed was his answer. With the addition of new team members, a packed portfolio, and a history of success to point to, he believes they are well on their way to meeting, or even exceeding that goal.
“It’s very exciting,” he said. “It really shows the hard work, dedication, and strength of the team that we’ve built here.”
To learn more about Latitude Commercial, including their team of property managers, visit latitudeco.com.
