Fast 15: Lindy Janes

As property manager for Northwest Arkansas’ largest office park, Lindy Janes has a long list of professional responsibilities.

Collecting rent, paying bills, overseeing maintenance and repairs, handling tenant management, retention and improvements, as well as leasing and project management duties — all of it can be in a day’s work.

“Property management is actually quite fun,” Janes said. “Your day-to-day work is never the same.

“That’s what makes it fun.”

A Springdale native, Janes graduated from the University of Arkansas with a marketing degree in 2006. She landed a job as marketing coordinator at Colliers International, but soon was learning about property management, too.

“It’s a small office and we kind of work together as a team on everything,” said Janes, who credited Dee Ann Gilgen for serving as an early mentor.

In 2009, Janes was made an assistant property manager, and in 2011 took on some of her own properties. Then came last May, when leasing activity started to pick up considerably as the local commercial market rebounded from recession-era levels.

“We started talking about, ‘Do we need someone at Beau Terre full time?’” Janes said of the 35-building Bentonville office park that contains about 400,000 SF.

“It definitely was a huge honor for them to even ask me to move out here and do this.”

About 60 companies — primarily retail suppliers — currently call Beau Terre home. Janes said that number, however, soon could go higher as new companies consider moving to the area.

Combine those prospects with existing tenants looking to expand and other area companies considering moves, and Janes is dealing with more and more leasing activity.

“I don’t think a week goes by without me showing a property,” she said.

Janes also stays busy in terms of professional development. In addition to serving as chapter administrator for Northwest Arkansas’ Certified Commercial Investment Members, she recently earned BOMI International’s Real Property Administrator designation.

The RPA designation involves a wide-ranging array of educational components, and earning it is intended to help professionals like Janes maximize an asset’s income and value while minimizing risk. Still, Janes said she would like to add a Certified Property Manager designation — her industry’s CCIM equivalent — sometime in the near future.

“The more you can learn, the better,” Janes said.