Commercial real estate firms merge in Bentonville
by February 8, 2023 3:23 pm 1,571 views
Two of Northwest Arkansas’ newest commercial real estate firms have merged.
Ramsay Ball, the principal broker at Cignus Real Estate in Bentonville, has joined Bentonville firm Focus Commercial Real Estate as a principal and executive broker. Khandice Baldwin (leasing and sales) and Mikayla Dietz (financial analysis) followed Ball from Cignus to join Focus’ brokerage department.
“I trust and respect these guys,” said Ball, speaking of Focus co-founders Patrick Byrd (CEO) and Butch Gurganus (president). Ball is a real estate executive and investor with 40 years of experience in Arkansas. His career started in 1983 in Little Rock, working for Barnes, Quinn, Flake and Anderson. In 2003, he moved to Northwest Arkansas and founded a company that became the Colliers Arkansas office in the region, where he was a principal and executive broker. He started Cignus in 2019.
Focus is a full-service commercial real estate firm specializing in investment sales, tenant and landlord representation and property management.
Byrd and Gurganus co-founded Focus in early 2021. With Ball, the three principals have combined experience of approximately 90 years working in the commercial real estate industry, and their professional expertise overlaps.
While working for separate companies, Gurganus worked for Byrd as a broker for 10 years before forming Focus. Ball hired Gurganus in 2005 at Colliers International, and they were business partners in the Northwest Arkansas market for 14 years.
“I think [merging] gives us a whole new set of opportunities and some highly talented people,” said Byrd, who also manages and invests in an extensive real estate portfolio for multiple investor groups who own storage facilities, offices and duplexes. “I am excited about what we can do together. We will have real opportunities with the three of us working together.”
Focus has 15 employees and agents, including brokerage associates Oksana DeMaris and JP Huntington and director of property management Lindy Janes.