Industry Heavyweight Joins CushWake's Tampa Team

MIAMI—One of Tampa Bay's most successful commercial real estate professionals has joined Cushman & Wakefield. Julia Silva Rettig, a 20-year veteran, has been appointed as director of the firm's Davis Industrial Team. She will take over the team's overall industrial user and landlord leasing practice.

“We have achieved our goal of enlisting someone to run the operation that has an institutional owners' mentality,” says Mike Davis, CushWake's executive director in Tampa Bay. “She has successfully represented some of the nation's largest industrial and office REITs and positively driven the profitability of their business. We want to govern our accounts in lock-step with our owners.”

Most recently, Rettig managed the Tampa area for Penn Florida Companies, where she oversaw the leasing and management of a $60 million class A office portfolio. Her responsibilities included the repositioning of the assets, improving the occupancy in one asset from 20% to 85% percent over the past year.

Rettig also led the facilitation of a $1.5 million capital plan to enhance the overall curb appeal of a 150,000-square-foot vacant office building. Contributing to the growing economy, that property was recently leased to two companies that will create 1,500 new jobs in Tampa Bay.

“This is a very exciting time to be working in commercial real estate, and an equally exciting time to be involved in Tampa Bay's growth,” says Rettig said. She notes that new job provides a professional challenge and an opportunity to build on her reputation as a leader in the Tampa Bay commercial real estate market.

Earlier, Rettig served as vice president of leasing for Duke's industrial and office leasing efforts in Tampa. She was responsible for the leasing of 800,000 square feet of industrial space and 700,000 square feet of office space and was honored for generating the highest deal volume in the country.

As vice president for Liberty Property Trust, Rettig grew that REIT's market share from 200,000 to 700,000 square feet with land acquisitions and then developed and leased 500,000 additional square feet of industrial space in Silo Bend. Rettig was the recipient of the Top 40 Under 40 award from the Tampa Bay Business Journal for Business Leadership and is widely recognized as one of Tampa Bay's most prominent and visible female real estate executives.