Local women entrepreneurs launch new east Austin development
AUSTIN (KXAN) --- There's a new office development under construction in east Austin, and three women entrepreneurs are behind the initiative. The corner of East Seventh Street and Pedernales Street will be the future home to WORKBENCH. It will be a four-story office retail and restaurant development.
Jennifer Seay, Shawna Sieck and DeLea Becker spearheaded this initiative. Each of them own businesses in Austin.
Seay founded Art + Artisans, an art consulting firm that focuses on curating artwork for real estate developers. Sieck owns Legacy Lighting, a lighting manufacturer representative firm. Becker has 25 years of experience in east Austin real estate and she founded Beck-Reit Commercial Real Estate.
Through this space, the group hopes to help other women entrepreneurs.
"We are going to have the conference room filled with events, events that are focused on women. We want you to learn," Becker said. "We'll sketch out how we did this project, financially, development wise, what we put in it. How that all went together."
Women in commercial real estate
This comes at a time when some reports show women represent a small percentage of commercial real estate investors nationwide.
"Only 3% of commercial real estate worldwide is owned and managed by women, which is significantly low."
DeLea Becker, Founder of Beck-Reit Commercial Real Estate
A 2020 report by the Commercial Real Estate Women (CREW) Network found women made up nearly 37% of commercial real estate professionals. CREW said that percentage hasn't changed much over the last 15 years.
This group of women wants to change that.
"Just gives light to what women can accomplish in commercial real estate when they're willing to just kind of work hard and get out there and put their mind to it," Seay said.
Sieck said they'll have their doors open to offer insight and guidance to whomever needs it.
"That's what this is going to symbolize," Sieck said. "Come here. We'll help you. We'll help you be what you want to be."