Susan Arledge

It was the “year of the woman” in politics, with a record number of female candidates being elected to both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. As it turns out, it’s the year of the woman in Dallas commercial real estate circles, too.

Last night, Susan Arledge was named the 2012 winner of NTCAR’s prestigious Stemmons Award. The president of Arledge Partners is only the second woman to receive this honor since the program was launched in 1976; the first was Susan Gwin, who won in 2000.

Arledge seemed truly surprised when the announcement was made—and even more stunned when she looked up to see that her daughter Kelly, who’s working as an intern in Beijing, had secretly flown back from China to join her brother in congratulating their mother.

Considered the highest honor in the Dallas-Fort Worth commercial real estate industry, the Stemmons Service Award recognizes a NTCAR member for superior performance, both in terms of production and supporting the industry. It’s named after Dallas real estate icon John M. Stemmons.

Arledge thanked her mentors—the late Dan Petty of Henry S. Miller Co., Roger Staubach and Jim Leslie of The Staubach Co., Dan Arnold, formerly with Swearingen now with HSM, and her business colleague at Arledge Partners, Jeff Pappas.

Her unscripted remarks drew many laughs from the audience—especially when she talked about fellow Stemmons Award nominee Gary Collett of Cushman & Wakefield, who was a football coach before getting into real estate.

“He was the hottest football coach at my high school,” Arledge said. “Every sophomore girl hung out at the football practices—not for the guys, but to watch Coach Collett.”

The other two nominees this year were Allen Gump of Colliers International and Riis Christensen of Transwestern.

Also recognized last night was David Liggitt of CBRE, who was named winner of the 2012 Young Citizen Award. Other finalists were Sean Dalton of Younger Partners, Reid Goetz of Hillwood, and Charlie Morris of Colliers International.