THE DEVELOPER | Carlton Dean

Whether it was a lemonade stand, a car detailing business or working as a disc jockey, Carlton Dean was his own boss throughout his youth. So it was no surprise that when he graduated from college, Dean didn’t turn to the classified ads to find a job.

“I had owned businesses already, and I knew that I didn’t want to work for anybody,” he said.

The path he chose would eventually lead to the founding of two companies: Southland Commercial and Dean Development.

Dean, a 32-year-old Tallahassee native graduated from Leon High School in 1992 and from Florida State University in 1996 with a bachelor’s degree in Entrepreneurship and Small Business Management. Dean had been exposed to real estate and development from an early age with his father and mentor, Bob Dean, and felt it might be a good fit for him.

“My father, had done a lot of development, so I had been around it,” he said. “When I got out of college, I decided commercial real estate was what I wanted to focus on and I had an opportunity to talk to Everitt Drew at SouthGroup Properties, and he was gracious enough to put me to work for him.” Everitt is one of the most respected real estate brokers in town and is now president of the St. Joe Land Company after they acquired SouthGroup Properties in 1999.

In 2002, Dean left Advantis, formerly SouthGroup Properties, to form Southland Commercial, a commercial real estate brokerage firm, with business partner Francis Rentz. It was there, Dean said, that he acquired a taste for development. In 2003, he started Dean Development with his brother, Wilson, to capitalize on opportunities they saw in the market.

“Our strategy is that we’re a niche company,” he said. “We try to focus on small opportunities. We like to see the light at the end of the tunnel before we go into the tunnel, I am not smart enough to predict the real estate market all the time – we want to be smaller, quicker, lighter.”

Dean said that they are not interested in expanding throughout the state – there are plenty of opportunities right here in their own back yard.

“I feel like I-10 has the potential to be similar to the I-4 corridor in Orlando over the next 20 years,” he said. “We live in a unique place. There’s not very much developable land, and most of it happens to be around us.”

Dean is planning to expand his personal life; he will be getting married in December to April Brueckhiemer, a local Tallahassee native.

“I’m on the cusp of a new chapter in my life, and I’m looking forward to it. I’m not getting any younger and I’m not growing any more hair,” he quipped. – Mackenzie Turberville