The Early History
The foundation of Tomlin Investments was originally laid in 1970 when owners Daniel Tomlin, Sr. and Daniel Tomlin, Jr. joined forces to pursue the land investment and brokerage business in the growing North Dallas area.
The senior Dan Tomlin was a Dallas native who attended Southern Methodist University and the Harvard Business School. He held executive management positions at various companies prior to entering the real estate industry. His son, Dan Tomlin, Jr., attended Texas Christian University and subsequently completed his education at SMU where he earned a Master’s Degree with Honors in Business Administration. Dan, Jr. was also engaged with corporate management prior to committing to a career in real estate with his father. In 1987, Dan Tomlin, III joined the rapid growth of the company after attending the University of Mississippi.
By the mid’80s, Tomlin Investments managed a land investment portfolio valued in excess of $500,000,000, consistently generating annual returns in excess of 40% for their investment partners. The company expanded offices throughout the country in order to further diversify the investment portfolios of their investors. By 1986, offices branched from the home office in Dallas to Washington, Atlanta, Houston, Phoenix and Los Angeles. However, as our nation’s financial crisis began to spread from the Southwest to other regions in the late ‘80s, the company consolidated operations around its home base in North Texas, waiting for the inevitable turn around in the market.
Fortunately, the real estate market began to climb in Texas in the early ’90s, and Tomlin Investments once again utilized their strategies to find superior investment and development opportunities for their investors. This market upswing brought an increasing consumer demand for affordable and well located residential property within well-conceived master planned communities. They concentrated on the acquisition and assembly of parcels of land on the edges of development that would be quickly impacted by accelerating job growth and expansion. By 2007, Tomlin Investments’ portfolio exceeded a value of $450,000,000 and approximately 11,000 acres, as a result of optimizing their research talents and past investment performance.
A shortage of lots appeared by the mid-1990’s. At that time the company moved from just land investments to residential lot development. Their focus was on master planned communities.
They emphasized bulk sales of lots to production builders for cash, and the sale of serviced mega-pads to third party users and developers. A prime example of this is their flagship master planned community, “Lone Star Ranch.” This magnificent 4,500 acre development is located north of Dallas, in Frisco, Texas. Because Frisco is one of the fastest growing cities in the nation, Lone Star Ranch has been zoned for single family, multi-family, commercial and retail development. The first two phases completed in Lone Star Ranch included over 900 lots and a state of the art amenity infrastructure to support a development of this magnitude.
Today, Tomlin Investments has four additional master planned communities ready to be developed in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, which will further enhance its competitive posture. Several other properties are the ongoing subject of intense research and negotiations for purchase. Tomlin Investments also retains partnership interests and management in a number of residential subdivisions and land investments throughout the region.
Tomlin Investments continues to optimize investment performance.