Swearingen Realty Group associate Austin Owen's previous incarnation: commercial salmon fisherman in Alaska. This pic was snapped in 2010 on the Egegik River in Bristol Bay, Alaska, on the crew’s best day of fishing with roughly 23,000 pounds of sockeyes stacked up to his thighs. That’s not a mustache on his face, he tells us, it was pride. The boat was practically sinking; the gray hatches to his left in the photo are full of fish. The crew had to offload the boat twice in that one day. They didn’t sleep that day. “We didn’t mind though,” he says. “It was the hardest work I’ve ever done. But, while you see fish in the picture, fishermen see dollar signs.” 

That season, the crew caught more than 100,000 pounds while at sea for 33 days. The first photo sits on his desk as a mental escape whenever the whole “sitting at a desk in an office” thing starts to get to him. Working the research department (on his way to junior broker in about six months), Austin has assisted in the leasing of 250k SF in the last six months.