News & Features

My Players

|

My Lists

|

My School

|

My Notifications

Team Home

Hilary Barte, the No. 1-rated women's tennis recruit in the Class of 2007, won two doubles national titles and one team championship while at Stanford, where she played No. 1 singles and doubles for all four seasons (2008-2011).

A lefthander, Bartle had a combined singles and doubles record of 258-63, and she was an eight-time All-American.

Barte played professionally for less than a year. Not liking the solitary lifestyle of the tour, she returned to her native California and planned life without tennis. She thought she would be a doctor, like her father, and completed some post-graduate classwork at Southern Cal with that in mind, but she ultimately decided she wanted to get to work right away and not spend ten years in medical school.

Today, Barte has found a niche in the San Francisco area working as an associate at JLL (Jones Lang LaSalle), an investment management company specializing in commercial real estate. She was encouraged to join the company by Hugh Scott, the managing director and a former Stanford player himself who had mentored Barte previously in tennis as a coach and hitting partner.

"My job is to help companies with their real estate whether it's a three-person startup finding office space or a 3,000-person company looking for a headquarters," Barte said. "I really like what I'm doing. It fits my personality. It's very much a team mindset, and I enjoy coming to work every day."

TennisRecruiting.net talked recently with Barte about her new career and her days as a junior, college and professional tennis player - and how tennis prepared her for her profession.

In this question-and-answer, Barte gives some advice to today's young tennis players and explains why a career in real estate has been a great fit so far.

Questions and Answers

Tennis Recruiting (TR): How did you start playing tennis?

Hilary Barte (HB): I had two other siblings, and I just followed them to the courts and started playing. I was probably 6. My parents got me started. My dad tells me he once saw an old couple playing tennis. There was an old man tossing balls to an older woman. He said, "Wow, that's the sport I want to play. They can play their whole lives." There was no intention for any one of us to be good.

TR: What do you think hooked you to the game?

HB: I really liked the feeling of hitting a tennis ball cleanly. I played other sports, and that always kept tennis fresh, but tennis was my favorite. I enjoyed the mental chess match.