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Gary Aubuchon is happy to be out of politics.

Really.

“I get to come back at a very good time,” says Aubuchon, 50, the president of the Cape Coral-based residential real estate and construction firm that bears his name.

Aubuchon served as a Florida state representative for six years, rising to chairman of the influential Rules and Calendar Committee in the Florida House of Representatives. He kept a grueling schedule of public events while remaining the chief executive of Aubuchon Team of Companies, which include homebuilding and residential brokerage companies.

After being re-elected twice without opposition to the Florida House, Aubuchon lost his bid for the U.S. House of Representatives when radio host Trey Radel defeated him in the Republican primary Aug. 14.

Although Aubuchon acknowledges that the electoral defeat affected him for several weeks, he says he has been eager to resume the day-to-day management of his companies as the economic recovery takes hold. “My leadership team functioned without my daily input for six years,” he says.

Another big bonus: “I get to spend real time with my family,” says Aubuchon, who recently took his first ski trip in nine years with his wife and three children. A trip to Europe is scheduled this summer.

“We're glad to have him back,” says Jeff Miloff, Aubuchon's business partner in several ventures, including Miloff Aubuchon Realty Group.

Passion for politics
Although Aubuchon built his firm from a small residential land company since starting 29 years ago during Cape Coral's infancy, he always harbored a passion for politics.

He started planning his political life in 2000, six years before filling the state representative seat left by Jeff Kottkamp, who became lieutenant governor in 2006. He regularly hosted fundraisers in the multimillion-dollar homes he continues to build today.

Aubuchon is known for his meticulous planning, and that skill translated well as he climbed the leadership ranks in the Florida State House of Representatives. He chaired the Rules and Calendar Committee from 2010 to 2012, a powerful agenda-setting position.

“I was hoping he'd stick it out in the House. He would have been on my leadership team,” says Will Weatherford, the Republican from Wesley Chapel who is the current speaker of the Florida House.

Weatherford says he valued Aubuchon's drive. “He worked really hard and was very prepared. He mastered the content before him. He was never a partisan person.”

Weatherford says Aubuchon was especially keen to represent small and medium-sized businesses because of his experience as an entrepreneur. While he was involved in moving high-profile economic development and pro-business legislation, Aubuchon says he's particularly proud of two lesser-known bills that removed impediments to business.

The first was a two-page bill that now requires the Florida Department of Health to notify local authorities and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection when water quality forces the closure of a beach. Aubuchon sponsored the legislation because the miscommunication between those agencies forced Sanibel beaches to close for three weeks at the height of the tourist season one year.

The second bill lowered the no-trespass sign requirement from five signs to one sign on smaller construction sites. Law enforcement officers were releasing thieves who had trespassed on small construction sites because builders hadn't posted the regulated five no-trespass signs.

“They were simple solutions to bring common sense to what didn't make a whole lot of sense,” says Aubuchon. “Neither one changed lives, but they were really important issues at the time.”

Back to business
Aubuchon confided to Weatherford that electoral defeat wouldn't be devastating. “He told me the worst thing that happens to me is I get to spend time with my family and my business,” Weatherford says.

Certainly, his six-year stint in Tallahassee expanded his network. Aubuchon says he used to have a Rolodex of about 300 cards inside little plastic sleeves; now, his Microsoft Outlook contact list has 3,000 people he knows well.

Miloff says Aubuchon's management style is much like a good politician. “He gets buy-in from everybody, and that's how we move forward,” Miloff says. “Nobody walks out of our meetings thinking it was a waste of time.”

“He's very organized,” Miloff says of Aubuchon. “He's the guy who keeps the company in check, and I'm the dream guy.”

But Aubuchon, always quick with a smile, has a sense of humor, too. “When we have our company meetings, he starts out with redneck jokes,” Miloff says.

When Aubuchon returned to the day-to-day management of his companies after his electoral defeat last summer, he didn't barge in. “The first couple of months he sat and watched what was going on before jumping back with both feet,” Miloff says. “Now he's got his arms around everybody.”

To be sure, it's a lot more fun to be in business during a recovery than during a downturn, when Aubuchon had four rounds of layoffs. The Aubuchon Team of Companies posted revenues of $18.8 million in 2012, a 27% increase over the $14.8 million in revenues in 2011. For 2013, Aubuchon forecasts revenues of $23.5 million.

“We're going to take 2013 to do some team visioning,” says Aubuchon, who builds luxury homes primarily in Lee County and has a construction pipeline of 20 homes.

Meanwhile, Miloff says the residential brokerage company now has 80 agents, up from 30 during the downturn. Last year, Miloff Aubuchon Realty did $125 million in sales and already $26 million in January, he says.

“We felt Cape Coral turned the corner two years ago and it's been a slow, measured ascent,” says Aubuchon, who isn't keen on seeing another real estate bubble. “What we hope for us as a business is some predictability. It's enabled us to plan, forecast and budget.”

While the residential construction market in Cape Coral has improved, it's still relatively modest compared with the boom years. For example, in the fiscal year ending in September, Cape Coral issued 329 single-family building permits. While that's a 39% increase over the same period in 2011, it's still a fraction of the 7,694 single-family homebuilding permits the city issued in 2005. “It's not anywhere close to the frenzy of the past,” Aubuchon says.

While Aubuchon is known for the million-dollar homes he builds, he also builds more affordable homes he brands as The Sterling Collection and cost from $350,000 to $800,000.

In addition to the real estate brokerage firm, Aubuchon also renovates existing homes, he has an interior-design firm called Evaluations by Aubuchon, a property management company called Miloff Aubuchon Property Management and a home-rental division. He recently launched a commercial real estate arm, counting on the fact that commercial real estate usually follows residential recoveries by about two years.

“It was our diversity that sustained us through the downturn,” says Aubuchon. “I believe diversification is the key to success.”

At this point, Aubuchon says he has no current political ambition. He says he's focused on growing his company and spending time with his family.

But his partner Miloff says he's not ruling out Aubuchon running again. “Someday he'll probably jump back in because it's in his blood,” Miloff says.