LA’s the Place recently chatted with “Million Dollar Listing”’s Josh Altman, a long-time real estate agent to the stars. Known for his exclusive clientele, which include some of the biggest names in entertainment, athletics and business, Altman started in real estate when he and his brother consecutively flipped 8 homes with a perfect record in 2002.
His skill and passion for real estate led Altman to own and run his own mortgage company, eventually becoming one of the top earning real estate agents with the famous luxury firm Hilton & Hyland Real Estate. He shares the secrets of his success with LA’s The Place.
LA’s The Place: Good morning and thanks for speaking with me and LA’s the Place Magazine.
Josh Altman: Absolutely, thanks for having me on.
LATP: First of all, congratulations on becoming one of the stars of last season’s Million Dollar Listing, which has turned into an enormous hit on Bravo. For those who haven’t seen Million Dollar Listing, how would you describe what you do?
JA: So, they follow around three high-end realtors and kind of follow the high-end real estate market as well as, obviously, our personal lives in Los Angeles. There’s one realtor in Malibu and there’s two of us in the Beverly Hills area. It’s just giving the audience the day to day of what it takes to get these deals done
Even on our show there’s only so much that you see; a deal is never easy, especially these days with the economy the way that it is you really have to think outside the box when it comes to selling homes. You’ve got to be creative, you’ve got to be 24/7, you’ve got to hustle. It’s not what it used to be, as far as selling homes. So they really get into our lives and see the day to day of what goes into closing these enormous deals. Everyone around the world loves looking at nice houses because everybody likes to dream, and that’s something you get to do through our show. You get access to homes that, you know, most people just won’t get access to and wouldn’t ever walk through. I mean, I wouldn’t either if I wasn’t a real estate agent, so it’s nice for people to be able to see all that.
LATP: Speaking of the difficulties in working in this market, I hear that you’re projecting a 100 million for 2012 and have already gotten almost a quarter of the way there, including the biggest sale of a condo in Santa Monica, ever, at 10.5 million dollars. That’s amazing at a time when so many others don’t seem to know what to do with this housing market; what are you doing that they aren’t?
JA: So obviously, living in Beverly Hills and dealing with this type of money is going to put me in a different category from somebody selling homes in, say, Alabama. At the same time, everything is exactly the same except for prices, which are obviously different. As far as personal goals, we sold over 60 million last year, 100 is our goal this year. That (Santa Monica) sale was an incredible sale, it was one of the most beautiful apartments I’ve ever seen. It was about 8,000 square feet with an 8,000 square foot rooftop deck, which is unheard of, a 360 degree view of not just the mountains but also the Hollywood hills. It was really just spectacular. As far as what I’m doing… I love what I do, so for me it’s not work. This is all fun for me and I have a great time doing it, I love real estate and being a part of fulfilling people’s dreams. Owning a home is part of the American Dream and I get to be part of that ultimate experience with them. I work hard, I love what I do, I’m 24/7 and I’m very hard on myself in order to be an extremely hard worker. All of that comes into play.
I specialize in dealing with overseas money from Saudi Arabia, China, Russia, which in this economy right now, those are the people coming in and dropping some major cash on the housing market. So that’s something we’ve specialized our business into when dealing with high-end houses. The company that I work for is affiliated with Christie’s Great Estates; typically when you market a house you want to market it locally, but for these high end, 10, 20, even 50 million dollar houses, you have to market globally. Chances are that the person coming in to spend 40 million dollars on a house is either one of 20 people in the this country or overseas money. That’s kind of become our niche in this market, but there are always deals out there.
For me, the way I look at is that America is on sale. Some people have to sell and if you’re in a buyer’s position, it’s an amazing time buy. There’s a lot of great properties for great prices, and if you can hold on to it for five years you’re going to make a profit on it. It’s just a matter of whether you can hold onto it or not. It’s another option besides the stock market, and I think a lot of people right now prefer the housing market to the stock market as a place to park your money.
LATP: Speaking to what you just said, you definitely do have a reputation for being someone who’s, as you said, constantly going, 24/7 and is always available to clients and new business. To me, that speaks of someone who really enjoys what he does. Is that accurate? What’s your favorite aspect of being a real estate agent?
JA: Easily, my single favorite thing is selling a home or representing a buyer and seeing the smile on their face when people get the home of their dreams. That’s priceless, that’s the payoff every time. Commission checks are great and all, but at the end of the day not only do you get to be part of the experience, but because you’re a part of it you become friends for life with these people. You know, I’m completely hooked up in the Los Angeles area, my connections are second to none. The reason is that the most important people in your phone are your family members and your real estate agent. It’s really funny how that works, but just being a part of that whole process you get to meet people you would never normally meet and you get to become lifelong friends with them. That’s the most rewarding part of real estate for me.
LATP: I can see why. On a slightly different note; I read that you graduated from Syracuse and were a kicker on the football team there. How does the world of competitive sports compare to the world of high-end real estate?
JA: Actually, that’s a great question which I’ve never gotten before, so good for you for asking it! I was a place kicker which can be the king of the hill in one second or you can be the dope. It’s a tough position and because of that you learn to have ice water in your veins. You can’t get nervous, you can’t break down in situations. The way that it applies to real estate is that you know there’s going be a lot of situations where you’re negotiating and you can’t back down and you gotta be strong. There’s going to be high pressure situations and we’re not talking about a couple of bucks here, we’re talking about people’s biggest investments in their lives. Millions and millions of dollars. You’ve got to be confident, got to know what you’re doing, you got to stand strong for what you believe the house is worth. And be ready to walk away if you’re not getting the price. That’s how I use it. It’s always about the pressure as a kicker, which I’m sure you saw this weekend in the football game.
LATP: Yeah, that’s for sure. So as well as being a real estate agent, you also do speaking engagements on everything from finance to interior design. That last one catches my attention, I understand you learned interior designing from your mother. I’m curious, what would you describe as your interior design aesthetic?
Josh: The speaking engagements are something that I do for fun to give back. I get a ton of emails from the TV show asking how I got to where I am, how do you become successful in real estate, how do you break into the high end market… All the aspects that I talk about come into play, which is everything from finance to interior design. A lot of times when I sell a house it’ll be an empty house that people may not live in anymore and it’s super important, which a lot of agents don’t realize, to make sure that house looks like a home when people walk through. The majority of people walking through a house are not able to see what the house looks like with furniture in it unless they have some kind of a design background or are used to seeing houses like that.
When it comes to staging a house, which is extremely important in helping to sell the house, you’ve got to do it the correct way to get those people who are interested and then turn that into sales. You know the whole design aspect, the whole flipping homes aspect which I absolutely love, I do that as a hobby. I was the guy at Home Depot who used to like playing with the tools just for the fun of it. I get a kick out of that. Even before I was in the business, I’d get a kick out of just driving around looking at homes. I love going to swap meets and finding different furniture, unique stuff. So all that has to come into play with how I do my business. I do love lecturing and I do that all around the country. If more people knew that and called me or checked out my website, I’d be more than happy to come to their company or speak at their conferences or anything like that.
LATP: I read that you’re involved in a couple of charities; would you mind telling me a little about them?
JA: Sure. We’re actually doing an event Saturday night for Habitat for Humanity, which helps build homes for people who need help and can’t afford houses. So that’s something that’s obviously close to me because I see it every day; I’m dealing with these larger homes, and by the way I do sell other homes as well, it doesn’t have to be a 10 million dollar house. I just closed an 800,000 dollar condo yesterday so I also deal with that. But it’s nice to give back and help out as much as I personally can. We’re doing a charity event at one of our listings where we’re going to try to raise as much money as possible to give to Habitat for Humanity, so that’s an important one. Along with other charities that I do deal with, that’s the one that has to do with real estate.
LATP: Fantastic. Well, I think that just about wraps it up as far as my questions. Is there anything you’d like to address or anything you’d like to say to your fans who might be reading this article?
JA: I guess if they want to check out my website, www.thealtmanbrothers.com. Or follow me on Twitter at #TheJoshAltman.
LATP: Well, thank you very much for your time.
JA: Thanks so much, it was a pleasure talking to you.
By Ryan Castle
