Ep. 19 Sheva Hosseinzadeh - Boss Lady of Long Beach

Embark on a transformative journey with Sheva Hosseinzadeh, who left the corporate world for the unpredictable yet rewarding realm of commercial real estate. 

As the principal of Coldwell Banker Commercial Blair in California, she shares her rise to leadership and the invigorating challenges that came with it. If you're looking to discover what it takes to climb the ranks and become a Certified Commercial Investment Member (CCIM), prepare to have your aspirations ignited. Sheva's narrative is a beacon for those seeking personal growth and professional evolution, showcasing how embracing continuous learning and authentic leadership can lead to motivating and propelling a team to success.

Our conversation takes a turn into the tactical, as we dissect the strategies that foster a nurturing business environment where celebrating wins, both big and small, is part of the culture. Find out how they're expanding their reach through innovative approaches such as YouTube marketing and the strategic recruitment of seasoned agents. Learn her philosophy on keeping a team motivated and navigating the choppy waters of challenging deals with optimism.

We wrap up with an exploration of the delicate balance between the grind and the grandeur of life, emphasizing how travel opens doors to new perspectives and fuels creativity. Plus, we dive into the real estate trends that shaped 2023, including the Southern California housing crisis, and look ahead to the potential of 2024 with a mix of traditional outreach and creative financing solutions. 

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Welcome to Heather Ewing the CRE rundown this afternoon. I am happy to have a wonderful guest for you. Her name is Shiva Joseenzada and she is the principal of Coldwell Banker Commercial Blair in beautiful California. Welcome, shiva. Thank you, heather, appreciate you having me. I am so glad that this ended up working out. We met in Chicago at the CCIM chapter officer training this past summer and it was just so nice to meet you. That is one of the aspects that I really love about CCIM If you could share with us how you got into CCIM and also, in general, share more about what you do and how you got into brokerage.

Speaker 2: 0:57

Yeah, absolutely. 2012 decided to leave corporate America, had a job with Subway corporate as a business consultant and just got tired of the commute back to downtown LA every single day. My father had been in real estate his entire life and it was something that I had always been interested in and wanted to get involved with. But I graduated college in 2008 when the market crashed, so it was just the worst time to get involved then and decided that school took me in other directions. But in 2012 I started noticing that the market was coming back and I thought it was the perfect time to leave my corporate role and start studying for my real estate license. So while I was doing that, I was looking for some sort of internship or training program that would be available, that I could learn the ins and outs about real estate while I was studying to get my license. And that's where I came across this Craigslist posting about a job opportunity here at Coldwell Banker Commercial Blair and I met Becky Blair, who was, at the time, the owner of our company, learned about commercial, which wasn't even on my radar at the time.

Speaker 2: 2:04

I was just considering just getting my license and doing residential, but, being that I had a degree in business finance from Cal State, long Beach. It just was a natural fit to get in the commercial industry and Becky became my mentor, so I joined her team once I was licensed in 2012, and I've been here ever since, and she herself was a CCIM. So she advocated for me to do to do the classes and get certified myself, and I did it a lot slower than she did, just because of the time frame and the financial commitment and the traveling. At the time there wasn't a whole lot of opportunities in taking courses locally, so we had to go to Chicago or other areas, but now they've changed that. So I'm encouraging all the agents of my team because they're offering four classes in Southern California this year, which saves on the travel expense. So it makes sense and I'm so became CCIM certified, I believe at the end of 2022, and I just was really excited to get that upper level of education and, at the same time, build my network.

Speaker 2: 3:09

Now I've met you and so many other amazing people already through the organization and this year just joined the CCIM SoCal chapter board of directors. So I'm now looking forward to serving and getting more involved with the group. So that's how I started and I've been doing this now. For going on 12 years I've been with the same firm and now Becky, my mentor and partner at the time, has retired and took over as a principal with two other agents here in our office in January of last year and so now playing the double role as an agent, broker slash, also principal. But I personally specialize in retail and office in the Long Beach area and surrounding territories, but my team does anything commercial related. We've got a multifamily division, industrial division, retail division, investment sales as well, as we do quite a bit of leasing.

Speaker 1: 4:09

That's perfect. It's full service. So congratulations again on becoming principal last year. That's a huge accomplishment. Yeah, you know it's one of those. Anything that takes you to that position, we definitely know there's been a lot of hard work, a lot of hours, a lot of deals, a lot of connecting, networking and also growth. I don't know about you, but I think one of the things I've noticed most about myself personally in commercial real estate for the past about 10 years is I frequently will say it's one of the best self development programs you can ever put yourself into, because you learn so much and you evolve so much and there is a big difference between agent, broker or principal and so many different little peculiarities, but they all make a big difference. What would you say are two or three things that really helped you to transition then to becoming a principal?

Speaker 2: 5:15

Yeah, and just to piggyback off of your point, growing and I'm there's never a point in this career where you're not learning or you're not growing. And so I've actually signed up for leadership programs because this is a new role and in a way, you know, I was equal with many of the agents here in my office and now, transitioning into being an owner, you have this other level of liability and other, you know, trying to still keep the team motivated. But you know, transitioning from being that equal role to now kind of in as a boss role is challenging, and so I've recently just started taking leadership classes and trying to learn how do I keep my team motivated, how can I communicate differently. In fact, I just took a communication course on Friday to learn any new tricks or traits or things, even one thing that can help me be a better communicator. And so you know, one thing that the leadership training is teaching me is that there's something called a lid, a leadership lid, and you have to rate yourself on certain characteristics and then you take the average of those characteristics to tell you what your lid is, and if you're a seven, then your team will, you know, be out of seven. The goal is obviously to get to a 10. So it's still that part, you know, putting in the effort, putting in the time.

Speaker 2: 6:39

I'm also spending 50% of my time focusing on what does the company need, implementing team building. We've been really celebrating agents as they are getting bigger listings or, you know, even something as simple as a birthday, just really letting them know that you know we care and we're not just a traditional brokerage where you just come in and do deals. We really act as if we're a family here and we all support each other, and so one thing we're recently doing is expanding on a YouTube channel, which is something that we see other brokerage firms doing, and it's truly benefiting their business and getting them to be able to market themselves more effectively and efficiently. People are watching videos now. That's where you know where we're going. So we just brought on a firm, a marketing firm, that is going to be helping us launch that and creating videos for us that we can use to promote ourselves.

Speaker 2: 7:36

So half my time is spent doing those things that you know involve the business, and then the other half is still spent on my personal transactions, because you're still always, even as a principal, always still focused on your own business and, of course, we're all in this business because we like what we do and I enjoy the transactions. I'm still out there showing, you know, 200 square foot space if my that's the need my client has, and have an 11 and a half million dollar listing that we just listed on the market this week. So we're still out there and I'm still out there doing the deals as well, which I think also helps motivate the team because they see me working just as hard.

Speaker 1: 8:17

Well, definitely, if you think about it too, you have the tangible real life experience, so it's easy to answer different questions. You understand the market intimately and you've been in Long Beach right for quite some time and you graduated from college there, which is kind of neat, you know. It's a parallel to me in the Madison area, but just a little different climate. Yeah, but I think too that's where that market knowledge is so important and I think that's too what has helped, like you and myself, really gain the respect and credibility in the industry, because it's all of those hours, all of those deals, understanding the market intimately and I think too, having been in an area, you remember what it was like 20, 30, 40 years ago versus now, and so it really does help to fill in the gaps of some of those little nuances that you still just don't get with the demographics, psychographics.

Speaker 2: 9:19

Yeah, I was born and raised in Long Beach and I work here in downtown. I live by the park in El Dorado, so I actually live and work in two opposite parts of the city but we've got the whole city basically in our you know, in our backyard and then that's why it was so easy for us to really grow the business here. But we're really now focused on expanding our footprint. I'm looking to hire agents. There's a huge market share just in Orange County, which is right next door to us I mean, we're part of where, the last city in LA County and there's just so much business in other parts of the county as well that we're just now finally when bringing on enough agents to be able to handle the volume in the business. Because you know, we're small firms so we're all really busy now and taking on new deals is kind of straining us. So we're bringing on new agents that we can then kind of pass on some of these leads to and expand our footprint.

Speaker 1: 10:13

Well, that's terrific. So how can I help you with that? Give our, give our guests, maybe a few things that you're looking for, and at the end of the podcast I'll include, of course, your telephone and email and then that way, if someone might be a fit, they can reach out and learn more.

Speaker 2: 10:30

Yeah, we're definitely hiring. That's actually our biggest goal this year is getting agents. They're looking for three to five, ideally somebody with a book of business, someone experienced in the business for minimum of three years or longer. But we do have a very extensive training programing. That that's how I got started. I worked off that training program and have just built my business over the past 12 years, and so we do take people that don't have any experience. As long as they're licensed and they're motivated, have sales experience and want to learn, then you know we're happy to talk with them to and put them through the same training program that I went through.

Speaker 2: 11:08

But we do want people that are local. Obviously, if you're looking to, if you already live around Long Beach or are looking to move around Long Beach, then that's who we want. We just recently interviewed somebody in kind of the downtown LA area and though we liked him, even though you think LA and us we're so close but with traffic in, you know where we live, you know it's an hour to an hour and a half drive, and so you know we don't really think that that's feasible for somebody Right? So that kind of commute every day Plus you know we're always on the road showing our property, so we'd like somebody that is more centralized to where we're located.

Speaker 1: 11:48

Definitely that makes complete sense, and you know so much of being an agent is related to mindset right. As you know, deals can go every which way, and what are a tip or two that you would suggest of something that's been really helpful for you, or maybe how that shifted over the years to if you use different tools or if you have one or two that are kind of like your trustee too?

Speaker 2: 12:16

Yeah, you know these deals are hard and it does get to you sometimes, especially when a big deal falls apart. I've learned over the years to just not take things so seriously as I used to when I first started, but just to be my a couple of tools for me that have made me successful. Number one is just staying organized. It, you know, have a system. If it's a CRM system, I'm old school, I use a Franklin Covey, I write everything down, but that's what works for me. You know, even younger generation the me is everything goes into their phone and that's okay, because whatever system benefits you just stay organized, Because once you start getting busy, you get a lot of contacts, a lot of calls, a lot of phone numbers and you just want to make sure you know where everything is.

Speaker 2: 13:03

I also make a to-do list every day. It does not matter for me if the market is really good or really bad. I have my same list of things I have to do every day and I just go through them one at a time and I checkmark what I finished and the things that I don't finish goes on to my calendar next day and usually goes on to the top, so that I make sure that I still make time to get to those. And just you know, work ethically and honestly. I mean this business.

Speaker 2: 13:31

A lot of it is repeat customers, referrals, and if you are really chasing the commission, if all you care about is that dollar amount the clients know it they may not want to work with you again. I never even know half the time how much I'm making on a deal. I treat every deal smaller, big, as if it's the same amount of money and I just try to do the best that I can for my clients and they recognize that. They know that they can trust me and that's why they come back. So you know, don't chase the dollars. If you do the right thing, the dollars will come to you.

Speaker 1: 14:06

And I agree completely. I think it's one of those where people can sense right, whether you're verbally saying it or otherwise, people can sense when you're genuinely there to help, versus kind of skimming over things to quick get to a finish line or something like that. So I think that's such an important point and, you know, piggybacking off of that of relationships are everything, everything. And if you're not a good communicator and I think too if you're not you know really intentional about how do you help them. I mean, there's a lot of details in each deal, as we know is very unique and different, and I think it's listening closely so that you can ensure you've dotted the eyes, crossed the T's and are really delivering on a platter that the perfect deal for them.

Speaker 2: 14:58

So and you know I made mistakes, heather, in the past and as long as you know and I've admitted to them I've told my clients you don't know everything and obviously this is a business in which you just grow from doing and you learn from those mistakes. And you know, one time I had to tell a client with a $6 million listing that we had on the market we had an escrow that I made a mistake on something. And you know what she said hey, I just appreciate you acknowledging that. And she didn't fault me for it and said hey, let's just work through it. At least you know you're not sitting there blaming somebody else for the error that you made. And we ended up closing the deal. So you know it's just. Again, it goes back to honesty and working at the meeting if you make a mistake, and just you know figuring out a way to figure out a way to fix it.

Speaker 1: 15:43

Right, which I mean our word, is our brand right, and I think sometimes people don't really consider that when they are choosing or choosing not to have those conversations. So, yeah, that doesn't surprise me, knowing you. So that's great. You know, I think, especially in the industry there's there's so many different stereotypes, like any other, right, but I think commercial especially. You hear some water, you hear some wild stories, so you know you get a bad reputation in this business.

Speaker 2: 16:14

It does not ever leave you. So you know, for the next 15, 20, 30 years, however long you decide to do this, you're going to have that reputation follow you.

Speaker 1: 16:23

So right, it's important to do the right thing right. Jumping back in when you were talking about YouTube. So the great thing with that. I'm excited to see what you do. I know it'll be great and if you think about it, it's a large search engine, right? I mean, the way I think of it is it's like the MLS, just a separate entity and it's free, right At some point. I'm wondering when Facebook, insta, youtube, all these different you know pieces are going to start having a high stakes fee because of the audience that you're able to connect with?

Speaker 2: 17:08

Yeah, I think that you know there's probably be a fee, but maybe not a lot, because they still want people to create the content which is bringing the people the views, and then, therefore, they can go back and charge what they charge to the advertisers that are advertising with them.

Speaker 2: 17:23

But we just, at least in our market, our competitors that have created YouTube channels and are doing that now actively are building huge subscriptions and are actively getting deals from it, and one of our competitors but also we collaborate quite a bit on our businesses as well as we do co-listings together quite often has a YouTube channel and he's got 10,000 people that have subscribed to it and are watching his videos constantly and what he's bringing to is just content about information about the industry, and that's what people want to know, and nowadays, if they want to learn something, that's where they go is YouTube and they watch videos because people don't have the time or they don't want to invest the time in reading things anymore, so they want to watch a quick video that can teach them something that they didn't know before about the real estate industry, whether it's.

Speaker 2: 18:15

You know, how do you grow from, let's say, a small to unit multifamily property to a 10 unit multifamily? 10 unit multifamily property. How do you scale that? You know I've had he does videos, or he's, you know, has told us about videos where he just brings on guest speakers that are potentially developers and they talk about what they look for in the market, and so all of that is information and the information is drawing people and then when they have a need, they're thinking of you to put that need Yep.

Speaker 1: 18:48

No, it makes perfect sense. And I know I've leased different properties with different videos too, from other states, so you know I'm a firm believer that it does work.

Speaker 2: 19:01

But yeah, now we're incorporating videos in just any time we get a listing. We've found a really good videographer here in our area and he comes out and he does these wonderful drone videos, shots of the properties us talking about the property, interiors and exteriors, and he edits everything together and we just put a QR code on all of our flyers and all of our marketing so whenever anybody inquires about the property, they can just click on the QR code and be directed to the video. And now they're getting you know first-hand kind of walkthrough of the property, in addition to having the marketing materials that might have. You know information about the property, income, you know expenses and other stuff. But so that's, that's where our future is and we're just trying to. I feel we're a little bit behind because other are already doing this, but it's never too late to start. Oh, definitely.

Speaker 1: 19:55

And sometimes you know what I mean. Letting the initial ones work, some of the kinks out, yeah, Never. Never hurts either, so you know. As far as the market itself, what are you noticing in the Long Beach area?

Speaker 2: 20:10

You know we're still we, we are in Southern California, so we have a major housing crisis here. Even though people are leaving California because of the high cost, there are still quite a bit of people moving here because of the you know benefits of the weather and and our just way of living, and so we're having to build quite a bit of housing just to fulfill the demand. Rents are high, assets are high, I mean, the price to purchase is high. So you know, but I could say that you know it's probably in a lot of places right now and the US things are just going up. Inflation is very expensive.

Speaker 2: 20:48

Last year was a tough year, 2023. The market just was kind of at a standstill because of the interest rates. Buyers were coming in with these low offer. Sellers Still were wanting 22, 22 values. We were having a very difficult time bridging the gap and so we just saw a lot of property sitting on the market. I personally pivoted my business more into leasing because, you know, leasing was still very active. We were still doing, you know, lease transactions. I was, you know, maybe leasing smaller spaces, like a thousand, 2,000 square foot spaces, but they all added up and 50% of my income last last year just came from from doing the leasing. So I know others brokers in the industry that don't do leases. A lot of them were, you know, kind of starving last year because of where the market was now very optimistic about 2024. So far, we started a little slow in January of this year but things have significantly picked up. We're getting calls left and right. Buildings that have been sitting for a while. We're all of a sudden getting activity on.

Speaker 2: 21:51

So I think everybody was waiting in 2023 to see what was going to happen. This looming recession. Is it actually coming? Are we going to, you know, be there. And it didn't happen. I mean, if it did, it wasn't significant and I think people are just tired of waiting. Now they're back to business as usual. Rates are supposed to come down this year. So far it hasn't happened, but I know that it's going to happen, likely in the second quarter and throughout the rest of the year, and for sure by the end of the year we're going to see rates coming down and that's just going to increase activity levels. So I'm feeling really good about 2024. And I know just from what we have in our pipeline we're going to have a good year and it's just about. You know, sometimes last year we worked harder, I mean we did. When the market goes down, you just have to put in more hours and you know, just work harder. It still doesn't. You know, there's still business, you just have to go out this year.

Speaker 2: 22:45

We still think we're going to work hard, but I think that'll be a little bit easier to put the sale transactions together, like it was in 2022.

Speaker 1: 22:53

I agree, you know, and to your point, you step up to the plate. So sometimes you know you do whatever it takes and that's where, to your point, the outreach. You know I do a fair amount of cold calling still and different things like that too, because it's amazing what you can learn through a phone call or in person through canvassing. So those, those have both been kind of mainstays throughout my entire career and I don't see that changing. You know, do what works for you and, to your point, sometimes there's going to be the easy deals and the others you're really going to work for every cent. Within it was some of these different due diligence. But did you see more of like owner financing, things like that also?

Speaker 2: 23:40

last year we had to get creative. But surprisingly we found quite a bit of owners that didn't want to do owner financing because they really wanted to exchange. We had a, you know, large client base that actually really wanted to move out of California and they owned this was on the multifamily side. They owned 19 properties and they decided to do a portfolio sale and list them all at the same time. So my multifamily team was handling the transaction and they're just, they're moving the money to Utah and Texas currently and they're buying triple net assets where they don't really in absolute triple net, where they don't have to, you know, do anything with the building outside of check, and actually by doing that they've so far increased their net income by 58% from what it's significant.

Speaker 1: 24:32

It's a significant yeah, and it's less headache, less work for them.

Speaker 2: 24:37

So seeing that happening. But we're having a lot of clients want to do exchanges and because of that that they can't do seller financing. They just have loans, and so that also prevents them, depending on the size of the loan, whether or not they can carry back, because they still have to pay off the first and if they get a certain amount of money down, then it's just maybe going to pay off the lender and then there's nothing left over for them. So we're getting creative where we can, and that's definitely a question Anytime we go on a listing appointment. Now, would you consider carrying back? Because with where rates are now, if you are, then there's just a lot more opportunity and ways that we can put transactions together.

Speaker 1: 25:15

Yeah, totally so, while we have a great forecast for 2024, which I love to wrap things up, shiva, this is the big question, the pinnacle one, of what, would you say, living fully means for you.

Speaker 2: 25:31

It's a balance. For me, work is not everything. I love what I do. I think that there's just been always this mentality that who you are is based off of your career, and I think we got lost in living during that process. So I truly turn off on the weekends. If clients call me, they can wait till Monday.

Speaker 2: 25:55

It's really important that I spend my time with my family and do the things that I enjoy to do, like exercising and hiking and going on walks and things that just calm my mind. So I just think work hard because that's life. We are here to work and if we're going to do it, let's put everything we have into it. But enjoy your family, because at the end of the day, when things come to an end for us, we don't sit there and, thank God, I wish I would have worked an extra hour.

Speaker 2: 26:26

We always think about the extra time we could have spent with our loved ones and culturally we are a big on family, being that I'm Persian, so we really do value my family time and time with my husband. So I think life is about that. And take your time off, go on your vacations. Your deals will be there when you get back. See the world that's. The best thing that we have for us is to go and travel and experience other parts of this beautiful world that we live in and other cultures, and just have that balance.

Speaker 1: 27:01

Well, that is perfectly said. So, on that note, shiva, thank you so much for joining me today and, like I said, I will post your contact information so as people, if they line up, they can definitely reach out to you for becoming an agent or to learn more or utilize your services.

Speaker 2: 27:22

So, thank you so much. Appreciate it.

Speaker 1: 27:24

Thank you for your time Bye, bye.