Today’s RealTrending features Rod Watson and Rob Hite, both former professional basketball players and founders of the sports and entertainment real estate firm Aston Rose, powered by SIDE. They talk about how athletics prepared them for real estate, the expansion of their real estate firm and the systematic and highly focused way they go about serving customers.
The team specializes in working with celebrities, athletes, and high-net-worth individuals in Florida and California. Both Lisa Leslie, WNBA star and Tomi Rose, a former professional cheerleader, make up the foursome of a powerhouse real estate company.
Here is a small preview of today’s interview with Rod and Rob. The transcript below has been lightly edited for length and clarity:
Tracey Velt: Obviously when serving this niche, you guys have an advantage being professional athletes. But I still think it takes a lot of understanding to know how to reach these people, how they can find you. What do you see as the biggest challenges that you come across just every day serving the high end niche in this sports world?
Rod Watson: Yeah, that’s another great question. I think not just in the sports world, but I think any agent that’s producing at a high level, it’s maintaining the consistency of closings, transactions and developing relationships, nurturing relationships. Having that steady flow and balance of ongoing clients. And then when you talk about sports and entertainment, it’s getting in front of these individuals, and developing new relationships can be challenging. What we found, over our time of working, operating in this space is the relationships is what’s key. People that know you trust you and know that we’re competent, know that we have a proven track record of being successful in this space. It does create a somewhat of an unfair, competitive advantage for us, because if you’re starting out cold or from scratch, you got to build that.
And you know, Rob’s days on the basketball court as an NBA player, my days on the basketball court playing overseas or both of us playing in college, we built 20-plus-year relationships. People know us, they trust us, they like us. And so that does help, but it still is challenging oftentimes because these individuals are also, they’re busy, they’re on the go a lot, they’re on the move.
And when they’re ready to do something, they’re ready to do it right then. So you have to really be top of mind, you have to really be in the places where they are. And that’s something that we felt by creating this company gives us that unfair competitive advantage, because we can gain access to a lot of those places that the general public can’t, to get in front of these individuals.
RealTrending features the brightest minds in real estate. Twice a month, brokerage leaders, top agents, team leaders, and industry experts share their success secrets, trends, and lessons learned navigating this ever-changing industry. Hosted by Tracey Velt and produced by Elissa Branch.
