We were lucky to catch up with Jackson Zeitlin recently and have shared our conversation below.
Jackson, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. The first dollar your business earns is always special and we’d love to hear how your brand made its first dollar of revenue.
I am really proud of how I scored my first big commercial real estate client. I had been in residential real estate for about 4 years and then started to transition over to commercial brokerage. My first deals were all pretty small, office and retail leases of a few hundred square feet from referral business. This was a great way to get my toes wet, but I knew there was a better way to build my business.
So I started thinking about what kind of businesses I could connect with and the places I wanted in my neighborhood. I started calling folks from places I had been before, restaurants in New York, bars in Austin, hotels in London, and told them about my personal experiences with their brand and pitched why I thought they would be a good fit in Nashville. I really tried to make it a connection to their concept and highlight why they were succesful already as opposed to trying to bring them a deal and I think that differentiated my from my competition and got me some great clients along the way.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
For those who don’t know me, my name is Jackson Zeitlin. My official is as a Broker with Zeitlin Sotheby’s International Realty. I think this would broadly constitute my “day job.” As a broker, my main role is to help my clients analyze and make decisions around space needs for their respective businesses. This mainly involves site selection for retail and hospitality concepts as the move within Nashville, but also includes responsibilities like reviewing financial modeling and architectural plans to verify feasibility.
Though I very much love my work, I consider myself lucky to be in this role because it was never my goal to get into real estate. Coming out of college, where I studied international relations, I got a job working for Marriott in Dubai, doing brand marketing for Renaissance Hotels as they opened a flagship property in the Middle East. I loved the creative work I did with the company and really enjoyed being in hospitality, but quickly realized Dubai was not the place for me. After about a year and a half there, I returned home and saw what Nashville was turning into after having been named America’s “it” city.
My family has been involved in residential real estate for generations here in Nashville, but I never considered it for myself. Seeing the opportunities that were popping up, I decided to give it a shot and entered into the residential market here. I really enjoyed helping friends and family make such important decisions in their family and future planning, but just wasn’t excited with that as a long term career prospect, so I decided to start shifting my efforts over to commercial brokerage.
At the same time, when real estate pretty much shut down at the beginning of the pandemic, I got back into brand development work and start drafting ideas for cool and unique hospitality brands that I could try to bring to life in this new leg of my career.
Now, fully into the world of hospitality development. I am proud to have some of the coolest clients in the city and proud to be involved as an owner of some very fun projects that we’ll be opening in the coming months.
Does your business have multiple or supplementary revenue streams (like a ATM machine at a barbershop, etc)?
My business has multiple streams of income. As a real estate broker, I am a 1099 “self employed” person, who is exclusively contracted with Zeitlin Sotheby’s International Realty. This is where my primary source of income comes from, mainly, commissions on brokerage transactions including selling and leasing real estate. I make additional income through investment properties that are turned over and leased to other tenants
Can you open up about how you funded your business?
Part of my business is in real estate investment, actually owning the properties that others will end up filling, whether in residential or commercial. The story of getting the funds for my first commercial property is actually a really neat series of events.
When I left Dubai after working for Marriott, I really needed a break to reset. So, I took all my savings at the time and bought an 80’s era Scottish Land Rover Defender that was in the UK at the time. This cost me in the neighborhood of about $15,000. For a month later, my girlfriend and I drove it around and lived in a blow up mattress out of the back, sleeping in the Scottish rain and cold for way too long. After the month was up, I shipped it back to the U.S. and ended up selling it for about $30,000.
I used the money from the sale of the Defender as a down payment on my first house. It was a great starter house, cute but not in the best neighborhood, but it was something I could afford and was comfortable with. I lived there with 2-3 roommates for 2+ years so most of my mortgage was paid and I didn’t have to worry about making payments. Overtime, my girlfriend and I ended up buying another place together and moved out of my home, but keeping it as a rental.
Months later, a property came up for sale in a neighborhood that I loved and really wanted to invest in. This property had commercial zoning and was a lucky strike. I was able to find a buyer for my first home and sold it immediately with the purpose of using the funds from that sale to finance the new property. By the time I sold my first house, I had turned a $15,000 car into over $200,000 in equity in a home that ended up being my down payment for my first commercial investment.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://www.jaze-digital.com
- Instagram: @jackson.zeitlin
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacksonzeitlin/
Image Credits
Jackson Zeitlin