Aaron Kirman – President of Aaroe Estates

I believe in general hard work, persistence, positivity, being strategic, and being ahead of the curve.

Aaron Kirman, President of Aaroe Estates at John Aaroe Group, is one of the leading real estate agents in the USA and has repeatedly been named Top Agent in Los Angeles, named #10 in the country by the Wall Street Journal. Kirman has an extensive client base featuring those who seek the luxury lifestyle including heads of industry, celebrities, royalty, major lending institutions and foreign investors.

As a prominent figure in the luxury real estate market, Aaron has received international acclaim from the architectural and estate communities and represents some of the most exclusive residences across the globe including: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Ennis House, Richard Neutras Kaufmann Residence, Frank Gehry’s Schnabel House, Lions Gate by Paul Williams and the only Oscar Niemeyer in North America. Aaron attributes his success to his vast marketing and advertising strategies, partners, market knowledge, exclusive contact base and true love of luxury sales.

He is sought by many developers to sell multi-unit projects including a private island in the Pacific, Turks and Caicos, and the W Hotels. Many developers, architects and designers contact Aaron prior to construction and completion of their projects to take advantage of his long track record of success to insure the design, architecture and plan would appeal to the right high end buyers. Aaron is often featured in various media outlets including CNBC, The New York Times, CNN, The Los Angeles Times, Variety, London Times, E! Entertainment and CBS. Media sources often call for information and quotes as he is a go to source for current real estate insight.
Aaron Kirman, President of Aaroe Estates at John Aaroe Group

How did you become a real estate entrepreneur?

I became a real estate entrepreneur at a young age. It was something that I always knew I wanted to do. I always had a passion for houses, architecture, people, and I knew that because I had certain disabilities that I needed to be my own boss. From a very young age, it was always my dream job.

What does your typical day look like and how do you make it productive or stay productive?

Days are incredibly busy. The interesting thing about what I do is that there is no day that is the same, everyday is so different from start to finish. We start our day with meeting the sellers and buyers of mega luxury houses and try to figure out how to successfully sell those luxury houses. I do try to take some time for myself every morning. I go to the gym, meditate, and figure out how I want the day to be so I can go ahead and get that executed.

With such a complicated job, how do you bring ideas to life? How to you make things come to fruition?

Bringing ideas to fruition takes a great deal of energy and time. I have an incredible team of people that help me bring those ideas to fruition. As everyone says, Rome was not built in a night or in a day. Often times it takes patience and understanding. However, with the right team and the right group of people, it is certainly possible.

What is one trend in this industry that excites you?

Trends change every single day, and that’s what actually excites me. Because we need to be ahead of the curve, ahead of the trend and really ahead of what everyone else is doing so that we can calculate and calibrate it so that we are making the trends.

What is one habit of yours that makes you more productive as an entrepreneur?

I think one of the most important habits that I do is self-care. I do my best to take care of myself first and make sure that my personal needs are being met. And from there, it helps me to have expanding ideas on entrepreneurship and get that executed.

What is advice that you would give to your younger self as you move forward in your career?

The advice that I would give to my younger self is to not be so hard on yourself. To really accept both the successes and the failures, and to really enjoy the process along the way and not worry about the end result. Really focus on being present.

Tell us something that is true that almost no one agrees with you on.

More often than not, I have different a perspective than most people, so I could truly give you a laundry list of things. You know what is true that I think people realize? I don’t believe that I work as hard as I could. I actually think I could be working even harder, but this job is a very interesting mix of being social, being super intelligent, being ahead of the curve, and being strategic. To me that does not feel like work. People think I work extremely hard, but I believe I can always do more.

As an entrepreneur, what’s one thing that you do over and over that you recommend everyone else do?

I believe that it falls into self-care. I think that if you take care of yourself, your clients will take care of you and your staff will take care of you. If you are not happy, it is going to have a trickledown effect and no one around you will be happy. So it is really important to do the things that make you happy, whether that is going to a place of worship, working out, hiking, even going to a party. It could be anything.

Is there a strategy that has helped you really grow your business?

Yes, I used to run my business very haphazardly, in that if someone wanted to buy or sell a house, I’d be like that’s ‘great, let’s do it.’ I got a little bit bored with that business model, even though it certainly made me very successful. I decided that I wanted to run what was a bigger business, so I did everything necessary for a multi-million dollar corporation to exist, from structural organization to press to marketing to investing in growing markets of the future. All of those things really have led to where we are today.

What is one failure that you had as an entrepreneur that you learned a lot from that you were also able to overcome?

Yes, I’ve had a lot of failures in my life. I seriously still don’t know how to add or subtract, and I have suffered from dyslexia my entire life. But I truly believe that that everything I’ve learned today is a result of those failures. In this business, you win a lot and you lose a lot, and from every loss there have been lessons. You lose clients, you lose houses, you lose leads, you lose customers. From every one of those things, if you evaluate them honestly, then you can understand how to prevent the same situation from happening again. So every time something goes awry, my initial reaction is how can we make sure this does not happen again. I think that the biggest lesson is to never take it so seriously, because you can lose a house and lose 3 million dollars on commission and if you take that loss too seriously it can really bring you down. You almost have to view it as a game of chess, in which you win some and you lose some.

Is there any business idea or principle that you are willing to give away to your readers and people who are maybe hopefuls of the industry?

I have no secrets. In order to get to the level of success that certain people have, there is no one secret. I don’t believe in that. I believe in general hard work, persistence, positivity, being strategic, and being ahead of the curve. And I know that may sound cheesy, because that is what everyone is most likely saying. But there is no secret, if there was one then everyone would have it by now.

What’s the best $100.00 you recently spent? It can be professional or personal.

The best $100.00 I spent was to talk to my life coach who really gives me clarity and direction. When I leave I feel like I can really move forward. She makes things that seem complicated a lot more simple. Again, I believe in investing in myself.

Is there a piece of software or web service that helps you be productive, helps your team be productive, and how do you implement that?

Honestly, we have not had luck finding the magic service that is going to make our team or me productive. In fact, every week we talk about changing systems to try to figure out which one would work and still have not found our marriage system yet. But if I find it, I will let you know.

Is there one book that you would recommend to our community that they should read, and why?

I wish I could say that I read a lot of books, it is something that I would like to do. I am more of a reader of daily news and outlets. Understanding what is happening in the world often leads to ideas of growth and potential future trends that are really important for my business.

Do you have a favorite quote?

A quote I use quite often is, “the world wasn’t built yesterday,” because everything takes some time. And because I sell houses, and sometimes they are difficult to sell, I always say to my staff and my team, “ We make our own luck.” I put an emphasis on this everyday because as I said earlier, the real tools of my success are persistence, hard work, positivity, being strategic, and being ahead of the curve.

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