Meet Alexis Alegre of Smart LA Realty

Today we’d like to introduce you to Alexis Alegre.

Alexis, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
A little over four years ago at 21 years old, I was working three jobs in sales, hospitality, and catering while briefly pursuing a career in acting, when I was introduced to my broker and mentor today, Tiffany Gatto. I knew I was ready to dive into real estate full time and got my sales to license five months after meeting her. She’s been a huge inspiration and what I like to call my “business mom” in this journey: generous yet firm, extremely knowledgeable, and very caring.

When she began Smart LA Realty, my now-husband and I joined her to help the company get off the ground and haven’t looked back. Three+ years later, Smart LA Realty now represents the largest amount of private units for lease in Downtown LA, and my partner and now husband and I typically help around 100 people every year find a new home to lease, buy, or sell.

We were also happy to be recognized as part of the Top 1% of realtors with the highest sales/leasing volume for 2017, hopefully, a designation we can continue to keep in 2018 as well.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Absolutely not! There’s a saying that goes something like, “If you wanted to be successful at what we do, and I told you everything we did to get to where we are now, you would probably change your mind.” In any journey, there are always challenges, trials, and tribulations.

From helping to get the company off the ground, to doing Facetime tours of properties in the rain on a holiday, to trying to please the most difficult clients, to figuring out how to keep our business running while caring for our almost one year old baby boy, this business always presents new challenges as you get more experienced.

What we’ve come to appreciate about the real estate industry is that the adversities almost always present us with opportunities to improve, to learn more, and to serve our clients and ourselves better.

Struggles are inevitable. Success is determined by how quickly you can get back up after being knocked down, and how much you can learn from the experience, so you get knocked down less… or you at least have more cushion when you do.

Smart LA Realty – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Smart LA Realty is a boutique real estate firm based in Downtown Los Angeles headed by my broker and founder, Tiffany Gatto. It was founded in 2015 and has become one of the fastest growing boutique firms, with the entire team living, working, and playing in DTLA.

Although there are a plethora of real estate services the company provides, my partner/husband and I specialize in residential leasing, private units or entire apartment buildings, selling mostly condominiums and SFR homes, working with investors, and occasionally representing commercial tenants in finding retail or office space.

A large majority of our business comes from helping tenants lease a new home in DTLA, and for 2017, we were recognized as part of the Top 1% in of Sales/Leasing Volume in Southern California by RentSpree — this happened to be the year that I was pregnant for 9 of the 12 months with our son who was born January 8, 2018.

We closed 154 separate transactions (including all leases and sales) in 12 months, which has been our best year yet! We created a bit of a niche for ourselves in that many other realtors do not represent residential tenants. We know the DTLA neighborhood inside and out having lived here for over four years and being immersed in the leasing process full time (and a lot of overtime) every day.

Because of our experience we’re able to help people reduce their headaches of finding a new home by cutting their search down to the best properties that match their personal criteria. Many of our clients become our neighbors and friends, and we love helping to building our community with great people.

What is “success” or “successful” for you?
Besides making enough money to sustain our family and lifestyle, defining success seems to be a constantly evolving process as we set our eyes on new horizons.

When I first started out at 21 years old, I was making about $1000/month as a personal assistant, commuting back and forth from Orange County six-seven days out of the week, and packing lunch in sandwich bags from my mom’s house. At that time I saw success as making 10x that, renting my first apartment in DTLA, and being able to eat well while paying all bills.

Now that we’ve surpassed that point, success is about being able to sleep happy, knowing that we did our absolute best by our clients and ourselves. It’s become about reaching goals that we set for the year and recognizing how far we’ve come, and making room for more growth. It’s about spending time with our baby boy and teaching him how to do live every day. It’s about maintaining great relationships with business partners, friends, and family.

As we accomplish and experience more, a new vision for success is created. And perhaps that is part of the reason we can be seen by others as “successful” — We constantly redefine what it means to us and strive to be greater every day.

Contact Info:

• Address: 541 S Spring St #205, Los Angeles, CA 90013
• Website: alexisalegre.com, smartLArealty.com
• Phone: 7143654480
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/whatsyourloftstyle/
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/smart-la-realty-los-angeles-3?osq=smart+la+realty

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