Today we’d like to introduce you to Lauren and Allen Blankenship.
Lauren and Allen, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
We met at 4am at a nightclub in San Francisco in 1997 and have been basically inseparable ever since. We married and launched our first venture – Rouze Media – in the same crazy month in 1999. The website found early success and attracted the attention of Playboy Enterprises, who acquired the company in 2000. It was a whirlwind pace, even by the standards of the first dot com bubble – exactly 1 year from incorporation to acquisition. After working with Playboy through the integration, we set out to travel for some rest and reflection.
When we came back to the US in 2001, we signed a large lease on West Broadway in Soho NYC to launch a new retail concept flagship store of modern bodywear and swimwear, only to watch in horror as the towers fell on 9/11 a mile away from us less than a month from our scheduled opening. We were essentially all-in at that point and when we opened the doors a few weeks later, the street was still closed to non-residents. But we fought on and persevered, won loyal clients, and the store eventually earned “Best of New York” honors from New York Magazine. In 2005, we sold the store to return to California and begin our next chapter.
When we rejoined forces at the beginning of 2017, we quickly realized that the culmination of our collective experiences gave us a unique perspective and powerful skill set for local property advisory. Our clients responded and we had a great year with several notable closings and a number of exciting mandates as we head into 2018.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
As entrepreneurs, our road has been anything but smooth! While we had a fast and seemingly easy success with Rouze, our first start-up, our retail venture was almost dead on arrival with the launch just a month after 9/11 less than a mile from ground zero. We lost everything we made on our first company trying to keep the store afloat and went into debt that took us a decade to work out.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
We specialize in luxury Southern California real estate for both lifestyle and investment. We view our role as that of a trusted advisor and fiduciary, counseling our clients as if they were family. We focus on the relationship, not the transaction, and our responsiveness is legendary.
With our work for clients for lifestyle purposes, we are known for our taste, market coverage, and respect for our client’s time – we preview properties before suggesting tours, make ourselves available nights and weekends, and hunt both on and off-market to find the perfect home and make the process enjoyable.
With our work for clients for investment purposes, we are known for our unique capabilities in deal sourcing, analysis, financial modeling, repair/renovation, and property management. We have direct real estate investment experience that few residential agents possess, and we bring those resources to bear for our clients across both buy-and-hold and fix-and-flip strategies. We’ve had several clients note how distinct our investment advisory offering is vs. other agents they have worked with, and that is what we are most proud of.
What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
When the acquisition of Rouze Media by Playboy Enterprises was publicly announced.
Contact Info:
- Address: 301 N. Canon Drive, Suite E
Beverly Hills, CA 90210 - Website: www.westlapartners.com
- Phone: 323-682-0371
- Email: [email protected]
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/WestLAPartners
- Other: www.sfrinvest.com
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