If you buy an independently reviewed services or products via a hyperlink on our web site, The Hollywood Reporter could obtain an affiliate fee.
Mauricio Umansky says he wasn’t seeking to settle scores in his new guide, The Dealmaker: Tips on how to Achieve Enterprise & Life Via Dedication, Willpower & Disruption. In his first guide, which is out at this time, April 11, Umansky — the founder and CEO of The Company actual property brokerage, star of Netflix’s Shopping for Beverly Hills and husband of Actual Housewives of Beverly Hills star Kyle Richards — dives into the interval in his life when former boss and brother-in-law Rick Hilton and his spouse Kathy Hilton stopped talking not solely to him but additionally to his spouse greater than a decade in the past.
All of it stemmed from when Umansky labored at L.A.’s Hilton & Hyland actual property company. At one level named the No. 1 agent in all of California, Umansky went to Hilton & Hyland co-founders Rick Hilton and Jeff Hyland (who died final 12 months) requesting to be made a accomplice. Whereas the reply was no, Umansky was supplied “a share of top-line income, not fairness within the firm,” he writes. Later, in response to Umansky, his bosses reneged on the deal through the recession in 2008 — and once more declined to make him a accomplice. Throughout this time, contends Umansky, his gross sales accounted for “roughly 20 p.c of their income.”
Umansky credit what went down at his former perch with setting him on the trail to creating his personal brokerage, telling The Hollywood Reporter that he’s by no means absolutely addressed the state of affairs earlier than writing his guide. “I had by no means talked about my stuff earlier than. Nobody has ever identified the precise motive,” he says, stressing that he feels a way of “thanks” to Hilton at this time. “I inform it from the attitude of, if that didn’t occur, if he [Rick Hilton] didn’t try this, I by no means would have had the balls to exit by myself. I wanted for that to occur to have the ability to go off by myself.”
In The Dealmaker, Umansky additionally particulars Hilton’s response to him decamping to start out a rival company. “Rick stopped talking to me, which prolonged to Kyle and our complete household. And naturally his spouse, Kathy — Kyle’s sister — did the identical. … They lower off all communication and not invited us to Thanksgiving dinners or different holidays. The one motive I can provide you with, as a result of they all the time hosted purchasers and pals, is that they didn’t need me to poach anybody. I by no means would have stolen a shopper from Rick, although perhaps he didn’t imagine my motives have been pure. He and Kathy held large anger towards us, which isn’t the way in which I select to reside my life.” (THR has reached out to Hilton for remark.)
Whereas these particulars in The Dealmaker add additional context to tensions between the 2 households — battle between Kathy Hilton and Richards boiled over in the newest season of RHOBH — Umansky says that every little thing is now effective between him and Rick Hilton. “That’s gone. It’s previous. Kathy and Kyle have their very own points which are separate type me. Rick and I at this time, if we see one another on the road, we cease, we discuss, we’re pleasant. I want him love and success and I hope he needs the identical to me. That’s previous,” Umansky says.
Since Umansky went out on his personal, The Company has grown by leaps and bounds since its founding in 2011, now counting greater than 2,000 brokers in 80 actual property markets each within the U.S. and internationally, together with Mexico, Canada, Portugal, Spain and the Bahamas.
All through The Dealmaker, Umansky — whose huge transactions over time have included promoting the Playboy Mansion and the Walt Disney Property — peppers anecdotes about his work and private life with a operating record of what he calls “Mauricio’s Mantras,” which embody his recommendation on success in enterprise. (One instance: “While you’re not promoting, you’re dropping cash. Studying to be environment friendly is a life-style.”)
Mauricio Umansky (right here with spouse and star Kyle Richards) typically seems on Bravo’s Actual Housewives of Beverly Hills.
Casey Durkin/ Bravo/Courtesy Everett Assortment
“It’s meant to be a brilliant simple learn,” says Umansky of his guide. “I didn’t need to write a how-to success guide. It’s actually meant to be via storytelling and life classes which have formed me to be an optimistic profitable human being and hopefully individuals could have the identical takeaway. For me, it’s about sharing again what I’ve realized.”
He tells THR that he didn’t share the guide with anybody near him previous to publication. “No person acquired an opportunity to see it beforehand, not Kyle, not my children, not anyone. I wished to simply let it go on the market,” says Umansky, whose daughters Farrah Brittany and Alexia Umansky work at The Company and star with him on the true property actuality sequence Shopping for Beverly Hills, which was simply renewed by Netflix for a second season. (Umansky hopes to finally launch variations of the present primarily based in different cities, envisioning reveals titled Shopping for London and Shopping for Miami.)
In his guide, Umansky recounts every little thing from his early years rising up in Mexico Metropolis — he suffered from neutropenia (a scarcity of a sure sort of white blood cells) as a younger youngster and was additionally recognized as legally blind in a single eye — to his profession working within the vogue enterprise (on the manufacturers 90265 and Carole Little, from which he was fired) earlier than getting into actual property.
Together with his vogue background, Umansky, who grew up in Bel Air, writes that he pays cautious consideration to what he wears for various conferences and home showings. “If I’m assembly an older, extra conservative purchaser, I’ll stick to the go well with and tie. If it’s a younger twentysomething tech man, I’ll most likely go for denims and a T-shirt.” He even generally clothes “to the design of the property, as a result of I would like potential consumers to really feel like they’re getting into a really particular way of life. Let’s say I’m representing a seaside home in Malibu, then I’ll go for white denims and a flowy linen shirt.” He recounts ruefully that he as soon as misplaced out on a $150 million property sale as a result of the shopper thought-about him underdressed. “I used to be in all Brunello Cucinelli, the most costly stuff you might purchase,” recollects Umansky, “however I wasn’t sporting a go well with and tie. Go determine. I screwed that one up. However you’ll be able to study much more out of your errors than you’ll be able to out of your successes generally.”
There are additionally anecdotes about promoting the previous residence of Michael Jackson, a property he believes was haunted the late pop star; profitable Woman Gaga as a shopper after Kyle appeared in certainly one of her music movies; working with an unnamed “well-known ’80s TV star” who as soon as ranted at him, “Mauricio, I feel you’re the lowest piece of shit on this earth. You’re scum”; and the time that he and shopper Nick Lachey acquired paid with inventory within the Citizen app when the CEO of the corporate purchased the singer’s home.
Within the guide, he additionally shares his ideas on rival brokerage firm Compass (“I’d equate them to the darkish facet in Star Wars,” he writes); says that he’s taking a look at taking The Company public “sooner quite than later”; and divulges that powerhouse actual property agent Jade Mills virtually joined The Company at its inception however that “on the finish of the day — I feel she acquired scared to go away Coldwell Banker,” he writes. (THR has reached out to Mills for remark.)
For readers who aren’t into actual property however who watch Actual Housewives of Beverly Hills, Umansky additionally recounts loads of backstory on his relationship along with his spouse, together with how they met when he was 24 and invited to her celebration — “All people would inform me that she was Demi Moore’s sister (which she was not!),” he writes — and the way they moved up their wedding ceremony date after they realized that she was pregnant “so Kyle might slot in her gown.” After Umansky misplaced his job at Carole Little, Richards “instructed we get our actual property licenses collectively … we each handed our checks and acquired our licenses, though Kyle by no means put hers to make use of, as a result of she was solely doing it as a present of help for me,” he writes.
Umansky stars on Netflix’s Shopping for Beverly Hills with daughters Farrah Brittany (left) and Alexia Umansky.
Courtesy of Netflix
As for why The Company has grown so significantly, Umansky credit a number of components: firm tradition, revolutionary advertising and marketing and a deal with back-end know-how. “, The Company sort of began via the concept of disruption and after I discuss disruption, initially it was actually disrupting in the way in which we market properties. We have been the primary firm and first workplace to do the mega-open home with Lamborghinis and a celebration and the entire thing and experiencing the life-style of the property. Clearly, at this time lots of people are copying that now and we’ve acquired a number of completely different actuality tv reveals. That’s develop into the way in which to do open homes. We have been the primary one to do this. And from the tech facet, we clearly get deep into the efficiencies and the way do I make brokers extra environment friendly If I can create tech that permits me to promote yet another property per week, that’s 4 extra per thirty days and 52 extra per 12 months, that brings a number of worth to my brokers,” says Umansky, who recollects within the guide letting go a top-producing agent whose character didn’t match nicely into the corporate.
“Tradition is every little thing for me. That’s what retains me up at evening — sustaining the sensation of household, openness and transparency as we’ve grown to 80 places of work at this time. Tradition is about open communication and hiring the suitable individuals and letting go of among the assholes. It simply has to do with what’s your north star and what’s vital to you.”
