“I remember in 2008, during that recession, if I had the opportunity to be buying a bunch of real estate, I would have a lot of money right now,” Mauricio Umansky, wearing casual jeans, a gray blazer and a white dress shirt told The Post from his new office space in New York City, off of Union Square.
Umansky, who had mostly earned a reputation as the loyal and charismatic husband of Kyle Richards from the “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills,” was in town to attend two events: the largest real estate conference in the country — the Inman Real Estate Conference — and to fête his new Manhattan headquarters.
But while the 52-year-old may not yet have retire-in-Monaco money, he has been building a real-estate empire in the last decade, with a global sales volume of $57.4 billion since its founding in 2011.
By 2013, in two short years, the Wall Street Journal ranked him the No. 3 residential broker in the country and the No. 1 seller in California with nearly $380 million in transaction volume the prior year.
Umansky credited his success to what he was doing a few years prior to launching his firm, known as The Agency, working as a real estate agent for his brother-in-law, Rick Hilton, at the luxury real estate company Hilton & Hyland.
He was earning more than $200,000 in commissions and was known as their No. 1 agent for more than eight years straight.
“You know what I did back then, is I actually started being a contrarian, as a real estate agent, and I started buying. I owned the LA Times from the perspective of taking out advertisements. So if you opened up the LA Times, it was like 30 pages and I was on 20 of them,” Mauricio said.
Fast forward to 2022, and Umansky’s real estate firm has expanded across the United States with more than 70 offices. There’s even presence in Canada, Mexico, the Netherlands, Turks and Caicos, the Dominican Republic, the Cayman Islands and the Bahamas.
His company earned $12.4 billion in sales volume that year, up from the $11.3 billion in 2021. His listings mostly inhabit the eight-figure range.
“My goal is to be the biggest global luxury real estate boutique in the world,” Umansky said, adding that finding the right global partners is key, since he can’t physically be at all of these places at once.
Nevertheless, his success was not without its challenges against fellow competitors, admitting that the size of real estate company, Compass, took its toll at one point.
“We were born at the same time, six months apart — on different coasts — with very similar idealisms and cultures. They just raised $2 billion, and I raised $1 million. And I didn’t even raise it, I put it up. And so we’ve grown you know, they grew with a $2 billion kitty and I grew with a $1 million kitty.”
He added, “They are our competitors, but they’re our collaborators … we do a lot of business together. Our agencies do co-listings. But by the way, when you’re selling the house, and you have a buyer and a seller rep, we’re like collaborating. I need them to sell my product and I want to sell their products … so I don’t see it as a huge competition. I want them to do great. So this is to me, it’s not a race. I’m only worried about how we do.”
Meanwhile, the brazen but captivating entrepreneur has his four daughters — Farrah Brittany Aldjufrie, 34, Alexia Simone Umansky, 26, Sophia Kylie Umansky, 23, and Portia Umansky, 14 — to keep the company going for years to come.
In his new Netflix series, “Buying Beverly Hills,” viewers got a different taste of the man, who has been described as one of the “hottest house husbands.”
The show follows the dynamics of his daughters and real estate agents competing for listings to make it within the firm.
When pressed about how he handles the feelings between his daughters and other agents at the firm, he calls the competition “common” among every company.
“I wouldn’t necessarily call it competition, that’s just part of the business,” Umansky said.
As to what he ultimately hopes to accomplish, Umansky said, he is hoping his firm can stand its ground on quality over quantity.
“Bank of America is the biggest, but I want to be Goldman Sachs.”