THE IMPORTANCE OF PLAYING IT SAFE It didn’t take Robson long after he left the accounting world to learn why sometimes it’s best to be conservative with money. He started his post-accountant life as a hard money lender. One of Robson’s roles was to underwrite loans and make sure what the borrowers were asking for and their property valuations were accurate. Unfor- tunately, Robson was hired in 2007, right before the real estate crash. “From 2007 to 2009, I was watching a lot of really suc- cessful people lose money left and right,” Robson said. “I was getting paid $80,000 a year and all of my friends that had done really well had all gone bankrupt. I was under- writing hundreds of deals a month, which was a great experience for me because it forced me to be conserva- tive since we were in a falling market.” The combination of the job experience and being con - servative with his money paid off for Robson. In 2009, Arizona’s Department of Financial Institutions shut down his boss’s company due to a filed lawsuit. Robson’s boss was cleared of any wrongdoing, but in the six months it took to sort out everything, he was forced to find another job. Fortunately, Robson had put away a fair amount of money ($40,000) to buy himself a little time. But, it only took a week or two for him to get bored and want to get back to work. “I felt like I had to do something with life; I could not just retire with $40,000,” Robson said. AREAL ESTATE CAREER IS BORN Robson’s fortunes changed when he met a friend who had just lost $1 million in the market crash and started doing short sales. “I thought for sure this would be the way to go,” Robson said. “I joined up with him because he had the experience and I had the vision.” Robson and his friend took the $65,000 they had between them and did their first flip in 2010. They pur - chased a house for $50,000 and sold it for $70,000. They did 38 flips that year, 70 the following year, and from 2012 to 2018 averaged over 100 flips a year. When people ask Robson which career path they should take, he asks them the same thing—what are they pas- sionate about? He recognizes that people might want to get into the most lucrative real estate arenas, but he understands that the true reward comes from not only enjoying the work one does, but also to liking the people that they serve.
“If you find yourself complaining about homeowners all day long, and you’re not really passionate about helping homeowners, you probably shouldn’t be a real estate agent,” he said. “If you find yourself complaining about this, that, or the other, or not feeling a passion to serve these people, you might be in the wrong industry.” Robson practices what he preaches. In 2018, he branched out from his house-flipping business and start - ed a real estate brokerage. Robson built his brokerage and in two years it was handling 30 listings a month, and he managed to sell it for seven figures. “Not only did I figure out the house-flipping world, where we’re doing hundreds of deals a year, I proved to myself that I could build a brokerage of agents and generate 30 listings a month and then sell the company,” Robson said. “That was a cool accomplishment for me. I love serving people, and going out of my way to build rap- port. House flipping really does not provide that feeling.” THEART OF RISKMANAGEMENT Putting every dollar he had into a house-flipping ven - ture and building a real estate brokerage from scratch were just two of the risks Robson has taken in his real estate career. Purchasing Rocket Lister is also on that list, but Robson perhaps made an even riskier move lead- ing up to the acquisition—breaking off from a long-time partnership. Robson and his business partner worked almost exclu- sively with handshake deals for years. Then in late 2017, his wife mentioned how one of her mentors said in every relationship, one should always leave more than they take. The notion stuck with Robson because he realized he was putting in more than he took from his business relationship. “The business was so much more important to me than how much I was gaining financially from it,” he said. “[My thought was] what could I do to grow the business, which was helping him out, putting in more time and sacrific - ing? At some point that started to weigh on my wife.” Robson was not concerned at the time that he was put- ting in more time than his business partner. However, his wife convinced him the only way for him to move further ahead was to do so on his own. She reminded him of all of the different businesses he wanted to do and the ideas that he had—and that he’d always have to bring his part- ner in 50/50 if he stayed with him. “She convinced me to break off that partnership, which was a hard decision for me because loyalty is one
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