Realtor Geoff Ramsey doesn’t sell real estate. Rather, like a lawyer practices law, and a doctor practices medicine, Ramsey practices real estate. As his fellow agents know, helping people make the biggest purchases of their lives is rarely easy.
“The rules and regulations, the lending requirements, and the contracts are always changing,” he says. “So I’m not just selling real estate, I’m practicing real estate.”
Ramsey, a Re/Max agent working out of the company’s new Shallowford Road location, is at least as busy as the average attorney. His work days would be better defined as work days and nights, as he typically puts in 12 to 14 hours at a stretch and takes only Thursday afternoons off.
“At 1:06 p.m. on Thursday, you can find me at Windstone Golf Club,” he says, grinning. “That’s when my buddies and I tee off.”
The smile is a near constant presence on Ramsey’s forty-something face, despite the grueling hours. Ramsey says he gets an average 100 emails and 100 phone calls a day. As he’s speaking, though, his smart phone is silent, as he’s turned even the vibration function off. Despite his lengthy to-do list, he knows the value of focusing on the moment.
“The only way a deal works is if it works for everyone,” he says, “so I’m driven to make deals work for my clients.”
Speaking of deals, Ramsey does a lot of them – about 100 a year for the last three years. He’s on course to hit a hundred again in 2013, making him the number eight Re/Max agent in Tennessee. He does this with only one buyer’s agent and an office assistant backing him up. “Most of the agents above me in sales have a large team. I have a team, but not as large as theirs. For a little guy, I’m doing alright.”
Ramsey says his clients – buyers and sellers in Tennessee and Georgia – benefit from his experience. Having made as many deals as he has in his 20 years in real estate, there are few obstacles he hasn’t encountered.
“I’ve done so many deals, I can see obstacles in the offer stage,” he says. “I’ve learned how to work around them before a contract becomes a contract.”
Like all Realtors, Ramsey simply wants to do a good job. He knows he’s succeeeded when his clients walk away from the closing table smiling. “The only way I’m happy is if my clients are happy,” he says. “If they’re not happy, then I don’t get paid.”
Knowing how that will sound, Ramsey laughs. The sound echoes through the empty cottage home in which he’s standing. The spacious and beautiful new construction is one of the many Hawks Landing houses Ramsey is listing. Ramsey attributes no small measures of his success to his partnership with the long-time developer and builder of the Ooltewah development, G.T. Issa Construction. “[Owner] Gus [Issa] and I have been working together for seven years, and we’ve sold probably 150 homes together. His new construction business has really helped me.”
Ramsey estimates new construction by Issa and the other builders with which he works makes up about 40 percent of his business. Residential resales make up another 40 percent, while land sales and commercial deals comprise the rest. Referrals make up a big part of the whole pie. “I work hard for my clients,” he says. “I want them to think fondly of me and pass on their good experience.”
Ramsey has an interesting answer for people who ask him what his favorite part of the real estate process is. It’s not dropping the keys in the hand of a new home owner, but something necessary for getting to that point: building a client’s trust.
“I like building trust to the point where my clients understand I’m trying to guide them in the right direction,” he says. “Without their trust, I can’t do my job, which is to find a home that matches their wants and needs.”
Ramsey grew up north of Knoxville in a small town called Clinton, Tenn. He moved to the Scenic City in 1993 to attend the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and start down the path to becoming a lawyer. (Ramsey’s father was the elected district attorney in Anderson County for nearly three decades.). However, the desire to start a career was strong enough to pull him out of school and into the work force. He’s been in real estate ever since.
Judging Ramsey by his pressed suit, slight swagger, and firm handshake, one might think he’s a consumate businessman who’s always selling, but that’s far from the case. Rather, Tennessee’s number eight Re/Max agent has a heart for children – specifically, the children of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. In 2013, Ramsey helped to build St. Jude’s 2013 Dream Home and raise over $711,000 for the hospital. His tone changes when he talks about touring the Memphis facility earlier this year.
“I knew St. Jude’s is a children’s hospital that specializes in cancer,” he says quietly. “But when I met the patients and the families, tears welled up in my eyes. The average stay is two years, and families don’t pay for anything.”
A bachelor who freely admits to being married to his job, Ramsey doesn’t have children of his own. However, he does have a brother in Knoxville, and enjoys being “Uncle Geoff” when he’s able to visit him during the holidays. “My nieces and nephews climb me like a tree,” he says.
Ramsey is also an avid motorcyclist, proving he’s not all work and no play. “I have one bike, and I think I’m picking up another one today,” he says. “I live in East Brainerd. Riding the back roads for 30 minutes is a great stress reliever.”
Ramsey is never far removed from the rigors of work, though. Even when he has a pocket of what could be free time, he uses it to strategize and think of new ways to market himself. He recently taped a commercial that will soon be airing on local cable, and his moving truck – a large vehicle that bears his details in Re/Max red and blue – gets a lot of attention throughout Chattanooga. While he takes credit for the former, he admits to stealing the idea for the latter, which he loans to his clients for free when they’re moving.
“I was at a real estate conference several years ago, and one of the speakers was talking about his moving truck. I thought it was a fantastic idea. Nothing says ‘sold’ like my truck in your driveway,” he says.
Ramsey turns on his phone, and it starts humming like a beehive. Although he says his work does sometimes overwhelm him, he wouldn’t practice real estate any other way. “If my phone stops ringing, then I’ve got a problem. So, I want people to call me. I’m grateful when my phone rings.”