April 4, 2006

Girl Powered Real Estate: who needs a prince
when girls can buy their own castles?

By Jennifer Robertson
Staff Writer

For many women, the magical time of childhood included fairy tales in which a princess was rescued by a hero and lived happily ever after. As adults, many have the workload of Cinderella, but have come to realize that a fairy-tale prince is not going to take them away on a white horse to live in a castle.

Amie Chilson poses next to one of her many creative ads designed to motivate and inspire women to take a proactive approach to their finances. Photo by Jennifer Robertson

Real estate agent Amie Chilson, a lively 28-year-old who has packed a great deal into her short life, believes women should buy their own “castle” instead.

When Chilson bought her first home at age 25, she knew nothing about real estate. What she did know was that she wanted to learn more about investing in order to create wealth for herself. She obtained her real estate license in 2004 and sold 21 properties her first year, earning the Rookie of the Year award at Keller Williams Realty.

In 2005, she created Girl Powered Real Estate, Inc., an organization that helps women take charge of their destiny through purchasing property. “I want to help people as I’m going up, too,” she said. Through creative advertising, she encourages women to build their own wealth with slogans such as “Slay Your Own Dragons: Rescue Yourself” and “Be Your Own Knight in Shining Armor.”

Girl Powered provides a workshop series and customized counseling to help educate clients about the process of buying real estate as well as provide advice to homeowners.

Chilson and the members of her network “tell it like it is” when dealing with clients, providing them with honest assessments of their financial situation. “It’s the only way I do business,” she said. If a client is not financially ready to purchase a home, she will help her client develop a plan to accomplish that goal.

Chilson’s reputation and talent have earned her kudos from her peers and she was recently featured in the San Jose Business Journal’s spread on “40 under 40” making a difference in Silicon Valley. In addition, she is an active member in the Campbell Chamber of Commerce, Toastmasters and volunteers as a Consultant for Girls For A Change Non-Profit Organization.

In spite of her altruistic efforts, Chilson has received some criticism from people who feel that by targeting women, she is discriminating against men. Chilson disagrees. “Many realtors have a niche and this is my niche,” she explained.

While her services are certainly not limited to women, she has chosen them as her target because she feels this population is underserved in the real estate market. She explained that many realtors are reluctant to work with single women because they are perceived as more emotional and less stable. If she doesn’t help them, “Who else is going to be out there cheering for them and promoting them,” she asked.

Karen Louie, age 29, works in Human Resources at KLA-Tencor and first met Chilson while training for a marathon. While some of the real estate agents she met seemed to “just want to make a sale,” Louie felt Chilson was different.

“She takes the time to get to know her clients,” said Louie. “She’s available all the time.” Through the ongoing counseling, education and encouragement she received through Girl Powered Real Estate, Louie found the resources and the courage to buy a two-bedroom, two-bathroom condominium in the Cambrian area. “It’s scary,” she admitted. “You just have to do it.”

The best part about Girl Powered is that the services are free of charge, even if the client never chooses to buy from her. Chilson’s motivation? “I want to make an impact in this lifetime on a lot of people,” she said.

Chilson also believes in the law of reciprocity. “The more you give, the more you receive,” she explained. “The more unselfish we are, the more the universe will reward us.” She believes this also applies to business. You better abide by the laws of “business karma,” she warned humorously, “or it will jump up and bite you in the a—!”

A modern-day Cinderella
Chilson did not come from a privileged background. Her parents had traditional jobs in teaching and nursing and didn’t know how to manage their money. She knew she didn’t want to struggle like they did and decided at an early age to start building her own wealth.

What they did give her was the confidence to believe that she could do anything she set her mind to. Her parents always told her, “You can be and do whatever you want in life, so I grew up thinking I could be superwoman if I wanted to,” she said with a laugh.

She earned her B.A. in journalism in just three years, and then moved to Idaho where she knew no one. She took the first job she could get, which was working for a newspaper. She quickly learned that the sales side was more lucrative, so she moved into a sales position and tripled the revenue for her territory. Her success lies in her ability to “create relationships, be creative and put the customers’ business first.”

She moved to Silicon Valley six years ago to work in sales for a startup company, which went out of business. During the economic recession, she had different sales positions, the most challenging being a door-to-door copier sales job, a job which sometimes resulted in being unceremoniously shown the door when the answer was no. Although she faced many difficult challenges, she always kept her eye on the “big picture” and didn’t take things personally.

“I made a lot of stupid mistakes,” she admitted, but she didn’t get “hung up” on them. “You fail forward fast,” she said, explaining that you need to learn from your mistakes and keep growing. She advises people to constantly educate themselves, have good mentors, focus on positive thinking and surround themselves with people who are positive and have their best interests at heart.

Happily Ever After
Chilson’s future plans include building Girl Powered into a nationwide franchise so she can help women across the country. Although some have called her “anti-men,” she maintains she is simply “anti-passiveness.”

In fact, Chilson is planning an auction in early June at which eligible men will be auctioned off for a date in order to raise money for the San Jose State University’s women’s basketball team. Perhaps Girl Powered is the Fairy Godmother after all.

Girl Powered Real Estate, Inc. is located at 2542 South Bascom Avenue, Suite 100, Campbell. For more information, contact Amie Chilson at 408-583-3712 or visit www.girlpoweredrealestate.com.