Two teas in a Pod with Teddy Mellencamp and cam Ridge Edge.
Hi, guys, welcome to another episode of The Twat Seat with Me. Twat Seat. You're going to give the little intro to our guy.
Yeah, I am so excited about this because anything real estate I love. Ryan, Sir Haunt, is in the hot seat today and he's got the new show Owning Manhattan, which has recently been renewed for season two on Netflix. If you have not watched it, I literally binge watched it, like just laid in bed and watched the whole thing and then DMed him and said when a season two coming out?
Oh my gosh. So he was originally on Million Dollar List Dark on Bravo and his upcoming show is for Netflix. Ryan has closed more than eight.
Billion billion bills.
When you got to be next to it, yeah, you ain't.
Well, he's a broker, so he's got his own brokerage there in Manhattan, so he's doing all the things, and he's he's married, he's got a daughter. I follow them all on Instagram, his wife Emilia and their daughter Zenna.
I think it's Ena. I think Zena. I would get horrible, all right. Well, let's bring him in. Let's let's do all the things.
Let's do it.
He's big energy, yes, big, big energy.
Well, hello, holy Macaroni, how are you.
I'm good, Macarny.
Can you see me?
Is the light?
Okay?
Should I change something?
No?
You look beautiful.
No, I'm so upset that you're so Tan and Tam and I are like ghosts right now.
Now we're over here, like, so, are you in your office right now? Your real estate office?
One hundred percent of my real estate office. That's still so. Oh, I'm in my I like a command station here as I go, so I will do my best to stay.
How long have you.
Owned your your office, your brokerage firm?
I got in real estate at the end of two thousand and eight. Well, I tried to be an actor for two years in New York City. Then I lost all my money, and so then I got my real estate life so I could pay my rent. And then I started doing that until basically twenty twenty and well, twenty nineteen, I made the decision to go out on
my own. And then people started getting sick in China and like threw me off for a second, and COVID and all that stuff, and then we kicked off September fifteenth, twenty twenty, so it's been four years.
Well, congratulations. I was in New York last month and actually saw your office. Oh, thank you have it, walked right past it.
What's what's that one be? Mean? Behind you?
One billion?
But we read eight billions? So what's one billion? Is that this year so far? Or what's the one billion?
Oh no, so the total sales since we started is now eleven billion? That behind to remember I'm a real estate agent, right, so like there's no salarytors. You know, we eat what we kill like all of us do you know as entrepreneurs. Yeah, and so you know, internally for me, every single person I knew, it's like, why would you ever go start your own company, especially when you're in real estate? Just go you can go to
you know works, you're hat work for warm Buffett. It costs you three thousand dollars a year to be there, Like what do you what are you going to go create overhead for and have staff and employees and burn cat Like why would you ever do that? It's like because I I could just cell real estate the rest of my life, or maybe this is the one opportunity, I'm ever going to have to take a huge swing
at created enterprise value. So in twenty twenty, it's like, we're going to do this, and you guys are gonna do this with me. We're going to build a billion dollar company by valuation. And so I stick it behind me in moments to I don't look at it that much, but a moment's just like this to shame me into working harder to build that. That's why it's there.
Well, I love it, Tam. Should we put some bees behind us?
Well, you know, I reached out to you recently because I binge watch Owning Manhattan and I too have my real estate license. I renew it every four years. I haven't used it in a while because I'm pretty busy, but I always have it because you never know, like when you might need it. Right, So, all things real estate, I love design, selling houses, all that stuff, and I was so ready for season two after I watched season one, I reached out to you. I'm like, where's season two?
When's it coming? So you did get picked up. You got renewed for season two of Owning Manhattan. It's on Netflix. Were you surprised? Where you expect and when do we get to see it?
Well, one, thank you for watching Only Manhattan. It was such a wild experience. But you'd that entrepreneurial like spirit.
You know.
I did million dollar listing on Bravo for ten years, and my wedding show, and you know my spin off, you know, the selling show, which was the hardest thing I've ever done, and my renovation show.
And then it was like, you know what, uh so you kind of are an actor.
I mean I trained to be an actor my whole life, and then I couldn't make any money doing it. So I got into real estate, and so instead of performing on stage, I get to perform.
I was going to say, a theater actor or a theater actor.
Who can you sing?
No?
No?
It was one of the reasons I couldn't make money in New York. You gotta be I mean I could, I can't.
You have to be like a triple threat.
Give us a little line of something.
See it's not there anymore, it's not now. I don't scream now, I just yell as a CEO. I scream at people. I don't sing at people.
Has Bravo ever.
Asked your wife to be on real Househoves of New York.
No, and then she would never do it. She literally she was very heavily involved in my Bravo life. But once we moved over to Netflix, Like if you if you watch it on in Manhattan, she's on it for a solid seventeen seconds.
Yeah, I say, there's no in your kitchen.
Yeah, yeah, there's just no like, there's no benefit. She's a lawyer, Like we have a Oh she's a lawyer. Yeah, like she's she's not you know, there's she does it for me. She's like, if it makes you happy and it's good for you, I'll do it. What do you want me to do? Push up Broad We're doing it. We're working out soon.
Yeah, but it's not something she's craving to do.
She's not willing to go.
Yeah.
No, we'll see what happened in the season two. But yeah, so we did that. We did the first season, and I had no idea because it's such a it's a weird show, like it's not selling Sunset, it's not million dollar listing, Like it's like, thank.
God is not buying Beverly Hills because that just got canceled.
Yeah, well, I was gonna ask what is the difference for our for our listeners, what is the difference with owning Manhattan versus like a million dollar listing or selling Sunset or any of those other shows that we've been watching, like what sets you apart?
Well, the only the only way I would ever go back to TV after doing ten years of million dollar listing and we started our business and everything, was if I had the opportunity to really play and have fun and do something that I hadn't seen before. So I wasn't gonna do million dollar listing too, Like I didn't want to do Saved by the Bell the College years, right, Like you got to surprise the audience and you got to got to get to give them something that keeps
them from looking at their phone. And so what's that going to be? And so it's like, what if what is reality TV three point zero? If one point oho is you know, American Idol and Survivor and the Osborne's and the Real World and that kind of stuff, and if two point zero is you guys, right, you guys, you know my little Bravo thing and you know a bit more of a of an unstructured reality programming, what's three point zho like, what does that what does that
elevated story look like? Like what happens if we have a narrative thread with voiceover, Like what if you tell the story all through one person's eyes, and instead of telling it from the ground up with heels and fancy shoes, you actually tell it from the top down right, And we start with drone over the city, the canyons through and it feels like, instead of watching a reality show where stuff happens, let's talk about it. Then another party and then stuff happens and let's talk about it. What
if this plays out like an eight hour documentary. And so the way I pitched it to Netflix was I started my own company completely by myself. We have our three year party coming up. The show should be capturing those moments leading up to our three year anniversary and what happens and real estate will be that backdrop, but the business will be the backdrop, and it'll cater to a very different audience than watch his selling sons selling
Sunset's awesome and it crushes it. It's just like it's it's a beast in and of itself, as did Million doar Listing and other shows. And I think there's an audience for everybody. But I was super super nervous because the show is very different, like it's very it doesn't play like a normal reality TV show that you'd expect, and so I thought the audience was either going to totally hate it or there were going to be some super fans, and thankful for us, it.
Went No, it's great. The one moment, the one moment that stands out for me. There's a couple of them, but the one the guy can't remember his name with all the tattoos. You fired him, Yeah, you fired Jonathan.
I liked him, Yeah, yeah, yeah, nice, he was edgy.
Didn't he have an accent like Danish?
Yeah? Yeah, he's a model like all those But hold on, didn't you fire him? But then you begged him to come back? Can you?
Oh that's what he said?
He said that, Oh shocker?
So why did he have.
A bunch of to control his own narrative as best he can? Which I think is which I think is fine.
You're all dude, you were fired on National TV?
Yeah, I think it's listen, it's them.
Uh.
I have to you have to protect the house, like you have to protect the brands like this isn't. This isn't just me running around as a real tur anymore. Like this is showcasing the entire growth of our company, and my goal is to build a multi billion dollar company now through Netflix and season after season, you're going to watch the business grow while also watching properties and fights and drama and all the stuff that you know
can appeal to to everybody who's interested. And uh, it's it's kind of my my experiment that we're doing well.
You were definitely a class act when throughout the entire season, Like there's the other shows like Selling Sunset and we have the Oppenheimer's or whatever they're called, which they're so douchey.
But no, but that's what I was going to ask him before we get into you being a class act, which I can't con firm or deny at the with one season. I need gonna need more, Okay, Like I I think first season edit, you look pretty good. No, everybody does.
Now that I've been watching this guy for ten years, I know I've seen it, like.
I know on your own show. But speaking of all the other you know, guys and girls that are on these these shows, has there anyone that you've met that you're just like, this is a total douchebag.
No, I mean yes, but unfortunately I'm too classy to say.
Yeah, hey, this podcast, this is the twat seat. Okay, you don't have to say douchey. Who have you had the hardest time with real estate agent? Wise on from one of these other shows?
Oh? I mean we're happy to say one of the Oppenheimer brothers.
No, I've met them. I think they're all great.
Like I don't.
I you know, I don't talk poorly about anybody. It's never served me, like, there's no there's no benefit of my life to do it.
To be honest, Jason is that nice to us. But I have talked to some of his agents in Orange County and they say, he's great. He's a really nice guy.
Yeah he can't, you know, he's They built something very cool, very special, very different, like we were on very very different businesses. They were great. I mean, I think I haven't had like really terrible experiences with people, and if I do, honestly, I black it out from my memory because it's not worth taking up brain space. I have no interest in thinking about or remembering haters like that's it's okay, right, they get to be there.
That's how successful people think.
Yeah, and they get to create the fire that fuels me as I move on like no problem, like I don't remember like the losses, like it's just not good for the evolution of my mental health.
You know, how do you how do you feel with when you know? I think we just read that Josh Flagg has expanded his business to New York City. Does that stuff even cross your mind?
Or like?
Whatever? The more of the merrier.
I think that people can say and do whatever they want. I think the proof is in the putting success. We get success. I think people can do the best they
possibly can everywhere. There's a big, big pie out there, and it's just about expanding that pie and presenting the greatest value to your customers, right and on the show, like our customer base is also the viewers is also you know, creating entertaining television while also showcasing a very real business, like they're The rule that I also had was other shows can be property porn shows. Our show
is a deal show. So if you're interested in seeing real estate and people, but you want to see deals, like you tune into ours. There will be deals NonStop, and we start shooting season two next Wednesday.
Okay, speaking of deals, Speaking of deals, I gotta cut in here. Are we going to see the fourteen million dollar deal of Andy Cohen's apartment for sale on your show?
I asked him and he was like, oh, the Bravo contracts. I don't know that was his.
Are you serious? Little Andy Kelling's shy to show his house. I mean it's all different, not.
Shy to show it. I've never been attached to more press because of a seller in my whole life.
Oh, so the deal with Andy Kohne, I think he told me this personally that he had bought another place and was renovating it. So he already has his other place he has now obviously moved into it. Did you help him buy that house as well an apartment?
No? No, no, he went. I think he bought it by himself a while ago, and he's been renovating.
It like a year ago, right, yeah, yeah.
Later. And from being somebody who's not from New York, you know, I've been there a bunch, but I'm not from New York. I don't really know the areas. We watched a bunch on Royal Housewives of New York. And then we see in the trailer this coming up season where I think there's a group of people where they're kind of arguing, like are you from Staten Island? Are
you from the here? Are you from this there? These are the upcoming places, like in your mind, you know, if you're a single or if you are a family person, the two best places to buy in New York at this current time in.
New York City, I mean Staten Island is you know, as a borough. I mean I would think about, depending on really what you want. Right I live in Brooklyn. I have a townhouse in Brooklyn. It's a great place to be as a family. It can definitely be a little tough with traffic if you're trying to get into Manhattan all the time. Traffic is insane, as it is everywhere these days. But I think Brooklyn, I think parts of Long Island are really great as well, and so
many people have moved out there. We also just open to New Jersey and there's just like you can just get so much more for.
Your money, you know, Oh for sure.
Parts of New Jersey, like right over the George Washington Bridge, like you can have a thirty minute commute every day, which is can be shorter than what I have as a commune in Brooklyn. But you get to live in New Jersey and have a pool and driveway, and your kids can have a yard, and it just depends on personal personal prefit.
It blows my mind the amount of money that's in Manhattan. I love looking at houses, so I'm always on MLS reeltor dot Calm or whatever, and I always like to look at New York. And not only are the price is high, but once you get into the millions, then you have an hoa that's sometimes up to like seventeen thousand dollars a month just for your ho and I'm sure it goes way on up from there, taxes, taxes, not. It just blows my mind that people like this is
just Manhattan. Yeah, there's that much money in that town.
But we'll speak of money.
We see that you work a lot with Bethany Frankel.
I did. I worked with her on a listing and then she fired me.
So I was gonna say, so, did you do something wrong?
What happened?
No, I just it didn't. It didn't. It didn't sell in the in the time that we allotted for the exclusive agreements. We were a little off season, and it was it was tricky.
You know.
She had a big, beautiful loft that she eventually sold later.
What she was asking when you had it for sale.
I think it was I think it was a little bit less. I can't remember. This was a little while ago, but she renovated it really. You know, it was a huge, huge space that she basically turned into an incredible.
It was beautiful.
I saw the pictures of.
One bedroom with like a small secondary bedroom. That just takes the right type of buyer. You know, most people looking for four thousand square feet are looking for more than one huge, incredible bedroom with like the greatest single closet and the greatest you know, makeup closet. Ever, like, that's a specific so it.
Didn't Yeah, a specific buyer. It doesn't appeal to a lot of people. But Okay, you know the house that on first season, the one with a big staircase, the very expensive one. Yeah, I saw that. That one's still listed.
Still, yeah, for one hundred and ninety five million dollars.
Yeah.
What how long do you think it's going to be on the market before somebody buys it?
Well, well, we've we've had offers on that, and this is not about lack of buyers. It's about just the right buyer and the right price. You know, it's such a one of one. It's just about that right purchaser kind of falling a lot with it and paying the right price. So I think we're think we're getting closer.
And just because I am clearly very much out of this price bracket to be able to buy one hundred and ninety five million dollar home, what do you think your yearly income needs to be?
Are?
Like?
How much money do you have to have to be able to actually sustain a place like that?
So without a mortgage, the carry cost you took what Hoap's plus real estate taxes are just over ninety thousand dollars per month on that place, right, So you're spending about a million dollars a year to carry the apartment. So it's the same who owns a three hundred million dollar yacht, right who owns a two hundred million dollar picasso? Is that that same it's that same clients out so they're it's the person is a billionaire, right, of which
most of them are multi billionaires. And then it's in terms of annual income. I mean some years they probably make no money. Some years they'll make fifty billion dollars, right, right, Typically how it works just depending on the kind of asset sales.
Would you say, would you say that most of your client tell is old money or new money.
It's a mixture. It's a mixture, and sometimes it's hard to tell these.
Days that does TikTokers.
Now, well, it's not just the TikTokers, you know, it's nuts. Like for the first half of twenty twenty four, gen Z surpassed millennials and buying homes in the United States, but when you look at how they bought it, it's like seventy percent of the gen Z purchases were financed by baby boomers. So moms and dads who've made money since nineteen eighty two to today, their kids aren't making hundreds of thousands of dollars. Yet rent is so high,
interest rate towards six percent. It's expensive, and so the parents say, Okay, I'm gonna put you through school. I'm also going to buy you your first home, and that's become the new American dream, like grow up in the right family. My parents were also buying me my real estate.
Yeah, I feel like I'm gonna have to buy my kids' houses. Like when my son just got out of college and he's like, well, I can't even find a job, yeah, you know, and he's like, how am I ever going to get ahead? Like, how am I ever going to buy a house?
And it's just crazy.
Now the real estate market in California is probably very different than New York. I know that the interest rates are high. I don't even know is it a good time to buy, is a good time to sell? Like where are we sitting right now? And what do you what do you think is going to happen?
Well, interest rates are lower now that they've been in like fifteen months that I don't know whether you're gonna air this part.
What are they now?
Like they're just under they're just under six percent. Yeah, you can basically get it down to just under six which is a lot more than two and a half, which is where most of us were buying for the last time.
That's what mine is right now.
Yes, exactly. So you have ninety percent of you know, people that have loans in the United States have loans under five percent, and so until those loans start to come down, and so you can refinance at least too into the fours. Most people like you, like me, like most of us, are going to say, man, it's got to really be worth it to sell, because now my
mortgage is in debt. Now it's a financial asset. So now people are looking at their mortgages as financial assets instead of putting them like the L of the P and L, which is just which is what happens in high end straight environments. And so you're right though, it is tougher for younger generations. I think you're going to
seal up. People continue to rent, right there's there's great companies that incentivize right now, or people continuing to either live at home or live with roommates and create income in different ways. Like at the same time, it's like, you know, I'm gonna have a hard time finding it job. It's also never been easier to make money. Make money your phone, you know. Yeah, that thing that we all asked for, which was I don't want to have a nine to five like grandpa, and I want to do
this and do that. The world said, okay, here you go, go make money on your phone. It's like, but wait, when, how where? How many different ways? How many incrimbship?
What do I sell?
I don't know.
I have to think I to get close.
It's the discipline people that can make a killing off their phone. It's the other ones that a lot of people don't have that mindset and then being like an entrepreneur like that, they like they need.
To be told what to do, they need they want the boss. But speaking of discipline, we you're notorious for having a very intense schedule. You wake up at four eighteen am. Do you have OCD as well? I have it? So the four eighteen time kind of.
That we're all three of us are up at four eighteen.
I was like, I actually would prefer four to seventeen. But you have interminute fasting. How do you maintain that discipline? But then how do you also balance and unplug and make time for your family and are actually present because I think a lot of us who my husband's an entrepreneur as well, he has multiple businesses, he works or
works and something, and the same with me. So it's finding that time where you're actually off your phone, you're connecting with your partner, you're you know, what would you say your keys to success on those things are I.
Try to what have I just turned forty, and it's it's been an eye opening summer for me coming out because I actually I've used it to kind of like smack myself around and answer some of these like exact questions. And what I realized was I spent my entire thirties waking up every day to be important instead of waking up every day to be happy. And I thought being important would make me happy. And so I have three
companies that do all this and it's fine. But I was convincing myself that that classic line of like entrepreneurship is when you sacrifice what others won't so that you can have what others can't, you know, But that becomes a drug and you become addicted to it, and then next thing, you know, like life goes by you and none of us are getting out of here alive. We're all on a spice rock, right, We're all just floating through nothingness. And then nothingness is just getting bigger? So
what are we even doing? And that like really hit me this summer, combined with the fact that like my key to success for the first let's say fifteen years of my career were like the power of yes. I'll say yes to every opportunity as long as it's not going to get me killed or arrested, and see what happens. I'm gonna yes, I'll go your event. Yes I'm gonna
do this. Yes I'm going to go do that. And I just what that ends up doing, though, is you can say yes to opportunity, but then you say no to energy, and then you have to like manufacture energy
and you operate kind of like a zombie. And so I've started doing a much better job at saying it's saying no and using the power of no, but while still being empathetic and still being humble, and discipline is one hundred percent my savior, Like it's the Secret Songs, if you like, if you're gonna lie to yourself, then
then I don't know how to help you. But if at least you can be honest with yourself and control the one thing in the world you can control, which is your mind, your body, right, your soul, the decisions you make, the decisions you don't make, than anything, honestly as possible. My success is because because I'm relentless, because I showed up the most, you know, and just kept calling. I talk to people all the time. They're like, well it's not working for me, Like, well, how long you've
been trying. It's been a year. Great, keep going.
What do you?
What do you and what do you do? Because you know, I do think there's a lot of this like toxic positivity out there where every day we're supposed to wake up and feel a certain way, and you know what, no matter what you do for your mind body, and so some days you wake up and you just feel, yeah, not your best when you're having those days, what do you do? Like for me, it's being vulnerable and just kind of sure sharing it. But what is your kind of method behind that?
Yeah?
I don't do that.
I think I should be more vulnerable. I think I try to own it as much as I can. I sold there's a book called The Subtle Art of Not Giving Up by market my husband, right, so Mark man I know Mark Manson's friend. I sold his apartment and try back up. And I remember going through that and even talking to him like there is an incredible life hack to just not giving that much of a to so many things, and like, what's the worst thing that's
going to happen. I'm going to read that, especially as you get older and you look back at your life and you're like, all right, twenty twenty two, twenty twenty two, okay, quick, go what's the worst day of twenty twenty two? Now? Barring personal tragedy and personal loss, which are obviously core memories evolutionarily, like, we don't. We're not programmed to remember the bad days are the rough ones, right, We are programmed to remember the good days, right. That's what keeps
us alive, That's what keeps us appropriating moving forward. And so I think when I feel terrible, I try to just own it.
You know.
I'll be late that day, I'll sleep that day, I'll just watch a TV that day. I'll do what's called a Ryan day, which is I will do nothing, yeah, you know, and I'll just like ved out and then I get over it, you know. I think I think it can be detrimental when you try to like play through injury. I got to own the injury, and you
gotta heal it and whatever way you can. And maybe it's a friend or a family member, or it's a personal trip or whatever it is, retail therapy, whatever works for you do that and for me, like the discipline of the day is what keeps me sane. And no matter what happens today, and it could be the worst to ever, it could be a great day, it could be a shitty day, no matter what. Like I can control my hours, my minutes, and my time, I know they will wake up. I'm gonna work out so that
I don't like balloon and die. You know, I'm going to take care of myself. I'm gonna focus on what I got to do and just go build and try to do a little bit better today than I did yesterday. And that's that's it. You take it one day at a time, and otherwise you get stuck in the anxiety of tomorrow that's caused by the worry of yesterday, and you just get in this never ending cycle while the life passes you by. And that's not fun.
Yeah.
I love seeing your to switch it off a little bit. But I talked about your family a little bit. I remember seeing you got married on TV. Right, I saw like a honeymoon. You were on a honeymoon. I saw that, and then your daughter, your daughter. How old is your daughter now?
Five?
Five? Are you going to have more kids? Are you done there? The shop is closed.
We talk, We talk about it. It's it's hard, like we live in New York, like we yeah, no matter what, against everything. I literally just said, we both work all the time. It's hard, like it's just you. Yeah, like I think we would love to. We talk about it all the time, and then time goes and time goes by, and we travel and travel for work and we're all over the place, and it's just been so awesome. Like I don't know, we've never had kids before, and you know,
I have three sisters and two brothers and family. Yeah, And I like, I love my parents, they're great. But I'm able to now spend more time with my one child than my parents never were able to spend with me at that age. And maybe that means Za her name is Zena. Maybe she'll grow up too coddled and babied and whatever. She'll just live with me until it'll just be fine.
I don't care.
I'll take care of her.
That's what I say about my daughter.
Well, we we appreciate you so much for coming on. Is there anything that you want to plug or say before we end up closing out for today or tease about this upcoming season or anything like that.
Well, the season that we're about to start shooting, I can, like, my life is already all over the place. And so if you like the first season, I can I can guarantee you the second season. We'll keep you on your seat. It is. It is unlike anything that we've ever shot, and the deals we're doing right now. The property is the ages, the that like it's just I think I hear screaming outside my door right now. I'm hiding in my office to do this podcast. Like I have something
really important. Guys, is super serious CEO work I got to do right now.
Please leave me alone. I have to be on the twat seat.
I'm on the twat seat.
Did not say that otherwise, HR has like it's like a real always employees. I gotta be careful with how I talk.
Oh my gosh, I know you're looking.
You're just starting to film. Do you know projected air date yet?
I don't know, But I think this season like we know what we're making now. The first season of Voting Manhattan and the first season of I think of any show you know, it took us like two years to put together, planning designing, you know, Netflix. I had a lot of thoughts and ideas and what it looks like, what it feels like, you know, is it going to be can music. We ended up having an orchestra, which I'd never worked with before. It was just like it was super super cool. And then I found out as
like the little side side quest story. For two seconds, I found out set the second season was being Gridlet. They called me while I was on set playing the role of Ryan Surhant, real estate mogul on the upcoming season of and just like that. And so I'm like, I'm on the Sex and the City set with Michael Patrick King, the creator and directed, really exciting talking talking giving me notes on in this scene how to be Ryan Surhant, And I'm like, dude, I wait, do I not know how.
To be myself?
How do I hold myself?
That is so, how do I walk?
And then I got a call and they were like second season screen that we got to move real quick, and I was like, hold on one second, I'm playing myself, playing myself.
That is very cool. I can't wait for season two.
Guys.
If you haven't watched Owning Manhattan, it is so good. You will be sucked into it and watch the entire season in one sitting.
I promise well, we love it. Thank you so much for joining us on the tat seat, which we are allowed to say with our HR and we can't wait for season two.
Thanks Ryan Yah