It couldn’t have been an accident that I ended up in commercial real estate.
I’d grown up around the business, after all, though watching my father’s rocky relationship to the field probably should have sent me running for the emergency exit. The lesson I learned from his bitter experience wasn’t that there was something wrong with the industry. I’d seen my grandfather and a couple of uncles make successful careers in real estate. The lesson I learned was, “Don’t work for your family.” And I vowed that I never would. My father might have had a smoother run if he’d worked for the Dursts or the Silversteins or one of New York’s other family building dynasties, although I’m not sure he ever would have loved the field. It’s no place for free spirits. But maybe he wouldn’t have been judged so harshly and he might have been spared the need to take everything so personally.
Who knows?
My first job out of Lehigh was at Edward S Gordon, one of the largest real estate service companies in New York. The company leased office space, ran buildings, and advised clients on all aspects of that world. It was Lisa’s dad – no one in my family – who helped connect me with this position (though Donald would later take credit, giving me a fun opportunity to set him straight). I went from there to being an owner’s rep at First Winthrop Corporation, which would lead to a four-and-a-half-year run at Shorenstein Realty Services. At every stop, I learned more about the business and learned what I was good at – mainly dealing with people.
In that way, I really was my father’s son.
Even though office leasing was becoming increasingly tech- and data-driven, the real decisions were still being made by human beings. For me, that meant getting to know our clients, their customers, and everybody’s needs. Finding things to like about a lot of different kinds of people. And selling. Plenty of selling. Taking people out to dinner. Meeting for drinks. Organising golf outings. Making human connections in the business world, often lubricated by alcohol.
I know that’s supposed to be an old way of doing business. Well, I can promise you this much: It ain’t dead yet, not in this industry, anyway.
One of the great satisfactions for me was knowing that I was being judged on my own. By my performance. By my relationships. By my hard work and reputation in the industry. Not by my DNA.
Did it help that my name was Fred Trump? You know, I’ve thought a lot about that, and my answer might surprise you: On balance, I think it’s hurt more than it’s helped. People in the industry had heard of Fred Trump, my grandfather. And when I introduced myself, I would often get the raised eyebrow of recognition. Yeah, I’ve heard that name! But as time went on, as my grandfather got older and less engaged, as my uncle Donald got more famous and increasingly controversial, there would be plenty of people who recoiled at the Trump name.
I had accounts I was pulled from. I had deals where I was told, “Stay in the background, okay? Keep a low profile.” There were clients and companies that simply would not deal with someone named Trump. And eventually, some client at dinner, three drinks in, would be asking me to defend some crazy political position that had nothing to do with my own views and chances are I didn’t even agree with. There were a lot of exchanges along the lines of:
“How can you defend that?”
Donald was a showman. Bombastic. And most of his comments that made the news were things I disagreed with. I spent a lot of time reiterating, “I don’t defend it. I don’t even agree with it.”
It could be a Trump lover or a Trump hater, either one. There were plenty of both. But the name was increasingly becoming a lightning rod in the real world. And I didn’t live in the bubble of the family company. I was out there on my own every day.
I understood. All families have baggage. But some days, it felt like I was hauling around a steamer trunk.
That said, the vast majority of my experiences in the work world were highly positive. I was doing well in my career. I got increasing levels of responsibility. I had great relationships with my bosses and colleagues. My income kept rising. I enjoyed going to work and serving the clients and making deals and doing it my way, on my own. And in the end, no one was going to sign a million-dollar lease just because one of the people on the other side of the table was related to someone. I just hoped it didn’t turn them off so quickly they wouldn’t hear what I had to say. And usually that worked out fine.
Still, the T-name was always there, and I understood: It always would be. I just didn’t know quite how much.
Excerpted with permission from All in the Family: The Trumps and How We Got This Way, Fred Trump, Simon and Schuster.
