As President and CEO of the Nick Shivers Team at Keller Williams Portland Central, Nick Shivers heads one of the top real estate teams in Oregon and Southwest Washington, as well as My Rocket Listing, an iBuyer program he successfully launched several years ago.
Most importantly to Shivers, who was named one of just 13 Newsmaker Hall of Fame inductees this year, is Sell a Home, Save a Child (SAHSAC), a nonprofit organization he co-founded three-and-a-half years ago.
SAHSAC has raised nearly $1.7 million to transform the futures of children in Haiti, Kenya, Nicaragua, Mexico and the U.S. The organization helps feed, clothe, house, educate, protect and guide children in deeply impoverished areas. As a founder, Shivers has partnered with clients and other real estate professionals to rescue thousands of children from human trafficking, prostitution and addiction.
Here, Shivers discusses what it means to be named a 2020 Real Estate Newsmaker and the impact SAHSAC has had on his life, as well as his own children's lives.
RISMedia's Real Estate Newsmakers honors were created to recognize the people who are raising the standards of professionalism in the real estate industry. What does it mean to be named among this year's 300 honorees?
Super surprising and humbling. The people that are on this list are incredible Newsmakers who are making a huge difference in the real estate industry. I'm humbled to be associated with them. I always love to learn from the best.
You were selected as one of just 13 inductees to this year's Newsmaker Hall of Fame for the headlines you made in 2019. Could you touch on My Rocket Listing, the successful iBuyer program you launched a few years ago?
It started because I met Eric Wu [co-founder and CEO of the $3.8 billion real estate start-up Opendoor] about five years ago and I asked him a simple question: How are you going to make money? He told me that he didn't need to make money for about 10 years. I thought he had a great idea...trying to simplify the real estate transaction. I created My Rocket Listing to help guide and simplify the home-selling process. One thing that the iBuyers miss is the emotional aspect of home-buying, but we decided to introduce our program three years ago so that we could bring the concept to our market.
What's the biggest misconception newer agents have about iBuyer programs?
The biggest misconception is that they have to hide from it. However, my philosophy, and part of the reason why I started My Rocket Listing, is to talk about the elephant in the room.
Could you tell us about the nonprofit Sell a Home, Save a Child that you co-founded? How did it get started, and what's your mission?
It's my passion. It's my love. The mission is that everyone wants to make a difference, but they get too busy or they don't know how to do it. We want to simplify that by getting people who are mostly in the real estate industry to get a monthly membership that allows you to incorporate a mission or a "why" to your business. I believe that participating in the nonprofit builds culture. Most people that work with you want to know that it's about you giving and not taking. We're serving people—our clients—and saving kids, and we're doing it by selling real estate. We've now raised about $1.7 million in less than four years.
What's it like to personally travel to countries like Nicaragua and Haiti to rescue children?
It has changed my life. I believe it's changed my children's lives, as well, and I've gotten way more out of it than I can ever give. In return trips to those countries, it has hopefully shown those people that we care. For those of us that have gone on those trips, it becomes very hard to ignore people whose names you know and whose children you have held in your arms.
To view Shivers' full 2020 Newsmaker profile, click here. Click here to see the full list of the 2020 Newsmakers.
