As a child living in a two-bedroom apartment with his parents and three siblings, Eli Masud dreamt of single-family homes, two-car garages and white picket fences. “I always just liked the appeal of what homes mean to families and being a part of that process,” says Masud, the founder and team leader of Second City Agents at Compass.
With a client base heavily skewed toward first-time homebuyers, Masud and his team love taking an educational approach to business. Over the last four years, they have all become experts in anticipating new buyers’ needs. “Working with a lot of the same demographic of first-time homebuyers has made it easy for me to help them find a place, usually within one to 10 showings,” explains Masud.
As a team leader, Masud is in expansion mode. He just sold a 13-unit building in West Town for $2.5 million and hopes to soon make investors a third of his overall sales. He also wants to offer listing services so he can maintain the loyalty of his first-time buyer clients as they transition into becoming first-time sellers.
Masud gained a comprehensive understanding of homebuilding, remodeling and construction at James Hardie Building Products, where he worked until the end of 2018. However, even before embarking on his seven-year corporate stint, Masud started his own limo service with his father while still in graduate school. “After finding success starting a business and working with a global company, I wanted to blend these experiences by diving headfirst into real estate,” he says.
Named among the top 200 teams of 2019 by Real Producers magazine, Masud and his team work tirelessly on behalf of their clients and maintain full transparency throughout the process. Masud received the Berkshire Hathaway Rising Star Award in 2018 and was the runner-up Rookie of the Year in Chicago Agent magazine’s Agents’ Choice Awards in 2015. He is a member of the Young Professionals Network and Business Network International and supports Foster Nation. In his free time, Masud competes in beach volleyball tournaments and takes corporate training courses at Northwestern University.
