Don Ha is one of the most familiar faces in New Zealand real estate. His 27-year career in the industry has included making millions and winning top awards through to going into receivership and climbing his way back out again. Now the CEO of RE/MAX New Zealand, Ha – who came to this country as a refugee aged 12 – reveals how he got to where he is today.
Q: What did you do before real estate?
Ha: I was a baker. After my family came here from Vietnam, my father had bakeries so working in one was my weekend job when I was at school then my full-time job, and I graduated to my own business. But I always wanted to be famous. I thought I would do it through martial arts or being a movie star, like Bruce Lee. But being in this country, they put me as a Korean fisherman at Piha or on Crimewatch. I thought, I am not going to get famous playing this sort of character. I never expected to be recognized because of real estate.
Q: How did you get into real estate?
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Ha: One day in 1991, a man walked into my bakery. He was dressed up and I asked what he did for a living. He said he was a real estate agent. I said, “How many houses have you sold this week?” He said two. I asked how much money he’d earned, he said $12,000. I decided to get into real estate after that.
Every Monday was my day off so I went to a company in Papatoetoe to study for my papers with the boss there. I passed in September 1994 and went to work with a company that had just been bought by a new boss. Nobody was interested in me. They put me at a desk next door to the toilet. I was 26 but I was shy about asking for help – being Asian and working in a European environment is very intimidating. I had to ask a friend who worked for an opposition company to help with things like appraisals because everyone in my company seemed too busy.
Ha on getting started: “I had Don Ha, Licensed To Print Money on my business card.” Photo / Fiona Goodall
My father told me I wouldn’t make it. He said, “Being Asian, how can you beat these people at their game?” My community said the same thing. Their mindset was you have to work in a bakery to make money. But I thought I could do it.
Q: Can you remember the first house you sold?
Ha: It was in my first month. It was worth $50,000. It wasn’t my listing so my share of the commission was $750. I thought this was a lot of money and wow, I just have to talk to make money. The second month I sold three houses and I didn’t know if this was good or bad, nobody in the company told me. So I kept going.
I didn’t know my licence was only to sell residential property, so I door-knocked on businesses in South Auckland – bakeries, butchers, supermarkets, service stations, dairies. Nobody wanted to sell their business but some of them had houses they wanted to sell. I always gave my business card out. I thought I should have a motto, like James Bond has Licensed To Kill. So I had Don Ha, Licensed To Print Money on my business card. I even gave out my business card to a policeman when he pulled me over. I got a ticket, but I have now sold 11 houses to this one policeman.
Q: When did you realise you were doing well?
Ha: My goal was to earn $50,000 in a year. I asked, “How many hours a week does the number one agent in the company work?” My boss said 50. I had been working 72 hours a week in the bakery so I thought, I will work 84 and beat the top agent. In my first year I sold 86 houses, a total of $10.8m. They brought in over $400,000 in fees for the company but they still didn’t tell me if I was doing any good.
Then I went to the annual awards and I was a finalist in the Real Estate Institute Rookie of the Year and I was rookie of the year for my company and number one salesperson of the year. I virtually cried.
I was only getting paid 40% of the commission but it seemed like too much to me. In the last month of the financial year, the year I wanted to make $50,000, I made $53,000 after tax. For one month.
Q: What’s the secret of your success?
Ha: I’m very competitive. I always want to do better. And I have the will power to help people with what they want. I am always available and I will do whatever it takes. When I was first starting out in South Auckland, there was a house in Papatoetoe for sale that was owned by an old man in Albany. The commission was only for $750 so nobody from the office was prepared to drive up to Albany to see him. I decided I would. I didn’t know how to read a map and I got lost. When I finally got there he said, “You are the only one from South Auckland who was prepared to drive up here to see me. I’ve got 10 more houses for you to sell.”
And at the beginning of my career, I saw a big subdivision being built in Mangere. The houses weren’t selling. I went to see the developer and said, “I want a joint listing with the company who are selling the houses. And after eight weeks, whoever sells more gets to have the whole listing.”
Ha with his wife Mohini in 2007 after buying race horse for $2m. Photo / Richard Robinson
He asked how I was going to sell these houses that nobody else could. I said I would get people to be my friends and help them with saving for a deposit. The houses were $100,000 so they needed a five per cent deposit and money for lawyers’ fees.
I talked to some people who had $2,000 saved, I said to them, “Move into the sleepout with your uncle and start saving. Get your wife a job.” When they got to $4000, the husband rang me in the middle of the night to tell me. We only had home phones in those days; I was living at home and I had to get a phone in my bedroom. If my mum picked it up and didn’t know what they were saying – she doesn’t speak English – she would just hang up.
I said, “Great, now we choose a house lot and a design.” It took four months to build the house and in those months he saved another $2000 for the deposit. It is probably worth a million now. A couple of years ago he rang me and said, “Don, because of you, we have a home and we can take the family to Sydney for our holidays.”
It is helping others to get what they want first, before you get what you want. After eight weeks, I had sold six houses and the other agent had sold nothing. So they signed the whole 35 properties over to me to list.
Q: What have been some of the high and low points of your career?
Ha: When I became rookie of the year and number one salesperson, that was a high point. I was later number one in another company and the international number two of the year. For an uneducated person with no degrees, that was beyond what I could ever imagine.
The lowest point of my life was being at the height of my game and then along came the GFC. I went into receivership and lost everything. I felt worse than when I came here as a 12-year-old refugee because my control was taken away from me. But I am glad it happened because I learned a lesson from it. I came back better than before.
Ha: “I went into receivership and lost everything. I felt worse than when I came here as a 12-year-old refugee.” Photo / Fiona Goodall
Q: How did you do that?
Ha: A friend who is a developer in Singapore was very supportive of me. He said, “Don, you are a tall tree. When the wind comes it will blow the top off but the trunk will stand. I know you and I know what you can do.” He gave me a 162-site development to manage and sell for him, and he reset my career. The brand I was with terminated me because I had gone into receivership so I became my own independent brand, Don Ha Real Estate. I had been selling $150m worth of property a year; on my own I did $750m a year. I realised then it is people and relationships that will get you there.
Q: Why did you give up your own business to go to RE/MAX?
Ha: They approached me but I said I don’t need to be part of you, I am good enough on my own. But I realised you can only achieve so much on your own. RE/MAX is a big company – 140,000 agents in 110 countries. They have a book called Everyone Wins and in it, it says one log of wood makes a lousy fire, 1000 logs of wood make a big fire. Don Ha was that one log, 1000 logs is when you are part of an international franchise. It also talks about an American developer who says, “Why do I need RE/MAX?” and the answer is, “We can take you to the world.” And that’s what I wanted. Now the world knows who I am.
In March this year the Don Ha project sales team was awarded the number one transaction team by RE/MAX International. This is another high point of my career.
Q: How did it feel when you were able to buy the RE/MAX New Zealand master franchise?
Ha: It wasn’t a life-changing moment, it was more of a generation-changing moment. It is beyond dreams. I came here as a refugee, now I provide employment for people, I provide leadership, I provide wealth. Since April last year we have opened a new office every three weeks. To be a CEO is a lot of responsibility, but I have a lot of experience through all of my hardship and I can help people.
Q: What do you do in your spare time?
Ha: I still work 72 hours a week, there is not a lot of spare time. I play a bit of golf when I can. I have three children so in the school holidays we travel and that is when I take a break. I couldn’t do what I do without my wife Mohini, she runs the family.
Even when I am not doing real estate, my time is busy with things like being a trustee of the Light For Life charity. We donate money to six charities.
People say, “Don, do you have hobby?” I say, “My hobby is real estate”. It doesn’t feel like work when you love what you do.
