Our Story
The Short Version
Our journey started after noticing many of our clients were being underserved by the real estate community. How can we make this claim? Before brokerage Nicholas Cook owned and operated Sleep Sound Property Management where he and his team would regularly see clients purchase or sell their homes and rental property. In many instances the brokers that represented them didn’t have general knowledge of how to conduct a transaction when the property was tenant-occupied or what to obtain from a seller when their client was buying a rental property. This often led to frustration among Sleep Sound clients and residents.
After witnessing this over and over we decided to broaden our services to better serve our clients and community. We launched Rise Realty, Inc. in March of 2015 and have been thrilled to make a difference ever since.
The Long Version
Nicholas Cook was born in Calcutta, India and adopted at 4 months old by two loving parents who had put down roots in Portland in the 1970’s.
At the age of 13 it dawned on Nicholas Cook that one day he would not only have to support himself, but eventually he would be responsible for caring for his older brother who was diagnosed with Autism. Overwhelmed by the thought and unsure of how he would do this, Nicholas looked into different professions that would allow him to support himself and his brother one day. A few months after he had this realization Nicholas was introduced to a book titled Rich Dad Poor Dad by a friend’s parent who happened to be reading it. With no preexisting notions of what financial literacy meant Nicholas quickly absorbed the information and decided real estate might be the answer he was looking for.
Years went by before Nicholas was able to do anything with the knowledge he had, albeit very little.
At age 17 Nicholas met a coffee shop owner who actually happened to be a real estate investor. That investor introduced Nicholas to a few books and told him to attend a local real estate investor group.
Hungry for knowledge Nicholas used what money he had to join the investor club. He attend nearly every meeting for over 2 years.
Nicholas soon discovered real estate involved countless topics of interest to him such as history, law, economics, business, finance, sociology and more. He was hooked.
At 19, Nicholas started his first business with a childhood friend. They saved every paycheck they earned at their retail jobs and passed out door hangers advertising their interest in buying a house with the intention of fixing it up to sell it.
After 6 months of work they found their first seller and successfully rehabbed and sold their first house. It wasn’t an easy task and Nicholas and his business partner Dave walked away with $1000 each to show for their 6 months of work. Even though the deal was not as lucrative as they had hoped, they learned a lot and Nicholas knew he had found his passion.
Nicholas proceeded to buy and sell houses for another 4 years as an investor. During this time he worked on his Bachelors in Real Estate Finance by attending night school at Portland State.
In 2008, Nicholas formed Sleep Sound Property Management, Inc. a company that manages and leases homes, plexes and apartments.
After witnessing brokers represent his clients in the purchase and sale of rental property over the years it became clear that most agents had very little knowledge on how to represent investor’s adequately. Nicholas Cook formed Rise Realty, Inc. with a mission of doing more.
