Coco Clayman-Cook's Real Estate photo and Work experience

---

My name is Coco Clayman-Cook and this is one of the headshots I used when I was working in Real Estate in Beverly Hills.  I have been in Real Estate in Beverly Hills for most of my life.  My very first job was when I was twenty years old and I worked at Hyland & Young.  I went to work for a man named  Larry Coffman who had lost his Driver's License from drinking but still had his Real Estate License. He hired me to be his Driver. Larry was the first salesperson at Hyland & Young. Jeff Hyland and Elaine Young had left working for Mike Silverman and launched their own Real Estate Company.  I also worked for Elaine Young and a woman by the name of Mikki Wood. Larry and I are featured in Elaine Young's Book that she wrote in 1979 called a Million Dollar's Down about Beverly Hills Real Estate.

I left Beverly Hills Real Estate and Hyland & Young just as interest rates skyrocketed. I decided to go back to school and get my  AA Degree at Santa Monica and then transferred to UCLA to get my Bachelor's Degree in Psychoanalysis and the Social Sciences from UCLA. I graduated Suma Cum Laude. I was accepted to USC and UCLA for their MSW program but soon realized that I had to go to work. I had rented a small single in Beverly Hills and called Alvarez, Hyland and Young to find out if anyone was looking for an Assistant.  It turned out that Victoria Lockwood was looking for an Assistant and  I interviewed with her and worked for her for a year from 1987-1988. The year that I worked for her she made  $500,000 which was a lot of money in 1987. Victoria was not happy when I quit to go out on my own. I tried to take the test and study while I was working for her but I ended up with a grade of 69% when I needed 70%.  Jeff was kind enough to give me a desk and I studied and passed the Real Estate Exam the second time I took it.  Victoria was upset with me and Jeff when I quit but after about six months we starting working together again 

I worked at Alvarez, Hyland and Young until 1990 and became an Executive Vice President the year I left working for Victoria. I found a great client who introduced me to all of his friends and by the end of my first year on my own I was making $250,000 which was enough to be promoted to an Executive Vice President at Alvarez, Hyland and Young. I worked there for just over three years and then left  over a commission dispute. I had worked for 6 months on a very complicated trade and my commission should have been $200,000 which would have been a lot of money for me. Unfortunately, my client spoke to Jeff and Jeff agreed to cut my commission in half without asking me first so I left to go to up the street and work at John Douglas up the street. I had also relapsed over close to a decade of sobriety at the time which contributed to my leaving as well. 

I went to work for a Telecommunications Company that marketed Sprint.  After my first year working there the owners decided to invest in four earthquake damaged buildings. After their initial investment they decided to pour all of the money they made in their Telecom business into their Real Estate Business and started PCS Development. I had Real Estate Experience and an Active Real Estate License so I was promoted to the run their Real Estate Development Company. I took care of every escrow and helped look for properties for them to buy on my own. I also screened all of the Commercial Real Estate Agents who were calling with their Earthquake Damaged Listings and met with Paul Jennings every morning to go over where we were on every escrow. PCSD purchased over 40 buildings and each one was in a different stage. Some were newly acquired and needed acquisition financing, others need construction financing and PCS had borrowed 13 loans from the City of LA and FEMA to rehab Earthquake Damaged Apartment and Condominium Buildings in both Sherman Oaks and Northridge. I basically took care of the Real Estate Development Business so Paul Jennings could take care of the Telecommunications Business which was a full time job. The Loans from the City of LA qualifed for tax credits as long as their were a certain amount of units dedicated to low income housing.  I was the point person with the City of Los Angeles for the low income tenants on each property. I even moved into one of their buildings after it had been rehabbed. PCS was competing with Real Estate Developers that had been around for years but quickly became a major player in Earthquake Damaged Properties. By the time I left the two owners Joe Fryzer and Paul Jennings owned over 40  Apartment and Condominium Properties plus a Commercial Office Building on Wilshire Boulevard.  I worked there for close to five years and left with a great severance package and three Residential Listings in Malibu which I shared with Joe Babajian and Judy Cycon when I returned to Residential Real Estate in 2000. 

I left PCS Development to go to work with Joe Babajian at Fred Sands in 2001. I brought my three listings with me in Malibu with me and was afraid that in the time that I had been gone I would need the help of another agent to work with. By the time I got  back the prices were the same as when I had left.   Joe gave me a few Buyers to work and shared a few listings with me but at the end of the year I had only made $65,000 which was not going to be enough for me to live on. While I was working for PCS they had bought me a condominium to live in around the corner from the office. I left making $150,000 a year and that included the condo and a car plus spa vacations every 3 months. I worked very hard for them and they appreciated it. You can read the letter from Paul Jennings in my Promotional Materials from LA Condo Lifestyles. 

My first year back in Residential Real Estate I managed to make $65,000. I had been making more than double that at PCSD. I decided that I was going to work on my own and asked around for a Coach. I had been to a Mike Ferry Seminar and one for Brian Buffini but none of their presentations' resonated with me.  I asked around for a referral for a new Coach. I was referred to Patti Kouri who had gone to Coach U. This was back in 2002 and Coaching was just beginning to be used by Executives and Business Owners. Coach Patti had been a Real Estate Agent herself and knew the Game as much as I did. But, as a TRAINED Coach she brought something else to the table that I had never had before. Working with Coach Patti made me want to be a Real Estate Coach. 

Coco had always worked in sales and had some experience in selling off all of her own belongings when she moved out of The Comstock. First, she launched a store on eBay called Coco Clayman-Cooks Closet to sell off her BH Real Estate Clothing. She saved enough to go back to work. She never expected to be home alone for so long. Her father passed away and she made a number of mistakes and eBay closed her store. She opened a new store on Etsy after she had sold off all of her own Jewelry and launched interested in Costume and Vintage Jewelry. She launched her own store on Etsy called CCCsVintageJewelry.com. When you are on disability you are allowed to make $1100 a month above what you get from SSDI, so Coco did what she learned to do in Real Estate. She searched for Jewelry that was priced low and that she could sell high. The only difference is the prices. Her profit was not as big, but it gave her something to keep her mind busy and she knew she could run the business from her home and still heal while working. The Store was doing quite well and between her SSDI money and the money from her Special Needs Trust she was making enough to live a simple life with her cat Miha. In 2017 it became hip to wear used Clothing and stores like Poshmark opened online plus a host of others. Coco is selling her vintage jewelry store right now. The Store is still active on Etsy but only so she can sell off everything last is left. Her main focus now is going to school to become a Coach and learning how to care for herself again by eating well, exercising, and creating a support system for herself.

Coco started to investigate going to a Coaching School in 2021. She wanted to go to the same school that her own Coach had gone to but ended up at at a school that was started by the same man- Thomas Leonard who is known as the Father of the Coaching Business. After months of research and learning all about how you become an accredited Coach she decided on CoachVille which was started by the same person that had started Coach U. Believe it or not there are over 200 schools that teach you how to become a Coach today as compared to twenty years ago when there were possibly a dozen of Coaching Schools. Coaching is a big business and they have Coaches for everything today from Business Coaching to Career Coaching and all kinds of specialties'. If you are going to hire a Coach Coco suggests you find someone that has attended an accredited school. There are a lot of people who call themselves a Coach after a few weekends of courses or less. Buyer Beware.