His mother Jeannie was born and raised in Dayton. His dad, Mehdi is originally from Iran.
Mehdi moved the family to Kettering where Mo, his brother Reza and sister Mariam went to Kettering Schools.
Zahedi graduated from Kettering Fairmont High School in 2002 and now lives in Dayton.
“My mom worked at Mead and my dad is a locksmith and has his own business,” Zahedi said. “My mom and dad ended up working together.”
After high school, he decided to start working right away. But with his friends going off to college, he thought he should do the same.
“I went to the University of Tennessee but didn’t have an idea of what I wanted to do,” Zahedi said. “I moved down there and didn’t have a direction and realized it wasn’t good for me.”
Zahedi moved back home and his aunt helped him get a job with Verizon Wireless, where he thrived, becoming a top salesperson in his first few years on the job.
“I kept climbing the corporate ladder, but I guess you’d say I hit a glass ceiling after four years because I didn’t have a college degree,” Zahedi said. “I kept getting turned down for higher level jobs.”
He decided to attend Wright State University and chose to major in English Literature because he wanted to travel and teach English as a second language. After graduating in 2009, he spent a year traveling abroad.
“I wanted to teach in Spain, but I missed the deadline to apply and didn’t want to wait a year,” Zahedi said.
He ended up in Columbus, working for Sherwin Williams. There his path changed once again, and he took a position at Riverside Hospital in upper management.
He loved the job and started thinking about getting an advanced degree.
“I was accepted to Ohio University for a master’s program in hospital administration,” Zahedi said.
Zahedi had been restoring a 130-year-old home in Columbus and when he rented it out, he was able to afford to take a leap of faith. He decided to join his brother, Reza and a cousin in Colorado, where both had careers in real estate.
“I realized if I didn’t attempt to do something on my own, my path would be set for me,” Zahedi said.
In 2016, Zahedi moved to Denver, where he remained for eight months. He loved spending time with his brother in Denver and his cousin in Colorado Springs.
“I realized real estate was an industry with many paths,” Zahedi said. “I had the ability to control my own narrative.”
Though he was working to create new social circles, Zahedi realized that success in the real estate business depended upon knowing an area well.
“I knew I’d have better success in the place I grew up,” Zahedi said. “I moved back home in October of 2016.”
After attending a real estate class, Zahedi passed the test and became a licensed Realtor in Ohio. He started working with Home Experts Realty.
Evan Kloth, one of Zahedi’s long-time friends, was working at Sinclair Community college and had worked his way into a corporate role. He told Zahedi that he had a real estate license himself and was doing that part time.
“I reached out to Evan and asked him how he felt about working with me full time,” Zahedi said. “We opened our own office with Home Experts in 2017.”
As the pair was working to recruit and train agents and begin building a culture, they realized they were doing something unique. Six months into 2018, they both decided to get their brokers licenses.
“By December of 2018, we both spoke to the owners of Home Experts and told them our goal was to be brokers,” Zahedi said. “We let them know we were stepping away at the beginning of 2019.”
That year marked the beginning of Glass House Realty. Nine people who worked with Kloth and Zahedi decided to move to Glass House with them. After months of deliberation, the pair landed on Glass House as the name because they liked the idea of bringing more transparency to real estate, which is closer to the way the business is handled in Colorado.
“The way it has always been done in Dayton has been a bit antiquated I think,” Zahedi said. “There has always been a closed-door mentality and the idea that training new agents was creating competition.”
Zahedi and Kloth wanted to train new agents and experienced agents together and treat everyone the same. Today, Glass House has 270 agents and 11 offices. They work on building a reputation designed to encourage agents and customers to reach out to them.
Zahedi said they want to continue to grow intentionally but with the industry constantly changing, it’s difficult to predict what’s on the horizon for Glass House.
“Whether it was ignorance or optimism,” Zahedi said. “It has always been fun for us.”
About the Author
