Introduction Time
Hi, I’m Lara Thompson Schellenger. I am a Real Estate Agent and REALTOR practicing in the Charleston, South Carolina, area. As a Real Estate Sales Agent I don’t sell houses, I sell myself and my service. I don’t care which house you buy, but I do care that you use me. So, I hope this will help you get to know me and feel comfortable using me for your real estate needs.
I grew up in the small town of Richlands, Virginia. Richlands is in the far western part of the state in the Appalachian Mountains. My dad was an Engineer in the coal mines and my mom was a banker. Growing up I always pictured myself as a career woman. I’d wear nice business clothes, carry a briefcase, and wear high heels. Those were my only real job requirements, ha!
When I was a little girl one of my favorite toys were my legos, I loved to build houses with them. I’m not sure how it started, but I came across an Architectural Digest magazine and made my mom get me a subscription. I was around 12. Thinking back I can remember always looking up to a family friend who was a Real Estate Agent. She was really friendly, connected to the community, and just generally seemed to have her stuff together!
When it was time to go to college, I knew I must go, but didn’t know where. Thankfully with my mom’s direction I attended a junior college for two years and then transferred to Virginia Tech where I majored in Psychology. I saw myself becoming a Psychologist. My friends always told me I was such a good listener, and called me Dr. Lara because I seemed to always help everyone solve their problems. I still like the sound of “Dr. Lara,” but I felt that becoming a Psychologist would take too much of an emotional toll on me.
After college I followed a boy to the northern Virginia suburbs of DC. Housing prices are super expensive there, so I thought, “what is a job where I can get a discount on rent?” I started working for Post Properties as a Leasing Consultant, and the perks were nice! I wasn’t the best salesman, but my clients loved me and I was good at the admin stuff so I moved up quickly into management. It turns out that managing a high-end residential rental community is like running a small city! You manage the operations, budget, sales, marketing, staff, maintenance, client retention, etc.! I did that job for 10 years!
You think, “10 years, you must’ve liked this job?” Not so much…I became burned out, but stuck with it because I didn’t know what else to do. The perks of discounted rent were still needed, but between trying to keep upper management happy, 500+ resident clients happy, managing a $1,000,000+ budget, all while keeping expenses in check, and commuting for usually 2 hours each day, I was miserable. I often felt like I was wasting my life away…
Personally things were looking up, I had moved on to a new relationship and made a ton of friends! Living in a big city through my 20’s was fun, but I knew that it wasn’t the place for me to settle down. So many people move to Charleston because of work, but I love to explain why I chose Charleston. I wanted to move south of DC to a smaller city, but still someplace large enough to offer culture and diversity. After visiting Charleston a few times I was completely charmed! We moved in January of 2015. It was 10 degrees in DC as we were leaving and about 60 and sunny when we arrived in Charleston! I was sure I had made the right decision! I withdrew some money from my 401K and took a couple of months to decide what I should do. I applied for management and marketing positions with a lot of the area’s big companies, but I slowly started feeling the seed of the idea to do real estate sales grow in my head. I had a couple of connections in town who pointed me in the right direction and pretty soon I had my real estate license and joined an experienced agent to form a team.
I gained a great deal of experience quickly by joining someone that had been in the business locally already almost 20 years. After a couple of years my client base grew enough and my lifestyle needed to change so I set out on my own as an individual agent with Carolina One. I love being able to spend the quality time with my family and my clients in the way that I see fit. I finally felt like I had found my career! All of a sudden so many pieces of my life had come together, my childhood interest, my formal education, and my professional experience all culminated into this wonderful job where I can help people, each day is different, strong connections are key, and occasionally I’ll wear nice dress clothes, carry a briefcase, and wear high heels!