Allison Sheffield

CELEBRATING LEADERS

PHOTOS BY JJ SHEFFIELD/CONTENT VIDEO PRODUCTIONS | STORY BY KEVIN GREEN

WHEN DREAMS BECOME REALITY

Even from a young age, Allison Sheffield had a mind for real estate.

She didn't quite know it at that time, but she remembers marveling at the fancy homes around her area of Tulsa. They seemed more elaborate and desirable than her living arrangements, and she often wondered how people afforded such lavish amenities.

Homeownership seemed like an elusive dream to Sheffield, whose single-parent household jumped from home to home chasing cheaper rent. She estimates they moved up to 12 times during her childhood.

Sheffield's father was present in her life but lived in Texas, while her mother struggled to make ends meet as a hairstylist.

At least staying within in the Union Public Schools district provided some sort of consistency in her life.

"To me, we were making it when we were living in two-bedroom apartments or we got to go to a duplex instead of an apartment."

BUILDING A BETTER FUTURE

Wanting to create a better life for herself, Sheffield took action.

She began developing her work ethic by immersing herself in the restaurant industry as a 15-year-old high schooler, starting as a hostess at Pepper’s Grill — a Tex-Mex eatery once located at 61st and Sheridan in Tulsa — before moving on to help open Famous Dave’s Bar-B-Que at 71st and Memorial and work at Full Moon Cafe on East 15th Street between Peoria and Utica.

Although all three locations have since closed their doors, Sheffield retains fond memories from her time in that line of work.

“I wore a wooden pig name tag (from Famous Dave’s) that said ‘Famous Allison’ on it, and I still have that one,” Sheffield said. “It was a great experience, and that was mostly just a job — the way to make income.”

She continued working in the food-service industry while taking classes for two years at Tulsa Community College, and not even a move to Norman to attend the University of Oklahoma could slow her desire to work.

In addition to working toward a degree in Letters — which OU.edu describes as a major focusing on history, literature, philosophy and language, both ancient and modern — Sheffield juggled three jobs simultaneously.

Regardless of whether she was serving customers at Charleston's, setting tables at La Baguette Bakery & Cafe or preparing cinnamon rolls at a local coffee shop, she was always working. She’d often work shifts as early as 4:30 a.m. before heading off to class later in the morning.

“I found those three because I could kind of stagger the shifts around my school schedule, and it worked really well,” Sheffield said. “It was enough income to get by. There were occasional times where I'd schedule a day off here and there, but for the most part, I worked. That was what I did. Classes I tried to do in the mornings and early afternoons and then stagger (work shifts) in. Fortunately, a couple of those places you could kind of pick your shifts, so it wasn't like I worked all three of them every day. Some of them were a couple of days a week, and then the others filled in the gaps. I was not a part of a sorority, I was not part of anything. I went to school, and I worked.”

According to Sheffield, most people pursued a Letter degree in hopes of advancing to a graduate program of some sort, and for a while, that is what she wanted to do as well.

However, working three jobs while being a student was starting to take its toll.

By the time she earned her bachelor’s degree, she wanted to focus on building a career rather than continuing the endless cycle of work and school.

That is when real estate came into the picture.

MAKING THE MOVE

After graduating from OU, Sheffield moved back to Tulsa and immediately started looking for new opportunities.

She narrowed her options to a sales and administration job at DHL Shipping and an administrator role at a local real estate company, ultimately choosing the latter. She is glad she did.

During the first 10 years of her real estate career, Sheffield worked an average of 50 weekends per year doing open houses, putting in 12-13-hour days. She described putting in massive amounts of focus and effort, paired with an extraordinary amount of time sacrificed away from friends and family. 

Sheffield has always valued telling the truth, learning to know as much as possible about the industry and homes she’s selling and working to have great relationships with others in the industry. Her work ethic and reputation has opened doors for Sheffield to help hundreds of local families buy and sell existing and new construction homes.

“I've seen extraordinary success,” Sheffield said. “I've gotten to personally sell over $400 million in real estate in my time, and that's crazy. Over 800 houses I’ve gotten to sell.” 

There is a lot of heart and hard work behind those numbers. 

Success in real estate is not easy. Through nearly 15 years of marriage, having babies and raising young children, it has taken an unusual work ethic for Sheffield to get to where she is today.

Even the first house she bought back in 2007, which was worth $70,000 at the time and has since multiplied to around $200,000 since she started renting it out, was a dream come true. She and her husband J.J. have now built a handful of homes and own several investment properties.

Now, Sheffield is among the top real estate professionals in the Tulsa area, representing home builders while also dealing with existing homes through her own real estate company, Sheffield Realty, which began operations in July 2022.

“It’s a brand-new brokerage, and I’m excited to see how it evolves and grows,” Sheffield said. “It’s been extremely energizing and a little bit terrifying, but it’s thrilling to have something new to work on. Every client is different, every property is different and this brokerage is different. We are partnering with agents of high character and ethics who utilize a concierge level approach to serving their clients in real estate transactions.”  

As a leader in the industry, Sheffield is also serving for a third year on the Board of Directors at the Greater Tulsa Association of Realtors, as well as for the Oklahoma Association of Realtors. 

IN HINDSIGHT

Sheffield is a spiritual woman, and she said she believes none of her success happened by accident.

When she was working at restaurants, she thought it was just a means to an end. She never wanted to be broke again and never wanted to return home to a notice on the door that the electricity was going to be turned off.

For her, that was the driving factor in establishing a relentless work ethic. Going backward wasn’t an option.

Looking back on everything she endured, from the childhood struggles to her strenuous work-life balance in college and beyond, Sheffield realized it was God using those situations to shape her into a successful businesswoman.

Her childhood lifestyle motivated her to become a hard worker, and the skills she learned from the labor in her young-adult years have yielded fruit in her current career. They prepared her for life after the service industry in ways she never would’ve expected back then.

“The way that God uses everything that we do to set us up for what we do in the future is so remarkable,” Sheffield said. “There are so many lessons I learned in the food service business dealing with people … In good ways — having to put yourself aside, no matter what you're dealing with … you have to show up there with a smile on your face and be ready to serve people and act like they’re the first person you've seen today.”

The same translates to Sheffield’s philosophy of working with clients now.

“Serve them with joy and gladness,” she added.

A DREAM COME TRUE

If Sheffield’s adolescent self could have seen her life now — living in a 4,000-square foot new construction home with an amazing husband, two flourishing children and an award-winning career — she would’ve been in awe, proud and grateful.

“My kids have a totally different life,” Sheffield said. “Not that there's anything wrong with the way I grew up, it was more of a I didn't understand how actually possible it was to do more. It seemed so completely impossible and unattainable to me as a kid, but it's pretty simple. Not easy, but simple. 

“Grit. Expertise. Hard work. Gratitude. Repeat.”