As entertainment director for the Bunkhouse Saloon, Ryan Pardey often headed home as the sun began to rise. These days? “I got up at 4:30 [a.m.] today,” he says.
Changing Course
When the Bunkhouse, one of Downtown Las Vegas’ most active music venues, shuttered in March 2020, Pardey had no way of knowing the toll the pandemic would take on the concert industry. But he already had alternate plans in place, having passed the Nevada Real Estate Exam a few months earlier.
“I thought it was something I would do during the daytime while I tended to the serious business of rock ’n’ roll at night,” says Pardey, also known on the Vegas scene for his band Halloween Town and for his close association with The Killers. “But as we learned, the pandemic had different plans for all of us.”
With the Bunkhouse still closed, perhaps permanently, the 43-year-old Pardey has fully embraced his new career, which he says isn’t as dissimilar from his old one as folks might assume. “Every client is different, the same way every band is different,” he explains. “There’s different personality types and different problems to try to work around and navigate.”
When Las Vegan Bryan Hainer began shopping for a new home in early 2021, he reached out to Pardey, whom he’d known since the latter’s days managing Cafe Espresso Roma near UNLV during the early 2000s.
“My wife and I didn’t have a great experience with our previous Realtor. Ryan helped us find a very desirable house in the Lakes within a couple of weeks,” Hainer says. “He helped connect us with a lender, with flooring people. … It was painless. He’s a natural.”
Pardey’s arrival on the real estate scene has coincided with a record-setting market. “When I became an agent, I think there were around 4,000 listings, and now I think there’s around 2,000—about three weeks worth of inventory—and there’s 20,000 agents competing for those listings,” he says. “If you’re representing a seller, selling the house will be no problem. But if you’re representing a buyer, it can be really difficult.”
Still, he says, the experience has mostly been a positive one, especially as he expands beyond the Downtown core into different parts of town—and different types of houses.
“I thought I’d be specializing in Paradise Palms and McNeil [Estates] and these sorts of neighborhoods, but when the phone rings I answer it,” says Pardey, who started out with eXp Realty before recently joining Real Broker. “I’ve sold in Spanish Trails, in Summerlin. My first sale was on the east side. I have a listing in North Las Vegas. And I’m about to do one in Calico Basin, which will be my first big, luxury listing.”
Ultimately, Pardey says, he hopes to get involved in commercial real estate—and potentially merge that with his love for the Las Vegas music scene.
“I’ll continue to sell residential homes, but I think you’ll see me pivot back Downtown sometime soon, where I can use real estate as a vehicle to maybe get involved with a live music venue.”
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