Elam Freeman didn't fit the traditional brokerage mold. Where most firms reward individual production, she wanted something more collaborative — a place where knowledge gets shared, where a rising tide lifts all ships, and where the client benefits from the full weight of the team, not just the broker in the room. So in July 2020, in the middle of a pandemic, she started Ojas Partners.

Today Ojas Partners has 16 people, a culture built on transparency and curiosity, and a front-row seat to one of the most exciting retail real estate markets in the country. In this episode, Brett sits down with Elam to talk about building a brokerage from scratch, what Nashville has become, and where it's headed next.

What you'll hear in this episode:

• The Ojas Partners model and why collaboration isn't just a value… it's infrastructure. Elam talks about how using tools like Asana has allowed a team of 16 to stay genuinely aligned, with every broker able to walk into a conversation knowing what the rest of the team already knows. It sounds simple. Most firms never pull it off.
• Hiring for curiosity above everything else. Elam's non-negotiable isn't experience or credentials; it's genuine interest. She describes her team's collective curiosity as the common thread behind their success, and explains why a broker who doesn't care deeply about a client's business beyond the square footage requirements is already at a disadvantage.
• What Nashville looked like when she started and what changed. Elam grew up in Nashville, left for school on the West Coast, and came back to a city that was just starting to percolate. She spent years flying to New York, sleeping on a friend's couch, walking the streets to scout new concepts, coming home, and cold calling them. That groundwork paid off when the pandemic-era influx hit and Nashville suddenly became one of the most in-demand markets in the country.
• The deal that told her Nashville was playing in a different league. Signing Equinox, a brand that was simultaneously evaluating Charlotte and Atlanta, was the moment Elam knew Nashville wasn't just growing. It was punching above its weight class, driven not just by demographics but by cultural credibility that bigger markets couldn't manufacture.
• The neighborhoods worth watching. Elam breaks down what's happening beyond 12 South and the Gulch: Wedgwood Houston (where her office is and where she walks to work most days), Germantown, and East Nashville.
• She also talks about the Hagen Gallery project, a retail-first development she's been involved with from land acquisition through design and now into leasing, as a case study in what intentional neighborhood development actually looks like.
• The persistence that never goes away. Even now, Elam still comes back from weekend trips to New York with 50 new tenants loaded into the system. The tools have changed. The tenacity hasn't.