NYC Agent Katya Nadirova Celebrates a Career-Best Deal 

Katya Nadirova is marking a major career milestone this month.  

Nearly a decade ago, when she joined Douglas Elliman, Nadirova was a single mom with two small children navigating a turbulent divorce, new to real estate and, as she put it, “completely broke.” 

Now, New York City-based agent has just helped her client close on the $18-million purchase of a townhouse on the Upper East Side. In addition to being ranked as the No. 1 contract in NYC in the June 15-21 edition of Olshan Luxury Market Report, the deal was a featured exclusive in New York Post’s Gimmer Shelter column. 

“This success required a lot of persistence, endurance, willpower, years of learning to meet the demands of luxury clients and never giving up,” Nadirova said. “And it wouldn't have been possible if I didn’t have such an amazing community at Douglas Elliman that has always had my back.” 

In a recent conversation with Elliman Insider, Nadirova reflected on this pivotal moment in her career, how much she’s accomplished in the past decade, and what excites her about the next stage of her professional journey. 

Congratulations on this wonderful milestone! What makes this deal so meaningful for you? 

It’s certainly the biggest deal of my real estate career in terms of the price point. But also, when I started out in this business, the idea of selling a townhouse seemed so hard to imagine. Now, it's clear that it was a matter of time and experience and building on each step to keep growing more. 

Take us back to when you first started out. What led you to become a real estate agent? 

It was absolutely by chance. Up to that point, I'd worked for almost 15 years in different international organizations and educational projects in various countries, including UNICEF and the UN Development Program. I was a newly single mom with two kids, so I was looking for work that would give me more flexibility. A friend of mine who was a broker invited me to lunch and told me about her work, and then she introduced me to her manager. Within three or four months, I got my license and started working. Of course, I learned pretty quickly that residential real estate doesn’t exactly give you flexibility, but I never regretted it because I also learned that my personality and previous career made me well-suited to advise people on these major life decisions. 

Tell us about your very first deal as an agent. 

My very first deal was actually international. My previous work helped with that because I really understood the buyer — a UN employee who was based in Maldives and wanted to buy an apartment near the UN building. I found a small studio in Tudor City for something like $300,000. But it was very memorable because I was absolutely a newbie, and this person who was not in New York put her full trust in me. We became great friends, and we still laugh about how we managed to pull it off across multiple time zones! 

Tell us about this latest deal. In what ways was it different from that first one? 

I obviously know much more about the business now, but the way I work with my clients hasn’t changed. I'm authentic and honest with them and able to develop the trust you need for any deal, no matter how big or small.  

This recent deal also involved international buyers who were moving from Europe. They were staying in a hotel and had a limited amount of time to make a decision, so we had to move very quickly and very efficiently. I had an Excel file with about 90 different properties. We’d meet every morning at 10, have a full day of showings until 5, and then come back to my office or their hotel room to regroup, discuss what we saw that day and apply it to what we went to see the next day.  

It was a lot of collaboration, and it was challenging in a way but also fun because we got to see a lot, and I got to learn more about my clients. There was a lot of camaraderie, and we became very close through the process. 

You mentioned that the idea of selling a townhouse seemed so far away when you started out. Did you have any particular goals or an idea of what success looked like back then? 

Honestly, these types of numbers were so hard to imagine. I just knew that I needed to expose myself to the business, to the coaching and to all the knowledge before I could be of value to someone. But, of course, I knew that if I was going to do something, I’d want to be good at it, because what's the point otherwise?  

So, has this deal changed your mindset about what's possible and what comes next? 

Well, the sky's the limit, right? It makes me hungrier more. And that’s really the advantage of being at Douglas Elliman.  

I started as a very junior broker. I've been on several teams. I left for another brokerage and came back again. And I can tell you that what you get as an agent at Elliman, you do not get anywhere else because Elliman just attracts top-tier people. I’ve been very fortunate to work with these people and see how they run their businesses and work with clients. The Elliman community gives you the opportunity to learn more than anywhere else. But you have to take that opportunity. You have to make the effort to learn from these people, and if you do, it can help you tremendously.  

I can honestly say that part of this success from the biggest deal of my career so far is thanks to the Elliman brokers and managers who mentored me. Nobody succeeds alone!