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While conducting media interviews to promote their new season of HGTV‘s “Married to Real Estate” over the last several days, Egypt Sherrod and Mike Jackson have frequently been asked how they keep the romance alive when they’re working together all the time.
Sherrod is a high-powered real estate broker in the Atlanta area, and Jackson is a contractor managing home renovations on their show. The couple, who’s been together for 18 years and have two young daughters at home, has revealed some of the ways they squeeze romance into their busy days, even if it means ducking into a closet while on the job.
Sherrod Jackson and Egypt Sherrod Sometimes Schedule ‘Date Hours’ on Work Days
Sherrod and Jackson were in New York City on January 9, 2023, for interviews including a chat with New York Live’s Sara Gore, who asked them how they successfully mix marriage and work.
“Well, there’s foot massages involved,” Jackson quipped. “And, depending on the day, you’ve got to take your time and have ‘you time’ and give each other our space.”
But they also find creative ways to be together, Sherrod pointed out.
“We may have a date hour where I show up to the job site and it’s like ‘shut everybody else down,'” she said. “Pull out a little bucket, and we’re gonna have lunch on the bucket. We might have date moments in the closet.”
Jackson leaned in and said, “This is not that show, okay?!”
“I was just talking about giving you a little smooch,” Sherrod replied, giggling.
The couple said each little act of romance helps them ensure they’re not letting work or parenting overshadow their identity as a couple. And because they’ve worked together since they met, balancing their professional and personal lives hasn’t been a huge issue.
Sherrod explained to Gore that they began dating after his construction crew showed up to a house-flipping project in Newark, New Jersey. When she saw Jackson take off his shirt, she was smitten.
“I knew she would be there, so I did a few extra push-ups on the way there,” Jackson joked.
Egypt Sherrod Likes That Her Husband is an ‘Alpha Male’
GettyEgypt Sherrod and Mike Jackson of HGTV’s “Married to Real Estate”
Though they’ve clearly figured out ways to stay romantically connected, Sherrod and Jackson have previously revealed rougher times in their marriage. In August 2022, Sherrod received lots of fan feedback on an Instagram post in which she shared that her husband had called her “man-ish.”
“For years it has been all about my kids and building my business,” she wrote. “So much that I forgot how to be a woman.. a soft woman that is. My husband told me a few months ago that I had become ‘man-ish’ and it cut me to my core. He honestly didn’t mean it in a bad way. We are honest with one another and he was expressing a concern and observation about how I’d become so bullish for my clients and family.”
While some of her followers took issue with his comment, Sherrod defended Jackson, saying that although his perspective hurt at first, it also inspired her to intentionally become more feminine again for the sake of her marriage.
She wrote, “I started pulling back out the cute clothes, the lingerie, flirting with him, but more so listening to him and my divine inner feminity.. ME!”
On the second episode of the couple’s new podcast, “Marriage and Money,” featuring a conversation with married couple Trina Braxton and Von Scales, Sherrod said she wants Jackson to be an “alpha male” in their relationship. One example she gave was that she likes knowing he will always pay for their dinners out, noting that “chivalry is not common anymore.”
“For years, we would go out to eat at restaurants and they would automatically hand me the check,” she explained. “And it bothered me. Like, ‘Why do you assume that you’re handing me the check?’ So when they would come, I would just put it down right on the table. He instantly grabs it. That’s something that’s very attractive and sexy to me.”
Season 2 of “Married to Real Estate” premieres on HGTV on January 12, 2023, at 9 pm Eastern.