Why a Real Estate Group, Instead of a Real Estate Agent

Why a Real Estate Group, Instead of a Real Estate Agent

Client and friends have been asking me. “What’s up with your Dreyfus Group? What does that mean? So, I thought I’d take the end of the year to talk about what our Group is and why it has come about.

The industry has changed. There is now a separation, a disintermediation in the market. Consumers don’t need as much hand-holding as they did in the past – they know more than they used to. Often not as much as they think they do, but still a lot more than ever before. One thing remains the same, though. Properties in the high net worth market need more marketing and personalized attention than other classes of real estate.

I’ve been in residential real estate for almost 30 years. Before, if you wanted to market a property, it just meant purchasing magazine and newspaper ads. Then came the internet and web placement, then video, then drones. Now we have augmented reality. All these new tools are added to the ones that came before, and that is expensive. You need skill and cash to do it right, particularly when you are paid only at the successful closing of a deal.

Add to this mix our 24/7 world. Consumers have instant access to real estate information and expect instant access to the homes they see and the agents representing them. Agents on their own cannot be available enough to respond to these demands.

Because of these pressures agents have started forming teams to offer better service to more customers and share the resources and expenses to help them succeed. In addition, existing experienced and successful listing agents are opting to lead these groups and leverage their knowledge and skill. The combination of skilled, well financed real estate agents with quality team agents has resulted in a new level of service and marketing for home sellers.

Over the past year, I began adding to my existing team more quality agents who can service clients from all areas of our market, adding five capable agents to our group. Each agent offers his or her own level of service and expertise surrounding the Mid-Peninsula market, and that allows us to broaden our scope of services level of marketing for our listings.

As a result of our initiatives, The Dreyfus Group successfully completed 33 transactions with a combined value of over $180 million, at an average sale price of $5.5 million.  This is more than double our 2017 figures of 16 transactions and sales of $89 million. A group can handle more properties and service clients better, it’s just that simple. 

And we can spread our efforts and resources more efficiently and for the biggest impact. Each property we represent gets an extensive marketing package developed by our exceptional marketing team – local, regional, national and international exposure through print and digital media as well as targeted social media. I am proud of our marketing plans for 2019 – they are bigger and better than ever before.

Additionally, through our affiliation with Sotheby’s, we have the power to connect our clients with other quality agents located all over the world, while continuing to offer the local, personal service and trust that you have grown to expect from us.

What will 2019 hold for The Dreyfus Group? During 2018, we found our way into our own roles and who we are as a group. In the coming year, we will build on that progress and let the business create the growth, adding new talent to our group as needed to maintain our level of service.

As for what I see for the industry in 2019, it’s my opinion that we will see further disintermediation – a reduction in the use of intermediaries between properties and consumers – at certain levels of the real estate market. Some areas of the country with lower price points will be sourced differently, but our Bay Area real estate market is going the other way. It’s getting harder, not easier, to sell houses. Clients require personalized, hands-on service tailored to their needs. This makes what The Dreyfus Group is doing the future of high-end real estate. If you have a house in this class that you are putting on the market, you need a special kind of agent with the skills, experience and resources to serve you best. 

The Dreyfus Group now offers you six.

Mike