As a first-time home buyer, I was looking for an agent with the industry intelligence, appreciation…read moreof my best interests and patience to walk me through the process from start to finish - and David encompassed all of that and more. Anyone will realize after chatting with him for a couple of minutes that David's amiable real estate charm stems from a genuine desire to make sure that his client is happy - and that is hugely important when making this kind of milestone decision. I cannot imagine going through the buying process without an agent like David who pointed out new opportunities, calmly explained lengthy loan documents, patiently listened to my concerns and provided thoughtful, intelligent and actionable feedback. My buying process was well-planned, swift and without stress, primarily due to David's diligent followup with all parties, his consideration of my needs and concerns and his funny and lighthearted company throughout the entire cycle. I'm shocked at how easily he facilitated the process, and I'm incredibly grateful for his support throughout it. Point being, David is someone you want on your side when buying a home. Whether it is your first home or your tenth, he is someone who you can trust to get the job done (and to make you laugh a couple of times along the way.) I'm very happy with my experience!

As a first time homebuyer, I admit that I was a bit leary about the big scary process of buying a…read morehome. David and his colleagues at The Art of City Living made me feel completely at ease from the first moment I walked in the door. He walked me through the whole process on the first day and answered every question that I had been pondering (including the realtor and transaction fees). We set up a date on the spot to take a tour of available properties that were in my described range of interests. Fortunately for me, his knowledge of my interests and the neighborhood paid off on that first trip. We found an ideal condo and put in a bid that was accepted the following day. From the tour through closing, David had my back, answering every question and providing expert, timely service on all the paperwork associated with my purchase. He also works with a cohort of excellent professionals who provided me with all of the services that were required to close on the property. In short, David made the whole process seem easy! I highly recommend him and his group of skilled colleagues.

We had Scott Shawkey representing the seller and we were the buyer for a home. We had a $350k…read moredeposit for the purchase of a new home. When the seller had over 6 months delay in delivering the house, he proudly told our buyer broker that they preferred we walk away so that they could keep our deposit. I would think this shows he is a highly unethical realtor and I would never recommend anyone hire him because he will probably cheat you. Brokers like this should be run out of the industry because they give every other honest realtor a bad name. I hope Keller Williams realizes he is a bad apple. This is just a personal opinion based on my interactions with this highly sketchy broker.

We can't say enough good things about Kesh and Scott! They helped us with the sale of our…read moretownhouse and purchase of a new home in McLean! These guys and their team have been awesome, very responsive, knowledgeable, and easy to deal with throughout both transactions! In the past several years we have had three other property transactions and always felt like the real estate agent did not add much value to the transaction. Scott and Kesh, however, added immeasurable value; I honestly don't think either transaction could have closed without them. Moreover, their negotiation abilities are unmatched. Our townhouse sold for more than any prior one (that we know of) on our street. With regards to the new house we purchased, Scott and Kesh negotiated us a better deal than we ever imagined. We could not be happier and highly recommend them to everyone!

I chose to work with Craig McCollough because I knew him personally. I was able to meet with him…read moreinformally at first to discuss what having him as a realtor would take. I did not realize that having a realtor as the buyer was a non-negotiable! Not only do you not have to pay for them, but the seller will definitely have one, and you will need somebody on your side. Craig was fantastic. Not only did he help curate places for me to look at, he also assisted in getting me around. As a DC resident, I don't have a car, and taking a bus to look at locations would be a little bit time consuming. He was happy to drive and show me multiple locations. Craig is extremely knowledgeable about all aspects that we encountered in my real estate journey. He was also happy to explain any questions that I had, and he was available at hours he probably didn't need to be. Possibly one of the best aspects about working with Craig is that he was always happy to answer questions. I am writing this review a year after having settled, and he is always responsive and helpful when I have questions as a somewhat knowledgeable, but still first time, home buyer. I would highly recommend working with Craig for anyone who is unfamiliar with what it takes to be a buyer. Thank you so much!

We sold our house for more than we thought we could get! Thanks Dustin Warren for helping every…read morestep of the way. This team is great to work with! Their communication and attention to detail are much appreciated. We had so much fun working Dustin. Made the process so much easier and enjoyable. And on top of that, they even donated a portion of their proceeds to charity of our choice.. what a great group!

During a recent trip back to the DC area, I had the chance to meet and work with this company. I…read morehad called in to get help with homes for sale and other real estate info. Eric answered the phone and was more than helpful. He addressed my questions, showed me how to search for properties on their website, and invited me in to one of their free workshops. The workshop times didn't work well with my schedule so he offered to have an agent sit down with me off-hours. I took him up on his offer to meet an agent in person. During my trip, I've now met with Gerard 3 different times in-person. It's been a great experience and I'm glad I took the time - I've learned a lot and am leaving town having all my questions and concerns answered.

We used UrbanLand to list our property in Glover Park. We no longer live in DC area and had renters…read morefor a few years. Gerard and Trish were a God-sent for us. They helped us get the property in selling condition: they handled dealing with contractors and then stage the home beautifully for us. The result was a night-and-day difference from when our renters moved out. We needed up selling at a higher price than we expected for the rowhouse. Gerard is very knowledgable about the DC housing market. He has lots of connections and gives sound advice. He and Trish are very trustworthy and true professionals. I wouldn't hesitate to use them if you're looking to list your property. I would give 6 STARS if I could.

When we were ready to sell our house, we offered the listing to Mark, and had a disappointing…read moreexperience. We had worked with his firm to buy the house and, in retrospect, I think we gave the benefit of the doubt a little too much the first time around. Both times, he was not straightforward with us about pretty fundamental stuff that we'd tried to establish from the beginning. He was also not especially positive to work with, and none of the contractors he recommended were positive either. On the selling end, what we were looking for was a realtor to work with us as teammates in selling our house, allowing us a little bit of input into how the house would be made over for the sale. We were selling a vintage colonial house in MD, so it made sense for it to be presented just a hair differently than a modern high-rise condo in downtown DC, for example. Of the realtors we interviewed, Mark had the most disagreements with us about how to make over the house, but we thought he would be the most straightforward person to work with. So before offering him the listing, we asked how differences of opinion would be settled, and he said he'd ultimately defer to us. After six weeks of waiting on his primary stager, Mark finally brought over another one, Bona Gjoni (who has iffy reviews on Yelp). We wanted to be open-minded, and we agreed to at least 80% of what she said. However, she was very hard to work with; she was cold, rarely spoke to us (she mainly just addressed Mark), and she frankly seemed put off that we were there at all. (Mark later explained that they usually just stage vacant homes.) We suggested that if she told us how strongly she felt about her suggestions on a scale of 1-10, we could use that to inform our decision -- but she rejected this idea out of hand and said she's "a 10 on everything." She wanted us to paint our kitchen a specific shade of light brown (!) because "all [her] clients do that". (Shouldn't design be tailored to the property, not the same for all?) Oddly enough, what was a dealbreaker for Mark was when we disagreed with Bona's directive to paint our whole fireplace a glossy jet black. This seemed way out of character for our parkside country-mouse colonial, and we emailed Mark to ask if we could take a breath before deciding whether to proceed with Bona -- while emphasizing how important it was to us to make sure *he* was comfortable with all the choices made. He said we should leave all these decisions to the professionals, and wrote a long message about how experienced he was. When we said we get it, we just want to be *a* part of the team to some extent, he abruptly emailed us to bow out of the listing because of the fact that we "have your own ideas of how you want to present and market your home." This was a real curveball a month and a half into working with him. We didn't have any particularly zany ideas for our house -- it seemed like the problem was that we wanted any input whatsoever. Then I realized that all 3 of the references I'd called from his recent sales were seniors who had already moved into assisted living and had him handle 100% of the preparation process -- maybe that is his jam. So it seems like Mark prefers to only work with sellers who do not want any input at all; that's fine if that's his choice -- the frustrating thing was that he was not straightforward with us from the beginning, even though we tried to be very straightforward with him. We had shared all our opinions/preferences on the house during the interview stage, so none of it was a surprise. We had even directly asked about how he'd handle differences of opinion. If he had been honest from the beginning about his "my way or the highway" approach, it would have saved us all a lot of wasted time. In the end, the realtor we ended up selling our house with was outstanding: very kind, smart, and straightforward; his stager and most other contractors were excellent (super nice, very responsive, and did quality work); and we were thrilled with the results. So all's well that ends well, but much like in our buying experience, Mark did a bait-and-switch. We told him exactly what we were looking for, he accepted enthusiastically, and then he changed things up on us later in a non-straightforward way. Our hope is that an honest review can be helpful to others trying to choose a realtor that will suit their needs.

Mark Meyerdirk is a rock star, plain and simple. Super organized, on the ball, and extremely…read moreknowledgeable about the DC market. We saw a listing in pre-sale and loved it. Mark went to bat for us and within an hour he'd sent us spreadsheets of comparable homes, pricing trends, and his impressions on what we should offer. He also advised us to write a personal letter to the seller. He surmised correctly from the condition of the house that the owners would likely prefer an early offer so they don't have a parade of people coming in and out of their lovely home. He was so right! The offer price he suggested was higher than the asking but not astronomically high. After reviewing all the data he shared, we followed his advice for the offer price and also spent some time writing a personal letter to the seller. It worked! Even though the sellers had another pre-offer, they accepted ours. Mark was not done. Since we were first time home buyers, Mark walked us through all the steps to closing. He communicated by email and text and answered questions at all times of the day and night, be it 7AM or 11PM. His working style fits right in with the typical DC type-A crowd, who (like me) want things done yesterday. Finally, we closed and then went out for drinks with Mark. He even bought us a surprise house warming gift that was incredibly thoughtful and personal. Mark is such a personable and likable guy. He'll adapt to your working style and roll with the punches. His communication style is straightforward and (thankfully) completely lacking the typical real-estate patronizing tone. I cannot recommend him enough for the DC market! Apart from being our agent, he is now our friend and we look forward to that friendship. Kudos to Mark. Even my angry cat is happy!

Ian and his team are awesome! They were very professional from start to finish with the selling…read moreprocess of our home including how to properly stage, pricing with the current market, negotiation to settlement etc. We always had direct and open communication with Ian at anytime, he was more than welcome to answer our questions and concerns and walk us step by step through the process. This was the first time my husband and I have gone through the process of selling our home and with Ian and his team it was seamless. Once Ian placed our home on the market we got an offer in 2 days and closed by the end of the month! We highly recommend his services and would absolutely utilize his services again.

Ian and his team are the best! We have bought and sold four houses with him. We sold our two…read morehomes both in one day. One home got multiple offers. Ian sifted through those offers to find the best one for us. He dealt with all of the negotiations while we vacationed at the beach! As for the ones we bought, each also had multiple offers. Ian won both for us! He returns calls promptly, and is there to explain everything as negotiations go along. You seriously cannot go wrong with choosing him as your realtor.

I have used TeamBallard Realtors for several sales as well as purchases of my homes. The time and…read moreeffort that they put in from advertising to showing and to selling your property is unmatched. They have always gone above and beyond to ensure that you are getting the best deal possible. I would highly recommend them and I personally would not use anyone else when it comes to the sale or purchase of a home. L. Vaughn

Over the last two decades I've owned and managed several rental units in Reston and for much of…read morethat time Mark Wilson, a man I've known and worked with for many years, helped me in vetting tenants, negotiating leases, and acquiring maintenance assistance when it was needed. It was always a smooth process. So when it came time to finally sell the final property there was no question in my mind who I would turn to handle the transaction. The sale was made as part of a 1031 Exchange which takes special expertise and Mark brought this and much more to the table making the entire process as efficient and as transparent as possible. His market analysis and subsequent contract negotiation was on the mark - pun intended - and we brought the sale to close in record time. Timing was important because of the Exchange requirements which necessitate closure within some very strict parameters. To assist in this Mark referred me to an excellent colleague of his in my acquisition market - Richmond, VA - and that proved key in making the entire process work. What could have been a tricky - and costly - procedure went very quickly and very smoothly. My time in the Reston market both as a resident and investor has now come to a close but were that ever to change Mark would be the first person I'd call to get it taken care of. He is a person of integrity whose opinions I value, skills as an agent I admire, and recommendations I have faithfully and profitably followed. If you're in need of a truly professional real estate agent, I highly recommend him to you. He does not disappoint. Thanks Marks!

I have worked with Mark for more than 20 years regarding home purchases, sales, and rental property…read moretransactions. He is great and highly recommend him for all your realtor needs.