Long story medium short. My TIC building partner in an SF duplex needed to sell. I have no idea how…read moreshe found Ren Grandahl, although I heard he was recommended by the owner's friend on the East Coast where she had relocated. That's how to pick an agent? Owner listed the place at $930K, way out of line. Mr. Grendahl should have shown her comps and counseled her. Perhaps he did, but overpriced property rarely sells; it hurts. Two or three price reductions later, two offers were made that apparently the owner turned down. These reductions also reduced the perceived value of my portion of the building. Ren should have involved me, my attorney says, but no. This all took Ren a YEAR to accomplish virtually nothing. A YEAR of sporadic open houses. A YEAR of occasionally not showing up for advertised open houses, or not advertising open houses at all. Their web site was regularly out of date. Near the end of that year, I had called the stager to offer to rent the staged furnishings myself so her place would look good. The stager agreed, and I sent him a check, but Ren poked his nose into it and claimed that was illegal (how exactly?), and advised the stager to clear his nice stuff out. I believed him too, but my real-estate attorney said that's not so. Gee, thanks Ren, it cost me $3500 to RE-stage the place because of your bull-headed attitude when I could have made things easier for all concerned. Where's that at? Just destructive. The owner was broke, underemployed, under water, and wasn't paying her mortgage or insurance, and couldn't afford the 5% commission. She would have killed me with a thousand cuts and I'd lose all. After some stressful legal maneuvering, Ren convinced the owner to grant her place to me via a Grant Deed and my foregiveness of all her debt -- BUT he wanted half of the sales commission in exchange! For what? A YEAR of total failure? Y'all, that's almost $11K, when MY brokers advertised and showed the place and MY brokers sold it almost immediately. (See my reviews of Jesse Fowler and Pete Brannigan, coming soon, who had to eat half the sales commission. Now THAT'S service!) This episode was a wasteful and costly total DISASTER! (Except Ren got to line his big pockets.) And don't be in the same room when Ren flips to angry mode. The above is all true. Negative stars are in order for negative results.

I was looking for a place at the St. Regis and Rob was great in helping me with a rental I wanted…read morein the building... he was always very responsive to my emails and phone calls... and was very, very patient acting as a mediator between the owner of the unit and me... Unfortunately, the owner turned out to be crazy and very vexatious....and she pulled out of the lease four days before I was supposed to move! (you know... since its a great housing market and all, it makes sense to change your mind at the last second and sell your place after trying to rent your place for 8 months...ehh) Needless to say, my frustration was immense... and Rob sent me a bottle of champagne as a token of good will, even though it wasn't his fault... and he also quickly reimbursed me for my deposit....very nice guy

Vern is very professional and it is clear his years of experience get put to use at all phases of…read morethe selling process. I wish I had more houses for him to sell.

Vern helped my husband and I buy our first home. We had been searching on and off for years and…read moreVern stayed ready and reliable every time we came across something of interest. Vern helped us write an offer that beat out over 20 other offers and, because of him, we are finally homeowners of the perfect home! Thanks so much Vern!

Cannot recommend working with Boutikia Homes. Sri was responsive but seems to expect clients to be…read morehappy with a neglected space that is not up to their own standard. We experienced retaliation in the form of a poor review when we complained and left our rental early. I suggest steering clear if you need a comfortable, home-like environment with concern for your experience as a guest.

We have just returned from our wonderful vacation in Kauai and this condo made it so perfect! We…read morecan honestly say that of all the air B&Bs we have had over the years, this was our favorite! Accommodations were beautiful, well supplied, thoughtful, and very comfortable! Plenty of spices, paper goods, soaps. lotions, etc and even a welcome gift basket in each of the refrigerators (we rented both condos in the duplex for the 10 of us!) Condo was also well supplied with beach towels, beach umbrella, boogie boards and beach chairs. Also loved using the beach club and the location of the condo. Hope we can do it again someday! Aloha! The Steinbergs

I have purchased and sold multiple homes, and the best real estate agent that I have ever worked…read morewith is Jamie Abitia. The experience I had recently selling my home surpassed all of my expectations, as Jamie is a person of quality who cares about her customers. She is very knowledgeable, on top of every detail, takes initiative, and excellent at staging and presenting a home. Jamie by nature has a way of putting people at ease, and making the experience enjoyable. Jamie does not stop. She is available morning, noon and night, seven days a week! (Sorry, but she needs a life! lol) She views her assignments as personal challenge, and adroitly uses the vast knowledge & resources of her support team at Maddox. She anticipates possible pitfalls, addressing them before they become a problem. In fact, whenever something came up that related to inspections, permits, power, plumbing, painting, home repair, electrical, landscaping, or staging; her phone was out as she was making a call to someone who could promptly attend to any concern. She is also very tech savvy, and utilizes this to make transactions easy and convenient for her customers. Jamie is gracious, patient, understanding, and helpful throughout a process that is normally very stressful. She also has a great sense of humor! Meeting Jamie was like opening your first bottle of champagne; knowing her was like drinking it. I am grateful for the marvelous service that Jamie and her team have provided. Even though I had never met Jamie before I hired her, I now consider her a trusted & valued friend. You are in good hands if you select Jamie Abitia as your agent! Sincerely, Stuart Damon

Katrena prior is the best real estate agent ever. Period. 1…read more Consistent 2. Ethical 3. Enthusiastic/great energy 4. Knowledgeable 5. Patient 6. Great teacher She definitely adds warmth to this business and was extremely helpful given my limited knowledge as a first time home buyer I love my new (recently remodeled) home and I'm thankful for her subtle push to make me as competitive as possible in this market

My wife and I came to Pittsburg to deal with her mother's estate. There has been some serious…read morefamily drama over the will, trust, bank accounts, etc A little bit biased, I admit - my wife knew April back in high school- but they, Dough especially, have really gone of their way to take us through this process. It's my mom-in-law's estate, and there are actual criminal acts we have to deal with. April and Doug have been perhaps the biggest blessing of the whole process. Doug even went out to buy us lunch, from my mother-in-laws's favorite restaurant. April and Doug have really gone above and beyond what they have to do just to sell a house. They actually care.

We are really happy that we chose Todd Hodson of Red Oak Realty to sell our vacant lot for us. He…read moredid a great job of educating and guiding us through the process. His experience and connections proved invaluable in preparing to put the property on the market, and it the end it sold extremely quickly. We couldn't be happier!

In a world of uproar with untrustworthiness, Ericka was a "safe place". I've never felt so…read morecomfortable with something so invasive as selling a property. Her expertise was beautifully demonstrated by her ability to keep a chill demeanor throughout any hiccup that occured on my end. I appreciated her patience; however, most importantly to me, her honesty "sealed the deal". Ericka has a gift of dealing with the curse of "taking on" her clients, personally. I noticed her diligence and her assuredness made me very aware she was "with me" as a client. This is my second time working with Ericka and it will not be my last. I recommend Ericka "hands down but thumbs up"; especially, if you value honesty!

Best realtor ever! This process can be so overwhelming, but Ericka is so thoughtful, patient,…read moreresponsive, knowledgeable and hilarious that the for us it was a breeze! I can't promise this for everyone, but we signed on with Ericka and a month later we have closed on our dream home. I mean, wow! I will definitely be recommending her and her team to our friends once they are ready to buy a house.

This review is long overdue. We took the plunge and decided to seriously look to buy a home in…read more early 2021. We had been casually looking at the market for a long while and happened to run across Eric Wong as the selling agent at an open house a number of years back (2019?). We remembered during that open house he was friendly, informative and seemed honest (to us even as the buyers). He has been a long time El Cerrito resident and knows the area quite well (along with a lot of the Bay Area in general, I'm sure). In the Spring of 2021, we reached out to Eric to see if he was interested in representing us as home buyers and he was. Having been casually looking at the market for a while, we had a good sense of what we were looking for (style and size of the home and in which areas). From that standpoint, Eric would usually send us newly listed properties and we would let him know which ones we were interested in seeing. So there was not much taking the day to explore what's on the market (which is needed to get a feel for what's out there and in surrounding areas if less familiar). For the homes which we were interested in moving forward with an offer, Eric provided his honest opinion about what a competitive offer would be, the risks of holding or waving certain contingencies, and set realistic expectations. He also gave sound advice in regards to what the home inspection reports indicated to him, as well as introduced us to a mortgage lender who was easy to work with and got us a rate that we could support a competitive offer. Our first few offers were not accepted, but Eric was encouraging, and he set realistic expectations, so we were not crushed with every rejection. His encouragement and even keel kept our hopes up and he constantly says buying a home is a process. Happy to say, the perseverance paid off, the process works and we finally had an offer accepted and a new home to look forward to! Finding a real estate agent to work with is a lot like finding a good health care provider, lawyer, or barber. At the end of the day, it has to be someone you can trust (at least on a professional level), share the same vision and probably more importantly, someone you get along with (not just tolerate). And for that personality does matter. Eric had the right personality for us and it worked out, and we can wholeheartedly recommend him. Remember though, this is variable, so find someone you're comfortable talking openly with, trust that his/her professional perspective matches your expectations and that should set up a good foundation for success. Update: We are very happy with the purchase of our home. To date there have been no major surprises which would probably have made us second guess our review of inspection reports or conjure doubt of how we missed something. In retrospect, the time Eric took walking us through all the documentation was worth the peace of mind.

Eric helped me and my family purchase our first home in the Bay Area this winter. He was very fun…read moreto work with and kept our best interests at heart. I love his approach with his clients which is professional and friendly. He's also very responsive and always made himself available to answer any and all of our questions. He made sure that we understood the process which at times got very tricky and kept things transparent. We worked together for about five months and even ended up exchanging foodie pictures - he's so much fun! I highly recommend working with Eric!

Deciding to buy my first house was skeptical. I did not know what I was getting into and did not…read moreknow where to start. I was referred to Jerome through a friend and talking to him the first time I knew I was going to be in good hands. He walked me step by step through every process and program I needed to accomplish in order to start looking for my home. He was always there when I had questions, took me house shopping which was an exciting and new experience for me. He has such a great team. Every concern I had he had a solution for. Kalaylah his daughter who's also a realtor was so pleasant, sweet , and energetic. They made such a great team by having senior experience and modern experience with finding ways on how to work with the seller and I. I had the pleasure working with Jerome and Kalaylah!