Howard was highly recommended to us by family who he supported through their purchasing and selling of properties. With a quick email introduction provided by our family, we were able to connect with Howard in hopes of finding our forever home. Howard made it a point to get to know our housing preferences including preferred areas, types of homes, pain points, areas of flexibility, and what type of information we needed to know to make informed decisions. After meeting virtually and exchanging several emails, Howard was quick to work with our schedule to view homes that we found on our own, and show us homes that he had found, on and off market. Each home we saw, Howard would provide information about the property prior to the viewing (which helped us decide if we really wanted to see some of the properties- this saved a lot of time), and during the viewing, he would provide us any additional information that was disclosed by the listing agent. When we would walk through the properties, he would highlight both the positives and worries about the home; he was very transparent about what was seen and possibly unseen by us as first-time homebuyers. There were times that we were looking at craftsman style homes that looked great on the outside but large horizontal cracks and basements showed a different side of the property that as first time homebuyers we would not have been in a financial situation to address. We felt fortunate to have a real estate agent with extensive experience not only with the home buying process but the areas in which we were looking to purchase and the overall conditions (smells, cracks, types of windows, lighting, etc.) of a home. As you may know, making a large purchase, especially as a first time homebuyer, is exciting yet daunting as there are a lot of unknowns; we felt very comfortable with Howard's professional opinions and confident in decisions we made based on the information we learned through him. We spent nearly 2 years working with Howard, viewing over a dozen homes with him, and making offers in Santa Clara and Alameda Counties. Due to being outbid and financial limitations (homes were going for WAY over asking), we expanded our search to Sacramento. Howard made sure to provided us a warm hand-off to an experienced real estate agent in the Sacramento region. Provided our two years of experience with Howard, we felt comfortable meeting with the new real estate agent who eventually helped us in the purchase of our new home. Even though we did not purchase with Howard, this review is important as it shines light on Howard's extensive experience in real estate and his ability to support all types of clients. We were definitely naïve about home buying and asked a lot of questions which Howard always sought to answer. His knowledge and expertise, and caring personality made us feel secure. Howard is the ideal real estate agent - someone we hope other agents can embody especially for first time homebuyers who have a lot of questions. Despite some of our financial limitations and our changing minds, he stood by us and supported in any way, even when we moved our search to Sacramento County. We will always be thankful for all his support and we will recommend him to anyone who is selling or purchasing a home in the Bay Area! read more