There’s been a shakeup in Orange County’s luxury home-selling business, as Rich Meaney and several other of Coast Newport Properties’ top-producing agents have left to form their own brokerage firm, Strada Properties.
The move comes close to a year after Coldwell Banker purchased Coast Newport from Danny Bibb, who continues to run the office for Coldwell.
Meaney said the partners in Strada are himself, John McMonigle, Susan Scanlan, Tim Carr, Steve High, Steve Mitchell and Keith Randle from Coast Newport, as well as Chris Brigandi, who moves over from Cannery Village Realty. Strada has also drawn agents and support staff from other OC operations; the company’s current job count is around 30, Meaney said. Strada, like Coast Newport, is based in Newport Center near Fashion Island.
“What you have are a few of the younger, new-breed kind of guys with some entrepreneurial spirit who have decided to open their own company,” said Bibb. “It’s kind of a natural thing, that these guys are going out and trying to build a business. I wish them well. We don’t have any hard feelings. They’re young guns and time will tell how successful they become.”
The partners are all in their 30s, with several of them having done well not just as agents but as developers and speculators in real estate. But while Bibb acknowledged that the defectors included some of the top producers in an office that reports doing more than $1billion worth of buy and sell transactions annually, he and Meaney described the agents’ precise status at Coast Newport somewhat differently.
Bibb said four of the departing agents were among the top 20 producers in his office of 100-plus agents, but none ranked first. Meaney chuckled when informed of Bibb’s comment. Meaney said that he, McMonigle and Scanlan were among Coast Newport’s top five producers and that he and McMonigle might have been “one and two.” Among other deals, Meaney said, he consulted this year on a $38 million home sale in Santa Barbara.
Industry sources said it’s not uncommon to see new brokerage firms start up in hot real estate markets, and few places are hotter than the Orange County coast, where Coast Newport and now Strada are focused.
“It always happens when the real estate market is at or near a peak and they (agents) have more confidence in their ability to succeed without the benefit of a national brand,” said Patrick Veling, whose Fullerton-based Dynamic Marketing Resources Inc. tracks the residential brokerage industry.
Meaney said a national brand is what Strada is trying to avoid. “Nobody was real thrilled that Coldwell bought Newport” and Strada is an attempt to replicate Coast Newport’s upscale reputation, Meaney said.
“It was kind of an exclusive, boutique office, independent but big enough,” Meaney said. In the past year, though, “you lost your story.”
Bibb said the culture at Coast Newport remains the same: “To some agents there may be a difference in perception, but most agents would tell you there have not been any material changes.”
Meaney said Coast Newport’s commission schedule was not an issue. Typically, agents pay anywhere from 5% to 50% of their commissions to the brokerage firm, with top producers paying the least.
Bibb said Strada’s owners face challenges, including their lack of management experience and the fact that they will be doing deals alongside other employees. “These guys are active sales agents out in the field. There’s potential conflict with other agents they’ll bring on board.”
“This is somewhat uncharted territory,” Meaney said, “but I think we’ll do well as long as we act in a professional manner.”
Meaney said Strada has brought in back-office people from Coast Newport to run the office, and he said his company is taking a collegial approach.
“The management style is by committee, as opposed to one person who may have favorites or biases,” Meaney said. “Danny called all the shots over there. We have a partnership.”
One of the new employees at Strada is Bibb’s own 21-year-old daughter, Lindsay Bibb, an assistant to agent Tim Carr.
“She’s just learning the business,” Bibb said. “Tim has treated her well, but she can always come back to Dad.” n
