Luxury brokerage Pacific Sotheby’s International Realty is placing an emphasis on Orange County following a recent ownership change for the San Diego-based firm, which counts nearly 250 brokers locally.
The recent ownership change comes about two years after the company first started to build its local presence through the acquisition of Newport Beach luxury chain HÔM Sotheby’s International Realty, which created a combined company with nearly 30 offices, 900 agents and sales volume exceeding $6 billion.
Leading the acquisition was Steve Games and Nyda Jones-Church, who acquired ownership stakes in Pacific Sotheby’s from founder Brian Arrington in 2012.
Now, Arrington has taken back ownership of the firm he started in 2010, buying out Games and Jones-Church in a deal announced last month.
Sources indicate the buyout came after disagreements over the company’s vision.
“We are changing from a philosophy of just general growth to more targeted growth,” Arrington told the Business Journal.
As the newly reinstated CEO, Arrington named a swath of executives to steer the company in a new direction, including Michael Bianchi, who will lead the Orange County division in a newly created regional vice president position.
“We’re looking to Mike to direct targeted growth in Orange County, a region that we are very bullish on due to its resiliency to withstand economic uncertainties like we are seeing with COVID-19,” Arrington said.
Quality Growth
This targeted growth will emphasize quality over quantity, notes Bianchi, who started with HÔM in 2017, previously leading the company’s Laguna Beach office.
Previously, Bob Braun ran the firm’s Newport Beach office and everything north of there; Bianchi’s new position brings the entire county under his purview.
“We want to grow our luxury brand in the market by continuing to support and add value to our existing pool of brokers, and bring on new talent that identifies with the luxury market place in Orange County,” said Bianchi, who started off his local luxe career with Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in 2013.
Notable local brokers with the firm include John Cain, Tara Foster Shapiro and Sean Stanfield, among others.
Office Consolidation
This growth doesn’t mean a physical expansion, however.
In fact, the firm is consolidating its Orange County presence into seven core offices; it previously had about 10 offices in the county and in San Diego.
“Our brokers are remote by nature, and that’s been emphasized with the recent stay-at-home orders,” Bianchi said.
“We definitely value our physical offices, but we are reallocating some of those funds back into our agents.”
At the same time, the company is reinvesting in its existing, 20,000-square-foot OC headquarters at 1200 Newport Center Drive in Newport Beach, recently wrapping up “a massive remodel.”
July Heat
Regarding COVID-19’s impact on the luxe real estate industry, Bianchi said the signs of market momentum from June have picked up significantly in July.
He notes that in early March, before the start of the pandemic, the firm was enjoying the start of a “blockbuster spring,” with 252 pending sales.
After a drop in activity in the following months, that pending sales figure rallied to 306 in the first week of July as buyers become bullish once again.
“July is going to be a massive closing month, and we will see it in the statistics,” Bianchi said.
