Business Profile: Better Homes and Gardens Rand Realty, Yorktown Heights
Real estate is a changing industry; it takes foresight and experience to keep ahead of the curve. Better Homes and Gardens Rand Realty has been able to grow into a premier real estate agency in the Hudson Valley because every office follows the core values of agency founder Marsha Rand—integrity, service and innovation.
Still run by the Rand family the company continues to grow at a time when many other real estate offices are merging or closing. It recently opened up a new location in Somers.
According to agent Diane Arenholz, that is because Rand Realty focuses on service, training and being ahead in technology.
“My husband [Bob] and I were with another big agency in the area for five years,” she said. “I think Rand is ahead with technology and that was what made me want to join them.”
Rand Realty was the first local brokerage to put the entire MLS listing inventory online and is the only broker to provide full service real estate services through the bundling of real estate, mortgage, insurance and title services.
It also provides its agents with extensive training on internet tools and mobile devices.
“Rand’s mobile device is cutting edge,” said Arenholz. “It is the first local real estate company to have such an intricate app. When people are in their cars they just pull up in front of a listing and put in a text number and it sends the person all the information about the house.”
Emerging technology has completely changed the way people shop for houses, according to Arenholz who has been selling homes as part of a husband-wife team for the past 17 years.
“The difference in between now and 17 years ago is that in the past people use to call up and not know anything about real estate,” said Arenholz. “The people would ask where this house that I am reading about. Now they tell you exactly what house they are interested in and know everything about the home, like whether it just had a price reduction.”
According to Arenholz the role of the agent has changed. “You have to keep up with technology,” she said. “You have to go to classes all of the time, you have to be willing to communicate with the clients in their preferred method on contact. There is a lot done through emails and texts now.”
The Rand Realty office in Shrub Oak has moved to a larger location in Yorktown Heights so its office manager Matthew Vanacoro could have an onsite training center to work with the agents.
The new office, which is located at 354 Downing Drive across the street from Turrco’s and next door to the Yorktown Diner, is over 3,000sqft. in size and includes the office of the regional vice president Joe Monaco, who was formerly with Coldwell Banker. It also has a lounge area that the 25 to 30 agents that work out of the office can do work in.
“Rand believes that the future of real estate is going to be like Starbucks,” said Arenholz. “The offices are going to have a lounge area and everyone is going to be on their iPads. So they have a nice setup with comfortable seating and a flat screen television.”
In addition to providing more space for the agents to work, the new location is more visible to the community, by being in the heart of Yorktown, and gives the office the added advantage of having a 10598 zip code.
“The internet people said that it was very important to have the Yorktown Heights zip code, because when people are searching they are looking for Yorktown, they do not know the hamlets like Shrub Oak,” said Arenholz. “So much of the market is dependent on the internet nowadays. Over 80 percent of the buyers come from the internet.”
Nevertheless Arenholz and the other agents have listings in all of the surrounding areas including in Cortlandt, Somers, Putnam Valley, Mahopac and beyond.
“They wanted our home base to be in Yorktown Heights but our listings and buyers go further,” said Arenholz.
To celebrate the new Yorktown office, Rand Realty will be hosting a grand opening that is open to the public from 5 to 8 p.m. on June 14.
For more information, visit www.randrealty.com. To contact Diane Arenholz visit www.nyhometeam.com.
Adam has worked in the local news industry for the past two decades in Westchester County and the broader Hudson Valley. Read more from Adam’s author bio here.
