Know Your Neighbor: Nelson Salazar, Real Estate Agent, Katonah
For someone who never intended to become a real estate agent, Nelson Salazar is pretty good at it.
The former Morgan Stanley technology and project manager had been buying properties, renovating houses and selling them while he was still working on Wall Street. His initial decision to take out his license about 15 years ago was simply to learn about better properties, not make a career change.
But Salazar became so proficient at acquiring, fixing and selling houses that others took notice and were soon reaching out to him to see if he could help them.
“What I did find was that I really enjoyed doing the business,” Salazar said. “I was good at it. I was selling my own properties and because I was renovating and selling properties, people were seeking me out to handle their properties.”
With the first of his four children having just been born, he then thought it was a good time to make a change and forego the tiring and time consuming daily commute to the city.
It didn’t take long for the decision to pay off for his family and career. In his first full year on the job, Salazar was the #2 agent in Coldwell Banker’s Katonah office and has been its leading agent every year since. He is also in the top 3 percent of the firm’s agents worldwide and is one of its top people in Westchester. Salazar, who is also licensed in Connecticut, has closed on more than $200 million in sales since becoming a full-time agent, according to Coldwell Banker.
What has made Salazar, 47, a lifelong Westchester resident and Iona graduate, successful in his second career? Of course, he attended plenty of corporate conferences and he watched how other successful agents operated. He also noticed there was no secret to the best agents’ success. While each had a good baseline knowledge of the industry, they developed their own style based on their individual strengths and personality traits.
But there were other aspects of residential real estate sales that Salazar didn’t care for and sought to change.
“This was a business that for a long time was done part-time and not in a professional manner,” said Salazar, who grew up in Mamaroneck. “It was a relationship business and, interestingly enough, it was a relationship business between brokers, not really between the clients. There was a lot of loyalty to your fellow broker and very little loyalty to the client.”
Psychology is one of the often overlooked factors in becoming a successful agent, Salazar said. Setting expectations for the seller, buyer and the other agent is important – and that’s critical regardless of which party in the transaction he’s representing. Eventually all parties need to agree to meet in the middle.
“You’re dealing with something that’s very personal,” Salazar said. “It’s their home. In some cases, their family may have built it, or they all have put a lot of effort into renovating it or they raising their children there.”
Salazar also instructs clients to avoid having their house linger on the market for too long. It needs to be priced properly, be in good repair and decluttered when prospective purchasers come to visit. He doesn’t recommend the need for major renovations in most cases or elaborate staging.
In a solid purchasing environment, a good house that is properly prepared should sell within a few weeks. When sellers say that they’re in no hurry to sell but want their house listed, Salazar tells them to call him again when there’s more urgency.
“I want the house to sell for the most that it can and what the market can bear and having it sit for a long time on the market does not increase that,” he said. “In fact, it does the opposite.”
Fifteen years after his career change, Salazar is thrilled with his decision. In a 24/7 world, he’s almost always on call from clients who need his attention. But he’s close enough to his Katonah home where has been able to watch his four children grow. With some seasonality in the business, it allows him and his wife and children to travel, one of their passions.
Most of all, Salazar derives satisfaction from helping people buy a home they’ll be living in for years or sell their home and move on to the next stage in life.
“I love the fact that no two days are the same,” he said. “I’m actually helping people with what is almost always their biggest asset. It’s important. It’s life changing for them.”
Martin has more than 30 years experience covering local news in Westchester and Putnam counties, including a frequent focus on zoning and planning issues. He has been editor-in-chief of The Examiner since its inception in 2007. Read more from Martin’s editor-author bio here. Read Martin’s archived work here: https://www.theexaminernews.com/author/martin-wilbur2007/