Oh Hi There, Family Fued
“I wonder if I will fuck this up?” VB DOB: 1/29/38 - DOD: 5/15/88
Michael, Charles, Vincent Jr
He glanced in the rearview mirror; a mess of dark brown collided - long curly locks of his three son’s hair setting the stage for what was behind them.
They experienced a flat tire within the first 100-miles heading north on I-95 before cutting over though (look up south route to California). His eldest Son (prone to car sickness) had already commandeered the middle seat after puking all over his two younger brothers - “The trip to their new “home” was off to a great start”, he joked to himself after having to pull the car over and physically separate his middle child and youngest son - who somehow were trading shots with Michael still in the middle seat of their blue and white Chevy station wagon.
He was confident in his trade as a mechanical engineer, and he was contributing to a mission worth all this. He was trekking West to California with the four people who mattered most to him. He was the first of his family to leave Long Island, New York, three years ago to join Northrop Grumman working on Cape Canaveral in FL, engineering the reflective materials for Apollo missions. He connected to those early, blurry memories traveling with his Father as they migrated from Sicily to Staten Island decades ago when he was his youngest’s age; the through line shining brightly between generations after the same dream - “The American Dream” - just with Sunday gravy and an orchestra of gesturing hand movements, facial expressions, and decibals high enough to get the hounds howling.
Four more days until they arrive in Point Mugo, CA, where they would stay before moving into a new home they had just closed on. It was walking distance to an elementary school, with a cul-de-sac across the street, or so he was told; as he’d purchased it sight unseen with the help of a Realtor partnering with his company to relocate he and his collegues, and their families to Ventura County.
He would do as much as he could, get involved with the boy’s sports team, perhaps even teach one day after successfully engineering the reflective foil to protect the Apollo Astronauts as they reentered the earths atmosphere. Temperatures reached (x) degrees, and withstanding friction, heat, and the entire trip to space and back, there was no room for error - because any failures on his end would mean the difference between actual life and death.
He’d do as much as he could. For as long as he could. That’s the best a man can strive for he thought to himself - glancing forward and backwards at the same time, and then to the side at his Wife breathing in the moment with this motley crew - his Family.
“I hope I don’t fuck this up.” CB DOB: 10/25/66
Sylvia, Vincent Sr., Michael, Charles, Vincent Jr.
He pulled up on the metal and suctioned it against his left hip. An all too familiar sensation as he glanced around to the other three pallbearers.
Charles had just graduated from Redlands University, class of '88; the universe extended his curriculum with loss - his family suffering three within nine months - on his maternal and paternal sides, extending to his eldest Brother in a freak accident. His position of youngest child somehow seemed irrelevant, ascending with the responsibilities of emotionally and financially navigating what his Mother and Grandmother’s lives would look like now. Law school was no longer part of his immediate next plan. In fact, he didn’t even think that Real Estate was part of his long-term future, but through chance, while working at Alison’s cafe, he struck up a conversation with a Broker/Owner who tricked him into investing his time and money studying for and passing the test to obtain his Real Estate license. Little did he know, said Broker had just sold his business, so the job he had told him was waiting was non-existent.
What did it matter? He had his first Son on the way, and he’d make it work - finding himself at Remax (understand name) with a mentor. Maybe it was because of how he expected his life to look at this age, including having more of his family alive, he learned to live with little expectations - nothing was guaranteed. So he took and began to take those chances, and identify opportunities in front of him. Yes, he looked back and thought, “What if?”, but his undiagnosed ADHD kept him moving to the next thought, fact, or observation, too jarring to linger in the past.
Soon he found himself a Father of two, still a Husband (surprisingly, given how she always attempted to lose him on their parental and physical ventures), full-time Realtor, and in sports management as a basketball agent to [almost] pro-players who could fulfill their childhood and parents’ dream of playing basketball for a living. These young men ventured to Western Europe initially before being recruited and placed in the Far East. He and his business partner placed the first American players in burgeoning Asian Basketball Leagues, representing another western influence on Chinese culture - yet Yao Ming’s presence on the (team name) forecasted an opposite, subversive impact flowing East to West.
Iron rails extending from the bottom to the top of the windows were the opposite of an inviting, warm feeling. Step inside, and a mismatch of splattered shades of red greeted the iris. Half-exposed uneven bricks lined the walls, chairs behind every other dirt brown turned ash red desk, and a saloon-style 3-foot tall swinging piece of sheet wood acting as a bouncer to the misaligned set of 1-1 desks. There was no toilet - yet. But the Bank behind the office had one, so he opened a bank account in order to claim customer status, which enabled him to have bathroom privileges.
Owning a brokerage on California Street in Downtown Main Street wasn’t part of his plan, but he accepted it a while back, after he and his wife had successfully sent both of their kids to college with limited student loans weighing on them after graduating, that he was okay with not having a plan. He had figured it out up to this point, and he’d continue to make it work moving forward. But he knew he needed a team of brokers and agents to establish the flywheel of referrals he’d seen the like of bigwigs like Fred Evans & Insert, Insert - whose faces had become synonymous with residential and commercial real estate in the community.
But how much longer did he really want to work? The Department of Real Estate licenses he’d begun to see attached to flyers, on open house signs, on Facebook and Instagram were getting further and further away from his #01007 beginning; he couldn’t believe how many agents were popping up everywhere. But then, there were all those who had come, reaped the benefits of the economy, low interest rates, and federally backed mortgages that enabled too many people to Buy that which they couldn’t afford - at least in the long term; those who didn’t understand the variability in rates and life. Surviving the 2008 housing market crash, not just as a Realtor and Homeowner, Tenant, Parent, Child, Neighbor, but the five years afterwards had him open to offers by some of the larger out-of-town big-box brokerages and private investment-backed Brokerages & Franchisees chasing him down for coffees and lunches to understand what would make him sell?
He had survived, he was grateful for the referrals, and repeat Clients (even their children who were now taking that step themselves), the dozen or so Realtors / Property managers, and a couple of Brokers who worked in the building he acquired and spent time in to change up the scenery and monotony of day to day. He was beyond grateful to be in the position he was, but it wasn’t clear what the future held for him. Sometime during the weekly phone calls with his Son, somewhere on the streaming list of topics they would jump from as they caught up, he shared one of the offers he had received, and that the terms just didn’t add up to make it worthwhile to sell.
“What if I fuck this up?”
NB DOB: 6/5/91
Nate, Sylvia, Charles
He shook his head from side to side, attempting to conceal his eyes rolling towards the back of his head.
“The Math Ain’t Mathin, Pops. Your standard of living is too high for you to consider not being the sole owner of the Brokerage, and still likely working while in “retirement,” I chuckled when I reviewed the terms. I could tell he still enjoyed representing his Clients, and relished in being able to identify every VC-code by neighborhood in the MLS - useful trick when you want to show how long you’ve been in the Ventura residential real estate business, and just one of the many fun facts my Father stored in his brain; including but not limited to Family Guy, Seinfeld, and Curb Your Enthusiam references made at any given point in time.
When looking at this period of time in my life from the present moment, I was beginning to see the scale weighing pros and cons of my current role at a tech company during a time where the tides were clearly changing from employees having leverage to the c-suite investing in emerging AI and generative technologies to reduce the noise coming from their workforce. My gut and intuition were telling me, it might be time to head back to Ventura and see if I could do what I had done successfully before, just on a different scale.
Open concept
Two rows of desks -
Light, airy, bricks exposed, sky blue -
Father had been shamed long enough -
Sun Coast got its much-needed makeover -
Influenced by newer agents with high tastes and higher-pitched cackles -
Big, block letters strung together without bullets or borders;
Fragments of thoughts leading to nowhere specific but spoken with gusto,
Anecdotes parroted from sources that one couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow at and look sideways to see others’ reactions in the meeting -
My first Sun Coast Quarterly Recap Q1’24 .
I soaked up and absorbed every conversation - broker, agent, client, inspector, videographer, marketer, lender, title rep, association committee member - my anemic, porous understanding of real estate stakeholders, priorities, forms, client journeys (emotionally, verbally, physically) began to fill as the sunny, summer months set in. The mental stimulation was only matched by the errant bursts of commotion from around me by other Agents or my Father - reacting to the woes, and riding the turbulent ride that both the listing agent and buyer’s agent experience when upholding their duty to serve - July 17th, I passed the California Real Estate Exam and joined the Realtor ranks - DRE 022333995.
“It must be fantastic to work with your Father!”
“The reason I joined as an Agent was because I got access to him.”
“Are you going to take over the brokerage - is that why you’re back?”
“What are you getting me for lunch?”
“I’ll take a hot Americano on your way in.”
“Guess what you’re working this weekend?”
“Do me a favor, take the trash out with you.”
“You’re right, there is time that’s been lost. It could have been done another way, like how you suggested.”
I did my best to conceal my reaction and prevent it from showing on my face. I had experienced a dozen transactions, and this one involved the ending of a marriage; we had our therapist glasses on in addition to our Realtor pins - had run comps over the 56 days the house had been on the market, suggested two price improvements based on what was available, and being sold in real time - nothing seemed to warm the chill always in the air in this broken home.
It’s not to say Charles isn’t one to chuckle at himself when he’s been proved wrong in fringe stance he’s taken on; a unconscious, childhood, knee jerk reaction of being the youngest boy of three - but during this transaction the grace he showed - brought back the praises and gratitude expressed by the brokers & agents in the office, family friends, and members of the association who made the connection that I fell from this tree. I was lucky.
Luck wouldn’t be what expanded the foundation and presence of Sun Coast in Ventura, though; above-average relationship-building skills would only get me so far beyond the respected reputation my Father instilled within us as children, and amongst his neighbors, colleagues, competitors, and long-standing clients.
Whether it’s at the office, in committee meetings, or on the hill lobbying for homeownership rights with NAR on Legislative Day, these sharp, contrasting feelings and experiences people shared hit a crescendo in my mind:
Stats
California median home price $904,210, | Ventura County Median Home $969,500 (Over the past five years, the median price of an existing single-family home in Ventura County has gone up 49%, about twice the rate of inflation*)
Average Income to Purchase Said Home $360,000…
Average Salary of $81,125* = Math Aint Mathin
California’s lack of home supply
Ventura County = 1.7 new homes per year for every thousand residents.
Nationally, the rate is 4.8 new homes per thousand people*
Ventura County Regulations impact why we’re behind (Save Our Agricultural Resources) SOAR
Laying seeds for future generations is tricky… In the moment, efforts are focused on protecting what’s growing in the soil, preventatives for growth of anything else are often imposed as a result; enabling the current harvest of crops to flourish, taking up space, reaching tall, and producing healthy stock. In the space that once existed for future harvests, the soil is conditioned to allow only certain types of growth and only in certain areas - thus building up the weeds, roots deep, stems furry and spikey - greeting those who try to clear the field to plant new seeds.
Exodus from California as a result due to home shortage and affordability *
The National Association of Realtors’ motto is “If real estate is your profession, then politics is your business.”*
I think “IF real estate is your profession, THEN community is the pulse of your business” -
More specifically, the people who reside in the community (homeowners and renters alike) - even the folks who haven’t come across Ventura County yet, but will, and will want to become a part of our community
Want to be able to walk, drive, or take the bus safely to school, work, shop, and spend time in nature
Who wants strong schools with resources to support teachers & staff, who can afford to live in the communities they are molding
Connected community colleges constantly evolving their curricula to land 6-figure salaries
Thoughtful County and City regulations that respect homeownership rights while advocating for more affordable housing for aspiring homeowners and current renters
Zoning, which connects Small Businesses to the neighborhoods & industries they impact, and where their employees reside, and
Safety nets for those in need when natural disasters occur within the Community.
With all the different mediums of information that exist, and the access to these groups while being a Realtor, there is an opportunity for Realtors to rally around these causes, and work together under a brokerage that serves the community beyond the transactions; one that listens to the problems and needs, and seeks to provide a through-point of local information and insights between Boomers, Millenials, and Gen-Z, Homeowners & Aspiring Homeowners, Locals & Future Locals - because while we all might roam in our own small packs, circling one another, venturing into others groups while seeking to expanding our footprint - we all inevitable, and luckily get to call Ventura County, Home.
Venture to make Ventura a place where all people have an opportunity to flourish? Join in on the conversation.
A Member of the Community,
Nate Bonsignore
