Testimonials
Following is a letter that was sent to my manager, Mr. Randy Fred, from one of my clients, David and Sarah Nichols:
October 18, 2006
Dear Mr. Fred,
As I'm sure you're aware, we recently bought a home in Studio City and sold one in Glendale through your office. Now that both escrows have closed we wanted to let you know what a truly wonderful job our agent, Dennis Finnerman, did.
We first met Dennis at an open house in Pasadena, shortly after we began looking at homes. We were still trying to define what we were looking for at that point and hadn't even decided if we wanted a house, a condo or a townhome. Nevertheless, Dennis took note of the few specifics we had come up with and, in a completely non-pressuring way, offered to e-mail us any appropriate listings he came across.
Over the next several weeks Dennis came up with a wide, creative range of properties for us to consider. One of the things that impressed us most was the way Dennis listened carefully to what we liked and didn't like about each place, then used that information to help us focus our priorities and narrow our search. In the end it seemed like Dennis knew what we were looking for before we did.
Then, after a month or more of combing the Pasadena area with Dennis, we happened to find a house we liked in Studio City. Dennis freely admintted it was a part of town he wasn't familiar with. Nevertheless, he happily helped us submit a back-up offer for the house we'd found on our own. More importantly, however, he immediately set to work educating himself about the Studio City market and showed us a number of other houses in the same neighborhood in case our back-up offer didn't go through (which it didn't). Ultimately, thanks to Dennis's perserverance we did find a house that was exactly what we had come to realize we were looking for.
As for selling our house in Glendale, we couldn't have asked for a more tirelessly diligent realtor than Dennis. He did absolutely everything imaginable to market the property. He held open houses every weekend the house was on the market, even the weekend after we accepted an offer - "just in case". He took extensive photos and wrote a lovely description of our home and neighbohood in order to create a beautiful full-color brochure. He established a website devoted exclusively to our house, as well as listing it on the Coldwell Banker site and his own site. He made sure we had advertising in the LA Times real estate section. He even went so far as to sew his own eye-catching banners to make sure our open house signs stood out from the crowd.
In the face of a softening market Dennis remained positive and steadfast. He never pressured us to lower our price or accept a low-ball offer. He gave us intelligent, imaginative advice in preparing counter-offers. In the end we found the perfect buyers for our home and received about 95% of our original asking price - a truly excellent outcome, given current conditions.
Throughout both escrow periods Dennis continued to go "above and beyond". He made a point of being present during the home inspections and kept us informed every step of the way. He was so attentive and quick to respond to phone calls that we felt like we were his only clients, even though we knew that was far from true.
Dennis's patience, persistence, and professionalism combined with his genial, outgoing personality turned what is almost always a stressful situation into a pleasure. I know nobody could have done more on our behalf. We would recommend Dennis to anyone in need of a top-notch realtor. He is genuinely exceptional!
Sincerely,
David Nichols
