Juwai.com, the Chinese international property portal, made a big commitment to the U.S. housing market today by appointing venture capitalist and former Move Inc senior executive, Matthew Moore, as its first-ever President of the Americas.
“China is the no. 1 investor in the U.S. property markets today and its level of investment will continue to increase over the next decade. Matthew’s role is to help real estate professionals make the most of this growing opportunity,” said Charles Pittar, CEO of Juwai.com.
Chinese investors purchased $28.6 billion of U.S. real estate last year — one-third of all international sales, according to the National Association of Realtors.
President of the Americas
Matthew Moore
As Juwai.com President of the Americas, Moore will run Juwai’s North American team responsible for sales, marketing and industry relations.
He was previously executive vice president of sales and marketing at Move Inc. until 2012 — realtor.com and Top Producer were both products under his umbrella.
He then became an advisor and investor to a number of real estate startups including Retsly, RealScout and FirstFive.
“Our aim is to create strategic partnerships with national brands, regional and local brokers, developers, new home builders, commercial real estate professionals, MLSs and associations,” said Moore, who will remain based in Los Angeles.
“We will directly service agents and agent teams from the U.S. We are looking forward to rolling out a number of new online and offline programs for these groups,” he said.
“Los Angeles is the single most-searched city in North America by Chinese property buyers, just as California is the most-searched state and the U.S. the most-searched country in the world,” Pittar said.
New/renewed partnerships
Juwai also announced a number of new and renewed partnerships with U.S. brokerages who are doing business with Chinese investors and want to do more — companies including Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties, California Desert MLS, Luxury Portfolio International, the luxury arm of Leading Real Estate Companies of the World (LeadingRE.com), Pacific Union and Windermere Real Estate.
The existing partners and new partners represent more than 10,000 real estate agents in the U.S.
Chinese investors are demanding more listings, said Pittar. “With this agreement, we move a long way towards satisfying buyer demand and providing a large number of quality for sale properties in areas considered most desirable by Chinese buyers.”
At the same time, Beverly Hills celebrity real estate agent, Aaron Kirman, president of Aaroe Estates, has announced he is increasing his partnership with Juwai, using the portal as his first-responder for Chinese email and phone leads, while juwai.com will serve as a China concierge for his buyers.
Kirman is aggressively promoting his listings on the site after Forbes recently reported on a surge of Chinese interest in the multi-million dollar homes he sells.
