Broker Spotlight: B. Michael and Chelsea Ireland, RE/MAX Collaborative
Name: B. Michael and Chelsea Ireland
Title: President and vice president, broker/owners, Realtors
Experience: Eight–plus years in the real estate industry
Location: Lincoln, Maine and soon to be Bangor, Maine
Brokerage name: RE/MAX Collaborative
Team size: Currently 8, but we have begun expanding and hope to have 30 to 50 agents by the end of 2022.
Transaction sides: Just under 200 (2021)
Sales volume: $28+ million (2021)
Awards: With our previous brokerage we were “Team Excellence” (2017, 2018, 2019)
“Top Duo of the Year” for 2020 and 2021
2018 through 2021 we were consistently the monthly top duo sales team
How did you choose your current brokerage?
We chose our current brokerage, RE/MAX Collaborative, which we opened in April of 2022, through an exhaustive process of deciding to open a franchise or open our own brokerage. We branded such a strong name for ourselves in the Maine real estate industry that the majority of our customers and clients had no idea which brokerage we actually were affiliated with.
We wanted to continue our individual branding while establishing a collaborative of agents who had the same value-driven mission that would recognize our individual agents and expand our notoriety as a brokerage. In establishing our brokerage we decided to make the move to RE/MAX.
Our individual branding and that of our agents is able to continue and grow while being part of the most recognizable real estate branding in the world.
What do you wish more people knew about working in real estate?
If you are going to really work in real estate it is about more than the check at the end of the transaction. To really want to work in real estate is to want to help buyers and sellers realize their goal of buying and selling.
Understanding the collaboration that needs to happen between agents, title companies and lenders for a successful transaction and being able to implement this collaboration using positive values is the most rewarding aspect of real estate. The relationships created throughout a transaction will pay huge dividends down the road.
What are 5 things you’d like readers to know about you and your brokerage?
Our Brokerage is based on working together for a common goal, hence “Collaborative”. The process of buying and selling real estate can be safely left up to any of our agents as they all have subscribed to a set of core values that include honesty, integrity, as well as accountability.
Feeling comfortable and confident in a real estate transaction are the most important aspects of the transaction for buyers and sellers.
At the end of the day, to successfully close a transaction our brokerage and agents stay professional and motivated, all the while following our core ideology of “Building a real estate collaboration of motivated and professional career-minded individuals that are visibly honest and ethical and view accountability as a reflection on their own integrity.”
What’s your top tip for freshly licensed brokers?
Most new agents have not even given thought to align themselves with a brokerage that actually has a core ideology or that they should even consider asking the question of the brokerage they anticipate joining. So, if you are a new agent and do not have this thought process the top tip I will give you is to understand the documentation needed in a successful real estate transaction.
Read the forms and know what they say! Be able to explain them to prospective clients. Follow them through the process.
However, if you decide to align yourself with a brokerage that has a core ideology, teaching you the documents and helping you to understand what they mean will be first and foremost when you start your real estate career.
What makes a good leader?
We listen. A collaboration will not happen in a dictatorship. We do not know all the answers and we do not have all the ideas.
Being a good leader means being honest and willing to make changes when necessary. Adhering to a core set of values and confidently expressing them through your own actions will help surround you with like-minded individuals that will help you adjust and move forward when necessary.