Berkshire Hathaway Home Services
Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices is its first member of the network to Mexico to the expat and retiree destination of San Miguel de Allende.
Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices (BHHS) has recruited its first network member in Mexico at the expat and retiree destination of St. Michael of Allende, announced the company, which will operate under the name Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Colonial Homes San Miguel.
Local real estate professional Alma Cecilia Ramarez and U. S. expat Gregory Gunter, appointed in the past as mexico’s largest sales agent among the country’s largest franchise, will co-own the new brokerage of 7 agents.
Gunter is also a certified member of the Institute for Luxury Home Marketing guild and has already been named a certified global luxury specialist. Ramirez owned and operated his own genuine local property since 1995, before Gunter approached him to shape the new brokerage company. BHHS.
“We have been watching Mexico for some time as a component of our global expansion,” said Gino Blefari, president of BHHS, in a press release. “With its gigantic American and Canadian population, San Miguel de Allende is a selection of herbs for our logo and the notoriety we possess.
San Miguel de Allende, located in central Mexico, is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The picturesque old town, filled with towering churches, outdated storefronts and street vendors, has long attracted American retirees looking for an affordable and tourist-friendly foreign experience. . The city of approximately 100,000 permanent citizens named “city number” in the world twice each through the magazines Condé Nast Traveler and Travel and Leisure.
Although Gunter expressed optimism about the popularity of the BHHS brand, he noted that the San Miguel market suffered a palpable blow to the pandemic.
“We are a market available only by air, we are in the very center of the country, and even though Mexico was open all the time during the pandemic, you have been able to move back and forth, of course, other people are not so excited to do that,” Gunter told Inman. “We are an expat destination for retirees and a very fast destination for air flights. Therefore, other places in the retirement market, perhaps like Scottsdale or even the Hawaiian Islands, can take a leap in the puddle, take a ferry from one island to another . . . However, we are literally a Mexican network with a fairly giant expat network of approximately 12,000 expats, however, for new buyers to arrive . . . This has actually decimated the market here. . . Our sales are down 50% compared to last year.
However, Gunter also noted that COVID-19 rates remained low in the pandemic region because the local municipality followed strict measures on masks in public and temperature controls for others visiting department stores and restaurants. And, only in recent weeks, he said the business had begun to recover again.
“In the turn aspectArray . . . we’ve noticed an increase in the number of visitors coming back despite everything since August 1,” Gunter told Inman. “Despite everything, we saw other people coming back to town, more sales, more homes under contract and more activity. “
The city’s high season regularly takes place around mid-December, so Gunter said he hoped traffic would increase further as winter approaches, and Americans are looking for milder climates in the colder months.
“We are very happy to have the binational and bicultural assets of our first franchise in Mexico,” Blefari said in a statement. “We hope that its cross-reach for Mexican and American/Canadian consumers will be unprecedented in the market. “
Email Lillian Dickerson