Eve A. Moss ‘Market opportunity’
Just over half of Boston’s population is made up of blacks, Hispanics and Asians, according to recent U.S. Census data. Recognizing that these minority communities need housing in the Greater Boston area, real estate professionals are becoming more sensitive to their housing needs.
For Eve A. Moss, helping minorities find homes is not necessarily a new endeavor.
An experienced real estate consultant and appraiser, Moss recently joined with developer Richard L. Taylor and Realtor Leo Brown to start up a full-service brokerage firm that aims to provide “high-level service” to the growing number of minorities in the Greater Boston area.
They launched Clarendon Real Estate Group last month. Their firm uses a Web site and e-mail to help people find homes in Dorchester, Mattapan, Roxbury, Hyde Park, Jamaica Plain, Roslindale and the more expensive neighborhoods of Back Bay and Fenway.
“I definitely think that, generally speaking, the markets that we are focusing on are underserved in terms of the level of service they can expect,” she said.
Moss and Taylor combined have more than 35 years experience in real estate. Taylor, chairman of Taylor Smith Properties, is a developer of single-family, multifamily and retail properties and has built new housing in Mattapan and Roxbury.
Moss has done consulting and appraisals for public and private clients, and Brown – who helped Moss start Clarendon Real Estate Advisors – has 15 years experience in brokerage, property management and valuations.
Seeing a “great market opportunity,” Moss said she thought it would be wise to combine forces with Taylor to help make minority consumers’ homebuying experience more efficient.
Moss explained that a lot of the technology-driven products designed to help buyers in their search for a perfect home are “generic” and may not be specifically geared for urban markets.
Moss and her partners set out to change that and educate minority homebuyers and other consumers through a variety of special reports, listings and guides that can be accessed electronically.
For example, CREG provides a weekly list of available homes in Boston neighborhoods and daily updates on new listings, price changes and homes under agreement.
A monthly list of homes for sale in suburban communities south of Boston, including Avon, Braintree, Brockton, Milton, Quincy and Randolph, is also available, as well as a statewide list of foreclosures. And just last week, CREG premiered its rental alert, a periodic listing of open rental properties.
In late summer or early fall, CREG plans to launch market reports and guides for buyers, renters and property owners that will feature community profiles, quarterly reviews of market trends and periodic surveys and analysis of the Greater Boston area.
“With homebuyer education, people are becoming more aware of what their options are,” Moss said. “Historically, they may not have been aware … and the quality of service was lacking. With more consumer education, it requires that the real estate professional bring more value to the transaction.”
The response from customers, so far, has been very positive, according to Moss.
Moss pointed to feedback she has received from satisfied people who have subscribed to CREG’s virtual network.
“Your e-mails are top-notch and a great example of effective use of technology,” wrote one person. Another thanked CREG for the firm’s guidance and support in helping her sell a home.
Here to Stay
Real estate professionals across the country are doing just as CREG and focusing in on the housing needs of minority populations.
Speakers at a recent National Association of Realtors forum said that since minorities and immigrants are the fastest growing homebuying segment in the country, they are having a significant impact on the marketing of real estate. They said that cross-cultural marketing is becoming a necessity.
NAR itself announced in April that it had joined with the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation and other housing groups to boost homeownership among blacks.
The black homeownership rate continues to lag behind that of the majority population, despite the fact that the number of minorities who owned homes grew four times faster than the number of white homeowners in the 1990s, according to NAR.
Today, real estate professionals are participating in various workshops and classes to help them better serve minorities
About three years ago, NAR partnered with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to develop a certification program called “At Home with Diversity.”
The program focuses on building diversity awareness and cross-cultural skills and preparing a diversity marketing plan.
In Massachusetts, a growing number of Realtors, trying to respond to the diverse homebuying population, are enrolling in classes to learn second languages like Spanish or Portuguese.
Patricia Pisch, education director for the Cape Cod and Islands Association of Realtors, said more Realtors are realizing the importance of learning about different cultures – especially on the Cape where more and more immigrants who discover the region while vacationing move in permanently.
Cape Cod Realtors are either learning other languages or participating in a two-day course that is part of the At HomeWith Diversity program, said Pisch. The Cape Cod & Islands Association of Realtors was the first group in the state to sponsor the course.
The courses allow Realtors to network and hear how other real estate professionals and communities have dealt with diversity, Pisch said.
“As a resort community, I think it’s taken a while to realize that the diversity is here to stay,” she said.
But because of technology, Realtors are doing international business more often and learning to integrate their diversity training into daily business, she said.
