Editorial
Front Page - Friday, February 26, 2010
United Country Real Estate carrying on proud tradition
David Laprad
Ben Brychta (seated), broker of United Country Real Estate Chattanooga, and Randy Land, co-owner and auctioneer, man their booth at the Small Business Expo at the Chattanooga Convention Center in February. The company is known for its rural real estate experience and auction services.
- David Laprad
The 1928 United Farm Agency spring catalog contains a letter from the president and general manager of the company, in which he writes, “Pleasing you is the only road to success for a United representative; saving you time, money and travel is the only way our organization can be successful.” The pages that follow contain hundreds of listings for farms throughout Missouri and Arkansas, including photos of quaint town squares and handsome herds grazing on fertile homesteads.
The letter ends with a statement that shows how much the world has changed in 82 years: “If for any reason you do not find the farm you want described in his catalog, use the special service blank (sic) and the personal envelope enclosed and we will search our files and the new listings arriving daily until we find it.”
In today’s fast-paced world, where searches on Google are measured in fractions of a second and the results can number in the millions, to send a letter and wait weeks, if not months, for a response is incomprehensible. Fortunately, United Farm Agency, now called United Country Real Estate, has kept up with the times: Today, the company operates a network of 790 Web sites that attract over 70,000 visitors per day. The response time has improved, too, thanks to brokers like Ben Brychta, the man in charge of a United Country franchise in Chattanooga.
“We have a lead generation system that’s second to none,” Brychta says. “Our Web site gives us leads from hundreds of people looking for properties across the U.S. I get inquiries from people in Colorado, California and Florida who want to leave the rat race and enjoy some peace and quiet. They might be looking for a house in the country, or a hunting property or a home in the mountains, and I’ll contact them by phone or email and let them know what we have.”
Although United Country is known for its rural land experience, Brychta says the company is equipped to handle every variety of listing. “I showed a condo in Chattanooga this week. We do commercial, waterfront, everything.”
“Everything” includes auctions. Marketing materials for the company claim United Country is the “largest integrated network of real estate and auction professionals,” although the company is not alone in singing its praises: the National Auctioneers Association recognized it as the industry leader in the January 2008 edition of “Auctioneer Magazine.”
Randy Land, one of eight co-owners of United Country Chattanooga and its auctioneer, says this positions the company as a partner in the local real estate market rather than a competitor. “We work with banks, lawyers and Realtors to help them move property that might be stagnant. If a Realtor is about to lose a listing, he might want to suggest to his client that he consider letting us auction it off.”
With auctions being a big part of the business United Country does, Land has an answer for any concern a client might express about allowing him to auction off a property, including the fear of netting a less than desirable price. “In this area, a home auction will probably bring in fair market value,” he says. “Tennessee hasn’t been hit as bad as Georgia in terms of foreclosures.”
With Land having breached the touchy subject of foreclosures, Brychta is quick to say United Country is not in the distressed property business. “We’ve been cautious about using the word ‘auction’ because people associate it with foreclosures,” he says. “If you put a sign in someone’s front yard advertising an auction, people think it’s a distressed situation. So, we don’t do that.”
Regardless, United Country, which opened the doors of its Lee Highway location on Jan. 1, plans to pitch its auction services to banks, which might own a number of foreclosed properties. “We want to get in touch with lenders because they’re going to have a lot of distressed properties, which we could auction off,” Brychta says. “Banks are not in the real estate business; they’re in the money business.”
Land, who has 25 years of experience as a real estate auctioneer, even says the number of foreclosures out there was one of the motivating factors behind the launch of United Country Chattanooga. “We saw an opportunity. We think there’s going to be a lot of real estate coming on the market that people will want to liquidate through our auction services.
“More and more auctions are taking place across America. Some of that is due to the troubles in the market. But auctions have always been a well-received way of selling real estate. We just have to get past the idea that it’s only for distressed situations.”
Brychta saw a United Country franchise as a way of shifting the direction of his career. After teaching TREES classes for 16 years, he was at the point where he wanted to do something that involved less travel. Around that time, one of his students, who had purchased a United Country franchise, told him about the company. Later, Brychta met and became good friends with a United Country broker named Jim Graves.
“Jim called me one day and said a couple of guys from Georgia were looking to start a franchise in Chattanooga,” Brychta says. “We had a few meetings and here we are. They believed in the concept and they believed in me.”
Brychta also believes in United Country, praising the company’s values and saying it does more for its franchisees than any franchisor in America. “Of course, you’d expect me to say that, but it’s true,” he says.
As Brychta talks about his hopes for the Chattanooga franchise, it becomes obvious something else is true: Modern technology might have changed the way United Country does business (potential buyers can even take part in online auctions and try to outbid opponents in video conferences), but just like in 1928, the company believes it must please its customers to succeed.
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