Berkshire Hathaway

Still working with Josh Allen, and I have to say, I love it.
I had already fired one agent because she was incredibly sneaky, and just wanted to push me into buying a home. Josh isn’t like that. He’s patient, friendly, very knowledgeable, and is comfortable with saying «I don’t know, but I can find out for you» which seems to be a rare quality in realtors.
I don’t like the feeling of having an agent make decisions for me. This is why we decided to go with Josh. He functions more like an extension of the buyer. He’s like a resource, rather than a leader. Remember, it’s your hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line, not the agents. You need an agent who will work with you the way YOU want to work. Be cautious about agents who want to just get you into a home ASAP. A lot are like this. Not Josh though. Patience is a quality that is in seemingly infinite supply with Josh.
Currently four stars, but will likely make it five stars when we close on a home. Back to house hunting!
Update: Upgraded to five stars. Finally closed!

When choosing a Realtor, it’s best to pick someone who you think you can be friends with, because you’re going to be talking to them a lot and spending a lot of time with them. Pam Thistle is not only someone who you can easily be friends with, she is also super smart and really knows all of the angles to buying a house. Pam is attentive, yet never pushy, always honest, gives her opinions if you ask, and is funny on top of it. She seems to be working all the time for you, and will always answer your emails and texts right away. After the first time speaking to her, I realized that she was a natural, has years of experience in real estate, and really knows how to negotiate. The office is conveniently located in Old City. Pam really made the whole insanity of home buying as enjoyable as possible and I’d recommend her to anyone.

I don’t plan on purchasing another home for a very long time but after the recent experience I had selling 2 homes in Philadelphia I will NOT be using the services of this realty company again and do not recommend anyone else does either. They did not have our best interest in mind and were only worried about the money. If I could give a zero-​star rating I would. Very disheartening.

First time home buying is scary! Luckily, we were hooked up with an amazing agent who walked us through every single step of the process. I cannot say enough good things about Bryan Capone.
At our first meeting, Bryan sat down with us for well over an hour to discuss what we were looking for and describe the home-​buying process. From there, we worked with the folks from Trident Mortgage, who share the office, for our pre-​approval.
Once pre-​approved we started receiving listings from Bryan on the daily. We spent the better part of a couple Saturday afternoons driving around with Bryan to look at properties in which we were interested. We revisited properties, talked about their pros and cons to death, asked a million questions and, through it all, Bryan was extremely patient, always honest and helpful and never pushy. He asked smart questions that often helped us find our own answers.
After we found our home and reached an agreement on price, the mortgage process with Trident began. I’m an extremely organized person so even though the list of required documents was daunting, I was able to quickly PDF everything, throw it in a zip file and send it along.
Everyone told me to expect a frustrating experience with the mortgage process, but our experience with Trident was at times very frustrating. We worked with a handful of people, which probably contributed to some of the confusion: lost paperwork that we had mailed in using their pre-​addressed, postage-​paid envelopes (the envelope was later found, thankfully), repeated requests for documents we had already sent, and general disorganization. It’s amazing that people can actually hold down their jobs while trying to secure a mortgage — everyone who warned me that it would be a huge headache and very stressful process was not kidding.
Finally, closing day came. Signing boatloads of papers was actually a joy because it meant the whole long process was coming to an end! Getting the keys to our new home was one of the best moments of my life.
There are still some minor things with our home that have to be taken care of by the seller, and Bryan has been great about keeping in touch and keeping us in the loop. After all is said and done, I’d definitely recommend Bryan to anyone in the market for a new home. Since this review is technically for the real estate side and not the mortgage side, I’m going with five stars. However, if you have a recommended mortgage broker, perhaps you’d like to shop around instead of defaulting to the in-​house.

Paul Chin is the best realtor in the city! He was referred to my husband and I through a colleague; we are soo happy we called him. He has an impeccable work ethic and is always available, no matter how frantic your schedule may be or how stupid your questions are. We also closed our house within our perfect timeframe. We are so happy in our home and are always referring Paul Chin to anyone we meet. Thank you Paul!

Calvin Phun is the best realtor I’ve ever encountered. He’s totally on top of things-​helped me with my first Short Sale-​I would never do another one without him!

A listing through this office happens to be across the street from my home. The person who takes care of the house put his fist in my face and threatened me. When I phoned the office owner to let her know what one of her clients did she was obnoxious and asked me how this had to do with her. I stated, «You are going to get $ 20,000 or more for selling this house and you seem to think it is OK that a male that is 6 feet tall puts his fist in a female’s face? It absolutely disgusts me that someone who owns a local business would allow this to go on, especially as a woman. I also phoned her listing agent who refused to address the problem, his name is Ryan Please, please, do not support a business such as this. Apparently she cares about one thing, that is money. When her client has record of breaking and entering other properties, it won’t be too cute.

There are some talented realtors at this office, to whom I would easily give a 4 – 5 state rating. But because so many people end up with Mike McCann and his group, I can’t give more than two stars.
The McCann team is one of the largest, but it has little to do with quality. I owned a property which was listed by Mike and he did a horrendous job. Ultimately, he just did what he needed to to get the listing and then just pushed the price down until my partners were desperate (and stupid) enough to settle. On top of this, the guy is simply an ass.
There are so many better options out there. I would far more recommend Miles and Generalis (Amy Schelanski (sp?) is great) or Coldwell Banker on Locust.

If you’re looking for a new house, this is the place to go! I’d recommend using Josh Allen, he’s patient, funny, and attentive. My partner and I have been working with him for 5 months now, and both agree that his flexibility and patience are virtues that we haven’t seen in Philadelphia Realtors!