Three years to the day that he founded Bailey & Co. Real Estate, Justin Bailey is set to open his second office. “On Feb. 16, we will open our new West Knoxville location at 410 Montbrook Lane,” said Bailey. “It’s strategically located between Bearden and Farragut.”
Agent Annette Sydes said, “I am so excited that my firm is expanding to West Knoxville! The company has experienced tremendous and positive growth since I joined, which is a huge accomplishment in our competitive industry. I live in West Knoxville and also conduct most of my real estate business in this area, so this second location will be invaluable for my business and clients.”
The home office is at 2322 W. Emory Road in Powell, the community where Justin Bailey grew up and lives today with wife, Kristin, and their three kids. “One of the most common misconceptions is that we’re Powell only,” he said. “While Powell is where we started and obviously where I live, 35 percent of our sales for 2018 were in West Knoxville. We have some great agents who primarily work that area and are connected to the community.”
Bailey & Co. is the fastest-growing independent company in Knoxville. The company has been a corporate partner with Knox TN Today since this online news source opened in May 2017.
Bailey called opening a new location both exciting and terrifying.
“I’m an entrepreneur at heart though so the terrifying aspects … fear of failure … risk … the unknown … all of those things give me a lot of life.
“Someone recently asked me ‘what keeps you up at night?’ It’s not whether or not this location will succeed. It’s a deep, deep desire to get every detail right. I don’t want to just be another office address. I want to be a good neighbor.
“I want our company to be more than just sales and production. Our agents produce because they’re adamantly committed to doing it the right way and they work hard to get it right. I’m less worried about whether they close 10 deals this month or 25, and more focused on making sure they’re doing it in a manner that allows them to still be doing this in 20 years.
“There are a lot of folks, especially on the national level, teaching ‘produce, produce, produce,’ but they aren’t teaching agents how to have a reputation of service that will allow them to do it forever. That’s the insight I have from being a fourth-generation Realtor. (His lineage includes both parents, Laura and Larry Bailey, his grandfather and his great-grandmother.)
“I’ve seen companies and agents come and go over the years. They’ve made a big splash and then faltered and failed because they cared more about transactions than relationships. I look at other models sometimes and ask myself, ‘What are you teaching your agents that they can’t learn from a YouTube video?’
“Anyone with a work ethic can make money fast in real estate, but are you caring for people in a way that will allow you to make a career out of it? Knoxville is a small town. Reputation is everything.”
Bailey hopes the West Knox office and agents based there will become as integral to that community as his office in Powell is there. Bailey & Co. Real Estate agents are involved with the Powell Christmas Parade, the Fourth of July party at Powell Station Park and the Travis Wegener Memorial Car Show. Justin Bailey himself is active with Young Life, Legacy Parks Foundation and is one of the newly elected directors of the Knoxville Area Association of Realtors. He also just finished an executive education program at Harvard Business School in real estate management, finance and design. He evidently came back recharged and ready to take on a new opportunity.
He’s got strong opinions about his profession. He wants to live out of abundance rather than scarcity, and he says there are not good companies and bad ones. “There are just good fits and bad fits.” He does not cold-call to recruit agents and is selective about ones he selects. As a broker, he is big on training and compliance.
“Our front office is internally reviewing every file during the length of the transaction via our cloud-based e-signature software so our new agents confidently know they’re doing everything correctly from start to close. And I’m extremely involved. I always tell them, ‘Never guess. Call me.’”
So, hold your hat, West Knoxville. Here comes Justin Bailey.
Bailey & Co. agents. It’s easy to see the need for a second office.
Justin Bailey leads lunchtime training at Bailey & Co.