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Meet Valerie Mitchener: President of HM Properties

In August 2006, Valerie Mitchener decided to turn her dream of owning a real estate company into a reality and founded HM Properties. The company began as a boutique agency with six agents and has grown to be one of the leading independent and award-winning real estate firms in the Charlotte region with over 60 agents and seven full-time staff.

Valerie's unique business model allowed her to build a niche within a very competitive real estate market. Her focus was to create a brand centered around top-producing agents whose experience would help enhance this brand. Hand-picking the right combination of brokers and staff was paramount in being able to provide consistent exceptional customer service.

Every choice was intentional from the office location to the company colors, logo design, print collateral and advertising, right down to the office wall paint color and furniture choices which were chosen with the HM brand in mind… and it did not take long to set HM Properties apart from its competition.

After graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Valerie worked as a writer and owned a company that provided training materials and documentations for the banking industry, while renovating homes on the side. Knowing she had a passion for real estate, Valerie sold her company in 1998, and transitioned into the industry full-time. She quickly became a top producer at her previous firm and seven years later made the decision to create her own brand – one that represented the values she believed to be important to the real estate industry.

 

HM Properties was founded during a time when the real estate market was solid and no one could have predicted the economic collapse that began to spiral downward a mere seven months later. However, the business model Valerie had built not only successfully withstood the downturn, her company continued to grow and even thrive in many aspects. Valerie attributes this success to being able to adapt to the constant changes that were taking place within the real estate market and she was determined to succeed despite the odds.

 

Valerie says, "Professionally, I am most proud of the company. More specifically, I am proud of the team of brokers and staff that I have here. We have been in business for seven years in August (2013), and only had three agents leave and go to another firm, which is highly unusual in our marketplace. We've added people, but it's been the same staff for all these years and I'm really proud of that."

Family has always been Valerie's greatest influence and she says that she started HM Properties with family in mind. She founded this company with the intent of building a stable future for her and her children. She is a proud mother of two teenage sons and two stepsons, and they, along with her husband, former NFL player and current investment banker Joe Pellegrini, are her biggest supporters.

Valerie moved to North Carolina in 1986, and believes Charlotte is a wonderful place to live and to raise a family. A short drive to the mountains and a few hours to the coast, Charlotte offers something for everyone, she says. A wonderful quality of life, natural beauty, and family friendly surroundings make Charlotte an ideal city to call home.

A major turning point for Valerie came shortly after the doors opened at HM Properties. A large real estate company approached her in an attempt to acquire the business. This company gave her a multitude of reasons that HM Properties would fail in the downward turning marketplace. After hearing this opinion, she felt even more driven to make it work and walked out of that meeting with a renewed motivation and commitment to the HM Properties team. Flash forward to today, HM Properties is one of the leading real estate companies in the Charlotte metro area.

Utilizing technology, social media, and email campaigns are an integral part of the HM Properties' marketing, but Valerie is a firm believer in relationship-based business. "Technology can't replace personal contact," Valerie says. Her long-term clients and customer base are those people that she calls, meets with, or keeps in touch with on a personal basis.

When she's not running HM Properties or selling prime Charlotte real estate, Valerie is a huge fan of decorating, furnishing, and interior design. Just this past year, she has built and designed two homes and is currently working on another. She is also a travel enthusiast and owns a second home in Palmetto Bluff, South Carolina, where she likes to get away with her family. She enjoys spending time outdoors biking, and paddle-boarding with her husband. In addition, she is a big fan of the NBA's Charlotte Bobcats and HM Properties has been its Preferred Realtor® of the team since 2010, and she will often travel to away games, even as far as Miami. Whenever she has time to spare, Valerie also enjoys baking.

When asked how her colleagues would describe her as a partner, Valerie said lightheartedly, "I guess it depends on the day." Then, she went on to describe herself as honest and fair with a strong work ethic. She also told us that she might tend to get stubborn sometimes when it comes to decisions about her company. The strength of Valerie's vision and drive were felt in her closing remarks when she said, "I feel strongly about my business and the decisions I make about our brand."

With that kind of commitment and dedication to your work and brand, it's no surprise that HM Properties is one of Charlotte's top real estate agencies. Leverage Global Partners is honored to welcome Valerie Mitchener and her team at HM Properties to the network.

Header Photo Courtesy of Photo Charlotte

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