10 years!!
This year marks a DECADE since I became a licensed real estate agent in Bellingham. I’ve been thinking a lot about what 10 years actually means.
I moved back to Whatcom County (where I’m from) in 2014 after living in California, New York, and Seattle. I took a job as a communications manager for the WA State Department of Ecology, but while raising two little girls, I kept craving more creativity and more control over my schedule.
When I announced I’d gotten my real estate license, one of my favorite colleagues (who loved to throw shade 😂) said, “Get ready to be broke….See you back here in a year.” Lol.
I never looked back.
Real estate turned out to be such a great fit for me, and the universe put the right people on my path. I started at Coldwell Banker, learning from local real estate legends like Dean Ulrich, Anne Cantrell, and Greg Flint. And later, while earning my managing broker’s license, the late David Hutton. I will forever be indebted to my mentors.
In 2019, I was part of the small original team that opened the Compass office in Bellingham — scary at the time, but one of the best decisions I ever made.
And somewhere in the last year or two, I’ve felt all of these years sort of sync up.
After 10 years of selling real estate here full-time, I don’t just know Bellingham’s neighborhoods. I know what it feels like to live in them.
Which streets feel tucked away or connected. Where you can walk for coffee or send your kids out on their bikes. Where you get the best evening light. How neighborhoods change with the seasons. The schools, communities, and little pockets you might never discover on a weekend house-hunting trip.
That’s become especially meaningful when I’m helping people relocate here. Because they’re not really just asking, “Is this a good house?”
They’re asking: Can you help me understand what my life might look like here?
Ten years has also given me deep relationships with other brokers and perspective from hundreds of inspections, negotiations, appraisals, weird houses, wonderful houses, and every kind of market.
Ten years helps me just know when to push back, when to jump on something. What exactly to ask for in that inspection negotiation.
There’s an intuition that comes from doing something over and over again that’s hard to quantify. I think that’s what I’m most proud of at 10 years.
I still love houses. I still get excited about a beautiful old window, a great kitchen, or a magical garden. But what I love most about this work now is everything that goes beyond the house itself — helping people make big decisions with confidence, knowing when to advocate, when to offer perspective, and how to help them find the right fit, both in a home and in a community.
I feel incredibly lucky that after 10 years, I get to help people find their place in a place I know and love so deeply. ❤️