I did an interview for Michele Fitzgerald on April 24, 2013. I was able to interview her at my Aunt Kathy’s house in Macomb, because this is her sister. Michele is now a real estate broker/owner of her own company. She did not start out thinking this would be her career plan in life. Her degree was in fashion merchandising and worked for Paul Harris in a chain retail store. She enjoyed this at first, but started getting burnt out with the hours and travel. She was the top position at this mall and didn’t see much of an advancing future in this field of business.
She then decided to get her real estate license. She took an insurance licensing review course in St. Louis and studied for her exam and obtained her license. She then started working for a realtor company known as Gundaker Real Estate as an agent. After some time she then found a developer and became a private agent for him selling the properties he would build. She was able to sell every single home in that sub division in Fieldstone Farms in O’Fallen, Missouri. This western part of the suburb has been a booming area for new real estate developments at the time.
After completing this she was able to start her own real estate company in 2004. Her companies name is called, “Above and Beyond Reality.” She has no employees under her and she serves as the companies’ only broker. When the economy crashed and the housing market dropped, this created a great challenge for her, because a lot of people didn’t want to sell their house under value. There were stricter policies being placed on banks for people getting loans. There were many foreclosures on homes causing the market to create a buyers market. Many homes were being sold at very low prices causing commission to obviously go down and people still being skeptical if prices were still going to go lower. Confidence was not there for buyers nor sellers. I