ForcesinRockyPointRealEstate:Jonn
iFrancis/Broker-OwnerCo
ldwell Banker Rocky PointFROM THE ROCKY POINT REAL ESTATE GUIDE
In a community with as rapidly evolving a real estate market as ours, it is inevitable that leaders emerge that shape the evolution of business practice, and embody the high standards of professionalism that are reflective of mature markets. Jonni Francis is just such a leader, and her journey is really the story of Rocky Points evolution from sleepy seaside village to world-class travel destination, and from "Wild West" real estate practice to Mexico's most secure market for non-Mexican homeowners and investors.
Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, most of Jonni's early years were spent in Phoenix, where her family re-located when she was just five years old. The daughter of a successful Senior Accountant for the aviation firm Air Research, Jonni fondly remembers the Phoenix of those days.
"Phoenix was very different then. The population was under 500,000, and the congestion and pollution and sprawl we see today was long in the future, and completely unimagined. It's hard to remember, but one of the draws -- especially for Midwesterners like our family -- was that Phoenix was clean! The air was clean, the skies were deep blue. The heat was a lot drier, which is understandable: we didn't have man-made lakes, we didn't have dozens of golf courses! It was a wonderful place to grow up."
Although it took decades for Jonni to find her way to the world of real estate, part of her childhood was connected to it through her grandparents, who also re-located to Arizona in 1959, and in 1960 were among the first twenty families to purchase homes in Del Webb's visionary development, Sun City. "They bought right on the golf course, they were crazy about golf. To this day my grandmother Josephine is still something of a legend in Sun City. She founded The Sun City Bell Ringers. There's still a Bell Ringers group named after her."
Jonni recalls being amazed by the scope of Sun City.
"They'd completely finished this spectacular community before they had any residents! Houses, landscaping, community facilities, the works! As a young person visiting grandparents, it was Heaven On Earth. I certainly wasn't consciously aware of it at the time, but I think that those memories have informed my thinking about real estate development throughout my life. Del Webb -- the developer of Sun City -- was a man of great vision, and it is the power of his imagination that brought Sun City into being. I see much of that same imaginative process at work in Rocky Point."
Jonni was married in 1967. After several years her husband enlisted in the Army where he was stationed at Fort Benjamin Harrison in Indianapolis, Indiana. "My husband was an Executive Chef. He was a great chef, and cooked exclusively for General's and dignitaries! Indianapolis is where our daughter Lisa -- my partner in Coldwell Banker Rocky Point -- was born in 1970. My family believes that I went back to Indiana to spawn."
But Jonni's journey did not take her directly into real estate. She had a long and highly successful career in the health care industry, her first career choice. Over many years Jonni took on many challenges within the health care industry, and exhibited organizational skills that continue to serve her today as Broker-Owner of Coldwell Banker Rocky Point.
"At one time or another I held most of the administrative roles that are available in health care; I managed a number of physicians practices, spent seven years as the Director of Inpatient-Outpatient Admitting at Phoenix Memorial Hospital, as well as managing two emergency rooms. Health care was very rewarding: helping people, experiencing the joy of participating in the development of your staff, and seeing the positive results of your efforts daily."
By the 1980's Jonni had risen to a very high level of responsibility in health care, and all of the positions that were open to her pulled her away from one-to-one interaction with people. "Directly helping people was what I loved about the health care industry. Many of my friends today are health care practitioners. I loved the idea of new challenges and responsibilities within health care, but not at the expense of my core values. I believe that as one door closes another opens. It was time to seek new challenges, and make a career change."
Jonni is a great believer in the power of loyalty and friendship, and it was one of her long-time friendships that opened the next door for her. "Fafie Moore, a very close friend, was a highly successful realtor with Realty Executives in Phoenix. She and her husband purchased the Realty Executives franchise for the state of Nevada in the late-80's. At that time, Las Vegas was on the cusp of the explosion of its growth, and Fafie invited me to consider a career in real estate with her. I decided to take on the challenge. Fafie made a large success of that office -- as well as the entire Nevada franchise. She paved the way for my real estate career. What a learning experience!"
Despite her success in Las Vegas, Jonni wasn't particularly fond of the city itself. "Las Vegas never felt like home to me. I relocated to Newport Beach / Costa Mesa, California. I really loved Southern California, its pace, its opportunities, the wonderful restaurants and shopping, living in the theater district of Costa Mesa, the truly exquisite weather. I loved that life."
In California Jonni specialized as a buyers agent working with mega-producers closing a minimum of 250 transactions a year, first with Remax Irvine and later with Coldwell Banker Tustin.
She chose to return to Arizona in 1995 to be close to her brother, who was seriously ill. "I chose not to work during my brother's illness, which allowed me a lot of time to think. To relocate to Phoenix was a difficult decision as my career was very successful, but the time spent with my brother is something I will cherish for the rest of my life."
After her brothers passing Jonni re-entered real estate in Phoenix, joining a company that designed custom homes. "My role was to find land for their custom homes. I made many great contacts with other builders who are now developing or have purchased in Rocky Point. It was necessary to know about custom home sites throughout the valley and surrounding cities. It was a great opportunity to learn about all areas of the valley."
Jonni was very aware of Rocky Point at this time, having first visited our community in 1986. "When I first visited Rocky Point I was simply enchanted. The town was so tranquil and quaint, and coming out of the hard desert the Sea of Cortéz and the pristine tranquility of the beaches was wonderful. But in those days there were very few accommodations, the Via Granada with its Bougainvillea-covered trellises being the one I remember most vividly. And Manny's on the beach for breakfast -- just a delightful place to eat breakfast. The town was charming, but there certainly weren't many "amenities" in the conventional sense -- even paved streets were a rarity! Some of the other landmarks we all know existed in those days -- The Reef, JJ's, La Curva, Posada La Roca -- but not much more."
But Jonni -- much as she loved our community -- couldn't translate that love into full-time residency. "As far back as 1986 I was drawn to Rocky Point, but I just couldn't imagine how that would look. I couldn't see at that time how and where I would fit in."
In 1996 Jonni was recruited by Coldwell Banker Tempe-Ahwatukee. "When I was with Coldwell Banker Tempe-Ahwatukee my visits to Rocky Point became more frequent. It was very convenient: in three hours I could be on the beach! As a real estate professional I saw the community through new eyes, and could see the fruits of the imaginations of the pioneers all around me. But let's not exaggerate: while development was modestly reflected at that time, the choices for potential homeowners and investors were still limited, and the challenges of ownership and construction still substantial."
By 1998 Jonni had decided that her future lay in Rocky Point, and began actively researching her options regarding brokerage ownership. "I felt that the strength of a major American brokerage was very important for the type of operation I was envisioning. What Rocky Point generally lacked in those days -- and there were some exceptions to this generalization -- were truly professional real estate brokerages. It was clear to me that Rocky Point was on the cusp of a great transformation; from "Wild West" to "Mainstream Practice", and I wanted to be part of that transformation. Good intentions aside, there are resources and support systems that major brokerages offer that simply can't be duplicated -- or even approximated -- by most small-scale independent operations."
But major brokerages weren't ready for Rocky Point. "In 1998 I talked to both Coldwell Banker and Keller Williams, but their view was that the market simply wasn't mature enough. I thought that there was a bit of "failure of vision" at work -- and argued that strongly -- but when people don't get it they don't get it. It's as simple as that."
Undeterred, Jonni relocated full time to Rocky Point and formed her first brokerage, Team Rocky Point.
In 2002 a remarkable thing happened: Coldwell Banker approached Jonni. "The explosion in the scope of active development -- and valuation -- in Rocky Point had become major news within the real estate community in the United States, and even in the popular press! Coldwell Banker wanted a strong presence in this market, and I wanted the corporate resources they could provide that would allow us to take our services to the next level. It was at this time that I met Jeff Reeco -- our Director of Project Development -- and things began to move very quickly. I was flattered that Jeff chose to join Coldwell Banker Rocky Point and assist me in my venture. Jeff has been in Rocky Point for a very long time -- he's married to a lovely woman, Audrey Anguiano, and they and their son Mariano live in the Old Port. Jeff had a successful brokerage of his own, Oceanfront Properties. I'd admired Jeff -- his ambition, his business ethics, and his development ideas -- for quite some time, and we developed the idea that, together, we could bring American-standard real estate practices to this market. It was a perfect blending of skill sets and business values, and Jeff and I couldn't be more pleased. Coldwell Banker Rocky Point has attracted the best of the best, and Coldwell Banker International has performed flawlessly for all of us, and more importantly, for our clients."
Jonni's leadership and commitment to the improvement in real estate practice in our community extends far beyond the high standards she has set for her brokerage and agents. She was a driving force behind the formation of PPAREA (Puerto Peñasco Association of Real Estate Agents) -- an important organization dedicated to maintaining and improving the practices, procedures, and ethics within the Rocky Point real estate community -- and was its first President. Among the many achievements of her continuing work with PPAREA, Jonni was part of a team that completely overhauled the matrix of documents that are integral to all real estate transactions in Rocky Point with the goal of making them more user-friendly for American and Canadian clients. She was also an early and unwavering advocate for the creation of PPAREAs MLS system, and her public and proactive stands on cooperation between real estate brokerages and the importance of ethical conduct to Rocky Point's real estate industry are widely acknowledged.
Jonni remains devoted to PPAREA saying, "PPAREA has had a very important and beneficial impact on the way real estate business is conducted in Rocky Point. Our goal has always been to assure our American and Canadian clients that their experience of Rocky Point home ownership and investment will meet the same standards that they expect in their home countries, and we've largely achieved that goal. I give great credit to Charlie (Charlie Salem, President, Oceano Realty, PPAREAs second President) and Paul (Paul Waterman, Partner, Tri-Vista Partners, PPAREAs third and present President) for their outstanding stewardship of PPAREA, and the great continuing strides that have been made under their Presidencies."
Jonni is decidedly bullish on Rocky Point's future:
"In an entire lifetime, how many people can say that they are in the right place at the right time? I believe that our clients are in that place. Some people dwell on the slight ups and downs of real estate markets as if they were watching a stock ticker in real-time, which in my view entirely misses the point. Real estate is -- by definition -- a longer-term investment vehicle, and the factors that determine the long-term value of real estate are structural, the first being the adage "location, location, location". Well, Rocky Point has that -- in spades! We have a fantastic location just 60 miles into Mexico with unique access to the United States. We now have quality health care within our community -- I know a bit about this subject! -- and, again, unique access to United States health care if that is required. Our community offers a mature real estate market now, arguably the most diverse residential and commercial real estate market in Mexico. For the prospective homeowner, Rocky Point delivers everything from solidly constructed Sonoran homes from under $100,000 to multi-million dollar estates; and for the prospective investor, our community offers virtually every type of investment option, from single-family condominiums and homes to multi-thousand acre beach front development opportunities. And the opening of the Coastal Highway. And our new international airport. And the new Aero Litoral air service to our existing airport. And our connection to Baja via the Nautical Ladder. And on and on! Rocky Point is no more than 10 years into a 25 year growth cycle. This community will continue to grow for decades, and everyone who buys here today will feel very smart very soon."
Jonni is joined in Rocky Point by her daughter, Lisa Adams, and Lisa's husband, Mike Ronco, owner of the Baja Hotel. Lisa moved to Rocky Point full-time in 2000, and is a vital member of the Coldwell Banker Rocky Point team. Jonni is grateful for Lisa's contribution to Coldwell Banker Rocky Point's success, saying, "With a company growing as rapidly as ours there is a real need for a diversity of management skills, and Lisa has made enormous contributions to the administration of Coldwell Banker Rocky Point."
Jonni also feels blessed by Lisa's presence on a non-business level. "The foundation of my life has always been family and friends. That's what it's all about. It is a daily joy to share these wonderful experiences with my daughter, and to see her experience being part of this vibrant community."
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