Happy Holidays & New Year! :)

It is that time of the year again, time for our “Letter from our Hearts”. We started doing this a few years ago for our clients that we’ve gotten to help over the years and let them know truly how much we care about them & their families.
When I read my letter from last year, my heart ached for all of the loss experienced by so many in 2020.  2021 did prove to be a better year for most and I do have great hope that 2022 will only be even better. It appears the way we do a lot of things may be forever changed but the gratitude we have for you and our other clients will never change. Real Estate is a business that truly depends on good word of mouth and referrals so, thank you thank you thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your support!

We absolutely go above and beyond to ensure that we are giving back to our clients and our community. I am actually writing this on the heels (pun intended) of hustling raffle tickets this past weekend at the Scotty D 14th Annual Golf Classic. With the help of Ayriel and Ashley, we were able to raise $1816 from the two YETI ice chests we donated to the event. This charity is near and dear to our hearts, as I went to high school with the founder, not to mention the money raised goes towards helping the youth of Chandler.
This past summer our team also sponsored another fantastic charity for the first time and I know it won’t be the last time… That’s Giving-Sole. Our agents went out shopping for brand new really nice shoes (apparently white Air Force Ones are the shoes to have lol) and we were able to donate them to 29 children in foster homes. Cherie’s little Myah happened to be in the office that day and was helping us count up all of those shoes!
To kick off (again pun intended) the summer, we did a Summer Cool OFF contest right before Memorial weekend for a FREE YETI followed by the 2^nd  Annual BEST IN SHOW contest we’ve done which ran over most of the summer.  We announced our GRAND PRIZE winner Calvin at our movie event which we hosted next door to our office at the Alamo, now known as the Majestic.  We did learn a valuable lesson with that movie and we will make sure that next time it’s a blockbuster everyone is excited for as sadly we did not get the turnout we’d hoped for.  It’s OK because like I said, a valuable lesson which will lead to the announcement and invitation at the end of our letter…
I would be amiss if I don’t talk at least a little bit about 2021’s market & the work we did for our clients. I had to chuckle to myself when I read the letter from last year talking about breaking records from 2005 during 2020… What we didn’t know then was that we hadn’t seen anything yet! I really am 48 years old and some days I feel like I look like this beautiful woman->->
It was a tough year! I think the record we had on one of our listings was 30 offers that we had to go through, which drove the price about $60,000 more than what my client ever thought he would have gotten for his condo. Worked out nice because that was about how much extra above list he paid to purchase his next home. We were happy that we could help so many get into a home that they loved, but shopping for a home in 2021 was definitely not for the faint of heart.
Meanwhile, we were blessed to be presented with some really cool awards again this past year. We were named “Duo of the Year”, which is a first for James and I. I actually think the East Valley Real Producers magazine made up that award just for us LOL. I was also awarded again by NARHREP #1 Latina for the state of Arizona and our team came in #1 for Berkshire Hathaway in the state of Arizona again as well. Fingers are crossed, we will find out in the next month and a half if we will see a 3 peat with that same recognition for 2021… but if not, we know we gave it our all and we couldn’t be happier for the other team that we are currently neck and neck with…
What’s funny to me as I read the last few letters we’ve mailed out over the years, is Ashley keeps making us new agents to join our team 🙂 Last year, we featured Aubrey Grey and mentioned her younger brother was on his way- well he arrived in the spring and by summer he was in the office doing training with James and I.  Besides Ashley, we also have Cherie and Ayriel who are instrumental parts of our team as well. This past summer Cherie hit her 10 year anniversary with us. We struggled to decide what kind of gift would be good enough for such a monumental occasion so James decided to cave and got her the fireplace for her office that she had been asking for LOL I had no idea one would fit in there!?
As for Ayriel, she definitely helps keep me on my toes and while she has only been with us for a couple of years- it’s gone very quickly as we’ve been very busy the last couple of years with my talk show www.GratefulHeart.tv.  This is in addition to all of the real estate office help she gives us. If you haven’t checked out our show yet, I would love for you to do so. We cover all types of topics that are business-related as well as health-related.  We’d love to hear from you and if you have any show suggestions or guests please let us know as we are always looking for good quality content to bring to our audience.
Last but not least, #MeetMollie!  She was born on 8/28/21.  She’s an English Bulldog.  I’ve been obsessed for quite some time now.  I think the timing for James to finally go along with getting her has a lot to do with the fact that we are recent empty nesters.  We aren’t ready for our girls to make us grandparents just yet, so I will scratch that itch with this adorable bully of ours.
The announcement/invitation I saved for the end is for ADULT PROM 2022!  Instead of a kid event, this spring we are sponsoring what could be the biggest party of the year with several other agents.  Details to come shortly after the first of the year with a save the date.  The tickets will be limited to a first come first serve, so if this sounds interesting to you (which I hope it does), please do shoot us a message as I will start an interest list to ensure those of you who would like to take another stab at PROM in their lives will have a chance to. 🙂
We wish you a TRULY fabulous holiday season and 2022!
With love in our hearts, James & Rebecca Hidalgo Rains