Randleman Realty closes, owner moves to John L. Scott

Published 6:56 pm Thursday, October 2, 2008

SNOQUALMIE — For Snoqualmie residents who have

wondered where Randleman Realty went, here is the answer: Randleman

owner Blake Randleman recently left his own business behind and went to work

for a former competitor — John L. Scott Real Estate in North Bend.

Randleman has owned several real-estate agencies in the

Valley throughout the years and decided it was time to make a different move.

In November he had an opportunity to sell the building in

downtown Snoqualmie that housed Randleman Realty and his wife Andrea’s

business called Go’n See Travel.

The building sold Nov. 6 and Randleman started at John L.

Scott shortly after.

“I really feel that I can better serve my customers at John L. Scott

than from an independent agency without the strength of the larger

company,” Randleman said. “With the number

of offices and agents that we have, it all goes toward selling a home.

Everybody works together to sell the home.”

John L. Scott currently has 2,800 agents working from 101 offices

in four states: Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana.

Each home gets its own Web site, a feature, Randleman said,

which helps sales considerably and is an option he did not have at his own agency.

“He’s come back, and we’re delighted,” said Tom Antone, owner

of John L. Scott in North Bend. “He’s run a successful business over there,

and he has a lot of loyal customers he’ll be dealing with over here. He has

a following — people look up to Blake.”

Randleman started his real-estate career in 1979 with Alpen View

Properties, also owned by Antone. He now sits one desk away from where he

sat in 1979.

In 1982, Randleman opened Falls Realty next to Ed’s Barbershop

— now called Main’s — in Snoqualmie. Two years later, he moved into

the building that he just sold and also acquired North Bend Realty.

Randleman operated both agencies until 1986. He then combined them

in the Snoqualmie location, and ran them under the name Century

21 Randleman Realty. In 1990, he left Century 21 and operated

as Randleman Realty.

Now that he has moved to a larger organization, Randleman said he will

have more time to list and sell homes and service his customers, without

the responsibilities of owning a business.

Although lifetime Valley resident Randleman has moved to Bellevue,

he said he still has the Valley’s interests at heart. He added that he’ll be able

to serve community members even better with their home-selling or

buying needs because he’ll have access to John L. Scott’s Bellevue office.

Randleman also has a home office, and his wife now runs Go’n See

Travel out of their home.

Another reason Randleman sold his building was to provide space

that could be rented out to a retail shop or restaurant, which goes along with

the city of Snoqualmie’s plan to have Railroad Avenue comprised of 75

percent retail-related businesses.

“I felt that I didn’t want to stand in the way of the city’s desires to

have more retail space,” Randleman said. “I’m happy for the city and for

the community because they’ll have a good restaurant.”

The owners of the El Caporal Mexican restaurant in North

Bend have leased Randleman’s former office to open a restaurant called

La Fogata, another family Mexican restaurant.

Blake Randleman can be reached at (425) 888-7405, or try his home

office at (425) 747-3337.