The top performers in the Northern Territory's real estate industry were recognised on Saturday night at the 2017 REINT Awards for Professional Excellence.

The awards ceremony was held at the Darwin Convention Centre, with entertainment provided by one of Australia's funniest comedians, 'The Doctor', Scott Williams.

The 2017 REINT realestate.com.au Awards for Professional Excellence winners

Residential Salesperson of the Year

• Gennie Cox, Elders Real Estate Darwin    

While statistics make up only a portion of this award, over 2017 Gennie has taken in 44 solo sales – plus another 10 where she shared the work – grossing a total of $28.5 million in sales. 

Gennie’s ratio of appraisals to listings for last year was a healthy 49 per cent but her ratio of listings to sales was an outstanding 85 per cent.

Residential Property Manager of the Year

• Jessica Maxwell, Real Estate Central    

Over the past year Jessica has managed 160 properties which include residential houses, units and apartments. During this time she has also trained three assistants, two of which are now property managers and the third is moving into a leasing consultant role. 

In June of this year, she was promoted to Operations & Department Manager after being with Real Estate Central for three years. With that promotion came a change in duties where she now manages 60 properties, a team of nine property management staff and looks after new business along with all training and operations. 

Small Agency of the Year

• Top End Real Estate

This is the second year in a row for Top End Real Estate. May Dunlop, principal of Top End, knows what it means to run a small agency working in an office where it is just her that does all the appraisals, listings, sales and marketing with two part time assistants to help with marketing, admin and opens.  

2017 saw an increase of 17 per cent in listings for Top End Real Estate and a 31 per cent increase in settled sales, grossing just under $20 million.

Medium Agency of the Year

• First National Real Estate O’Donoghues

In tough year First National O’Donoghues had a pretty good year with over 130 listings and 66 settled sales worth just shy of $49 million. One of the outstanding features of their years was the average time on market which sat at just 75 days. During the year they sold five properties above $1 million and two properties above $2 million.

The O’Donghues team also introduced a range of new systems to streamline their business operations and maximise the time staff spend on administrative duties. And they’ve also picked up 19 national and regional awards throughout the year for both their individual staff and their office.

Large Agency of the Year

• Real Estate Central

For the last financial year, with a 9 per cent market share, Real Estate Central was ranked first overall from a total of 45 agencies for the number of listings achieved in Darwin and Palmerston. This was an increase of almost 10 per cent from the previous financial year and gave them just under 300 listings for the year.

Real Estate Central achieved over 200 settled sales and saw an increase in their market share which they are incredibly proud of considering the difficult property market we are currently experiencing. These sales were valued at close to $128 million for the year. 

Corporate Support Person of the Year

• Parris Seekings, Elders Real Estate Darwin    

In addition to a long list of regular duties that Parris is responsible for, she also completes weekly updates for both offices of current rent arrears - both dollar and percentage figures for individual portfolios and office as a whole, manages document templates and ensures at all times they are in line with current legislation, and provides additional administrative support to other Elders offices, sometimes this means working from the Palmerston office.

Achievement Award

• Sam Bennett, Real Estate Central    

Sam is very proud of his “follow up system” with each buyer or home owner that he meets receiving a monthly market report video. Currently over 950 people receive this quick 2 minute snap shot video on the latest market statistics and latest market trends. And in just his second year in the profession, Sam has just employed his first PA.

Community Service Award

• Simon Watts, Real Estate Central    

In June of 2017 Simon ran his 4th annual Katherine to Darwin Challenge. The event is a 300km cycling ride that is held over three days between Katherine and Darwin on the last weekend on June each year. It has now raised over $180,000 for Total Recreation - a not-for-profit community-based organisation that creates opportunities for people with a disability to be active in the community through participation in sport and recreation. 

Body Corporate Manager of the Year

• Alicia Tollner, Altitude Body Corporate    

After acquiring Body Corporate Specialists, Altitude Body Corporate grew from a single full-time and two part-time employee operation managing 40 strata complexes to six employees managing over 160 complexes in and around the Darwin and Palmerston region.

In August 2017, after acquiring Prestige Body Corporate Management they gained over another 50 complexes and two staff. One of the most significant changes for Alicia this year was a move to larger street-level city premises with several separate meeting rooms and individual offices for all staff.

Commercial Agency of the Year

• Knight Frank NT

In a lacklustre year for the commercial and industrial market, Knight Frank NT continued to expand its business, albeit at a slower rate than previously.

 In 2017 Knight Frank had 41 leasing listings and an annualised rental in excess of $3 million. They saw seven settled sales in the year including a record $60,750,000 for the sale of Jacana House – a sale that took over 6 months to complete.

Commercial Property Manager of the Year

• Tilly Rogers, Knight Frank NT    

Tilly has a wide and varied portfolio that includes 16 commercial properties, nearly 74 thousand square metres of industrial space, over 26 and half thousand square metres of office space, just under three thousand square metres of retail tenancy and 38 tenants.  

As the primary manager of these assets Tilly is required to liaise with a wide range of business, government bodies and stakeholders along with covering property maintenance, preparing annual OPEX and CAPEX budgets, negotiating new leases and renewals.  

Commercial Salesperson of the Year

• Craig Inkster, Colliers International    

The Gross value of Craig’s ‘solo sales’ exceed twenty five million eight hundred thousand dollars in 2017 with gross commission well over three hundred and eighty thousand dollars.  

A few of Craig’s more significant listings included the sale of 2.7 hectares of Defence industrial complex at 84 Coonawarra Road Winnellie for $7 million exclusive; the listing of Truck Central Berrimah, a Master Planned logistics precinct that will change the face of logistics and movement of triple road train access in and around the Greater Darwin area; and the listing of 7 hectares of a Waterfront Super Site located at Frances Bay Drive.

Innovation Award

• Elaine Mills Property Management

Elaine Mills Property Management have engaged Virtual Assistants to lessen the workload in their office and thereby make the time of their staff a lot more valuable and productive. Currently they have three full time and two part time virtual assistant in the Philippines. The VAs do most of the administration work for their property managers and their business. This has allowed EMPM to provide a very high level of administration which in turns allows their property managers to concentrate on property inspections, maintenance and actually having time to talk to owners and tenants.

Public Nominated Categories

Throughout the year clients and peers were given the opportunity to nominate their favourite Salesperson or Property Manager through an online voting process.  The nominations came from either the residential or commercial sectors. Entries were considered valid if all of the parts of the nomination were completed including the person nominating and a reason why they were nominating you.  

After eliminating any invalid entries, which included those from family and friends who thought they were a “wonderful person and should win the award” – and there were a few of those – the person with the largest number of valid entries – from clients and peers only -  was deemed to be the winner of this award.

Public Nominated Property Manager of the Year

• Amy Darby, Absolute Real Estate    

This was Amy’s second consecutive year winning this award

Public Nominated Salesperson of the Year

• Peter Kafkas, i Property NT     

This category was very closely fought and it came down to just six votes! This was Peter’s third consecutive year as the recipient of this award.

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