Concierge Auctions
Concierge Auctions is a residential real estate company based in New York and Texas. It auctions properties to the highest bidder and has worked with celebrity and business figures such as Michael Jordan, Barbara Corcoran, Eli Broad, Cher as well as a home featured on "Keeping Up With The Kardashians". It holds the world record for the most expensive home ever sold in the United States through an auction. The company has been accused of artificially driving up the price of its auctions since 2014, with many lawsuits settled out of court. Since 2008, Concierge Auctions has sold  more than $1 billion in real estate properties in 40 U.S. states or territories and 29 foreign countries. It has been on the Inc. 5000 list since 2014. History. The company was founded in 2008 by Chad Roffers, who had owned Sky Sotheby's International Realty, a Sotheby's franchise in Sarasota, Florida and Laura Brady, a realtor also from Sarasota. It was conceptualized to hold auctions for high-priced real estate between a seller and a group of buyers. Local real estate agents receive 5-6 percent sales commission and Concierge Auctions charges 12 percent to buyers. Auctions  range from $2 million to $40 million, but have an average of about $4 million. Founder of the Corcoran Group and "Shark Tank" cast member, Barbara Corcoran joined Concierge Auctions as a strategic advisor in 2014. In 2016, LeadingRE and Luxury Portfolio International announced Concierge Auctions as the auction provider and an at-ready source for its members. In 2017, Concierge Auctions sold more than $340 million from 81 sales. "Forbes" reported that almost 90 percent of its auctions were conducted through a smart phone app that year. In 2018, the company became the "preferred" home  auction partner of Engel & Völkers Advisors, North America. It sold $390 million in real estate from 96 separate sales that year. The company became the "main reference in the Italian market" after partnering with Sotheby's International Realty as its "preferred auction provider". It has worked with Giveback Homes and Habitat for Humanity on its "Key for Key" program, which builds one low-income home for every property sold at auction. By 2020, Concierge Auctions had built more than 200 homes through the program. The largest private island for sale in the Caribbean, Little Ragged Island, was listed in  March 2021. Recognition. In 2018, the company's $36.2 million sale of a property in Dallas, Texas was the highest price paid for a residential property that went to auction in the United States. One year later, Concierge Auctions broke its own record for the most expensive home ever sold at an auction in the United States: an estate in Florida that sold for $42.5 million. It was the highest-priced home to sell in Broward County's history, according to property records. The company has also been recognized for its annual Luxury Home Index report, which evaluates  average selling prices for homes and the time it takes to sell based on the number of days on the market. In 2021, Concierge Auctions recorded the highest online auction for a single-family home in Beverly Hills owned by Steven F. Udvar-Házy. Since 2014, Concierge Auctions has been included on the Inc. 5000. Notable clients. Concierge Auctions is known for working with celebrity and business figures to auction their homes. The company has also partnered with sportspeople such as Nick Saban, Andy Mack, Billy Walters, Andy Bloch, Joe Nemechek, Matt Kemp, Jermaine O'Neal and Randy Johnson. Media outlets  reported in 2009 that Cher would be auctioning a house she had built in the Four Seasons Resort Hualalai and chose Concierge Auctions to market the property. In 2013, Concierge Auctions signed Michael Jordan as a client. Jordan hired the company to auction off his 56,000 square foot home in the Highland Park area of Chicago. The home had 9 bedrooms, 19 bathrooms, a beauty salon, indoor basketball court, gourmet kitchen, stocked fishing pond, and tennis court. The home was originally listed at $29 million. Jordan's business manager and spokesperson, Estee Portnoy, stated that Concierge Auctions "gave great  exposure to the property". Two days after the auction produced no bidder offering above the reserve price of $13 million, Jordan put his home back on the conventional real estate market in December 2013 asking for $16 million. As of May 2020, the home is on the market for $14,855,000, the digits of which total 23. Concierge Auctions conducted the sale of former chairman of Live Nation Entertainment, Michael Cohl's home in Key Biscayne which had a previous listing of $36 million. A beach estate in the south of Spain where Pablo Picasso painted and  signed the bottom of a pool in 1961 was also auctioned by the company. It worked with former chief executive officer of Lehman Brothers, Richard S. Fuld Jr. on the sale of his Idaho ranch. In early 2019, the company signed with the estate of Wayne Huizenga for his home in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and mutual fund manager Peter Lynch for his home in Paradise Valley, Arizona. An online auction for the Greenwich, Connecticut mansion owned by shoe designer Vince Camuto before his death was scheduled by Concierge Auctions for August 2020 after a spike in buyer interest in the  area due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Controversies and criticism. Prior to 2013, the North Carolina Auctioneer License Board issued a warning to Concierge Auctions for false and misleading advertising. In 2013, Grand Estates Auction, which is a competitor of Concierge Auctions, sued the company along with several past Concierge Auctions clients in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York for $23 million per claim, alleging multiple claims of false advertising, deceptive trade practices, tortious interference, mail fraud, wire fraud and violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Practices Act (RICO Act). Concierge Auctions had already  sued Grand Estates Auction before that, with allegations that Grand Estates created fake email accounts to publish “false and defamatory” stories about Concierge Auctions online. The case was dismissed in 2014. Since 2014, Concierge Auctions has been accused of artificially inflating the price of homes, allegedly by using fake bidders. In 2017, two real estate investors sued the company in a California federal court for allegedly keeping a deposit on a home in the country of Fiji. One of the company's African-American real estate agents sued the company, alleging discriminatory practices. A complaint was filed in the Houston  Division of the Southern District of Texas in September 2017.