Multimillion dollar homes are not unfamiliar to the over 80 agents of Coldwell Banker Village Green Realty, but the company has always emphasized an eagerness to work with every type of buyer, aiming to be “your perfect partner” in real estate.

“We work in every price range from the first-time home buyer with a budget of $100,000 to the one looking for the most beautifully-appointed home,” says Candida Ellis, who manages the company’s Windham office, currently the top selling real estate office in Greene County (by dollar volume sales, the company is the Ulster County leader as well). The company even sold a house for just $35,000 a couple of months back. It was a foreclosure in Kingston, says Ellis.

As a company, serving several counties from four offices, its average sale price is a little higher—currently around $363,000—and Dianne Jabbour, manager of the Woodstock office, says Coldwell Banker Village Green has the highest market share of homes prices over a million dollars.

If Coldwell Banker Village Green does have a specialty, though, it’s what the company calls “Preview Properties.”

“It’s a Coldwell Banker term for any kid of luxury property,” says Jabbour. “That’s the top five percent of the average market in any given area,” says Ellis, adding, “It has to be special in some way. Price alone will not dictate it become a Preview Property.”

Joan Lonergan founded Village Green Realty, what has become the Coldwell Banker Village Green powerhouse, in 1991. “The first office, on Rock City Road, had three people,” says Ellis. That office grew, moved across the street and doubled the number of agents. From 10 agents in 1998, the Woodstock office has grown to 30 agents today. That office is moving again, into a building the company owns—after years of operating from rented space. The new office, at the corner of Rock City and Mill Hill roads, offers greater visibility and is currently undergoing renovations.

Through the years a Kingston office was added, and around 2003 Lonergan bought Weatherby’s Paradise, run by Kate Weatherby in High Falls. That office was moved to Stone Ridge.

December 2006 to January 2007 saw the opening of the Windham Office, the company’s first in Greene County but not likely its last. “We went where we were asked to go by our client base,” says Ellis, adding, “Windham presented a need. Wherever the need takes us, that’s where we’ll go. We’re like the superheroes of real estate.”

“Joan has merged with some smaller companies over the years,” says Ellis. “In 2007 Joyce Beymer Realty in Woodstock, which was very successful on its own, merged with us. Joyce is the president of the Woodstock Chamber of Commerce. In 2008 Casablanca Real Estate, which had offices in Saugerties and Woodstock, merged with us.

“Even though Joan started the company as a boutique agency, we have sold some of the most expensive properties that have been sold in Ulster County and some of the least expensive properties that have ever been for sale,” says Ellis.

With all of this growth over time through merger and additional staff, came a perhaps more significant change with the evolution into a Coldwell Banker agency.

“Around 2000 it became apparent to Joan, a real forward thinker, that the way real estate was being done was going to change,” says Ellis, adding that the Internet was growing in significance. “It provided global reach, and provided the tools that would be needed,” says Ellis.

“It had a lot to do with the ability for us to be locally grown but nationally known. That type of global reach was really important to Joan,” she says, adding, “Today, 86 percent of people are making their first contact with a home on the Internet. The way we’re able to reach buyers and sellers is pretty much unparalleled.”

“It also provides a substantial referral base from all over the world,” says Jabbour. “We do a lot of referrals. We did one yesterday in Malibu,” says Ellis, adding, we also get calls from other offices and other countries. When they’re dealing with Coldwell Banker they know they’re dealing with a reputable firm. We come with the backing of a globally-known name.”

“Coldwell Banker is arguably a benchmark for how real estate is done. It’s a 104-year-old company that was founded based on a need for ethics and integrity in the real estate business,” says Ellis, adding, “It’s paramount to Joan that we carry that through to our company.”

“Joan likes to say that when asked to what she attributes her success that she did two things,” says Ellis. “She was really nice to everybody and did the things that no other broker was willing to do. She simply didn’t discard anybody. She was patient and kind, and after years of being that way it came back to her. She always followed through on what she said she would do and sometimes more. Never less.”

“Our general market, that all four offices cover, contains the preferred destination for second-home buyers. With the most favorable mortgage rates in years it’s also becoming a haven for first time homebuyers who live in the metro area and never considered it before,” says Ellis.

Lonergan, in an article The New York Times published in July, said there have always been Manhattan renters looking to by a slice of the country, adding, “But I think there might be more of it now, because there has been so much trepidation about the New York City market and some people see this as being more secure.”

“Many of them are considering relocating with increased popularity of companies developing work at home programs,” adds Ellis. “They start coming up on the weekends and Friday to Sunday becomes Thursday to Monday or Tuesday,” says Jabbour, adding, “We’ve seen several people who come up here and kind of commute to the city for a couple of days. … If they’re not going to buy a place in the city, they can be less than two hours from the city and use mass transit. They may have a car they keep here. It’s almost a reversal. There’s a sense of community up here in the smaller towns. You start on the weekends and feel a sense of community that sometimes is missing in the city.”

As Ellis and Jabbour spoke about the agency, eyes in the real estate industry were waiting to see whether President Obama would sign the extension to the first-time homebuyers credit passed by Congress. The assumption of course was that he would.

During 2009 Coldwell Banker Village Green, like other agencies and sellers, enjoyed a steady stream of first time homebuyers. “That was a pleasure,” says Ellis. “It’s always fun. I just had one yesterday, a single mom who took advantage of the first time homebuyers tax credit and bought a house in Cairo. She was in tears at the closing—that her kids would finally have their own rooms, that she would have to buy a lawnmower—and it was one of the absolutely most satisfying deals I have ever done,” she says.

More satisfaction will come no doubt as parcels in Windham’s exclusive Copper Ridge development are sold. “Copper Ridge is an amazing development consisting of 12 home sites on 80 sprawling acres with some of the most spectacular views the great northern Catskills have to offer,” says Ellis.

The flagship offering is an approximately 10,000 square foot custom tiber frame, post-and beam home with what she says are some of the most beautiful details you’ve ever seen. Local artisan craftsmen have been enlisted to construct the state of-the-art, chateau-style home, which includes an indoor pool, a movie theater, seven fireplaces, multiple suites, an art gallery, a wine cellar and more. “It’s luxuriously appointed … an amazing one of a kind property in every way and we’re excited about it,” says Ellis.

All of the home sites at Copper Ridge will be custom built and Ellis is certain they’ll range in price from $1 million to around $7 million.

Lot sizes are approximately five acres apiece, and are nestled among towering hemlocks with careful attention paid to location that ensures privacy and protects the viewshed both from and including the home sites. “It’s very exclusive and very private, and it will be a gated community,” says Ellis.

Listed under $6 million, the flagship house in the development also includes an outdoor kitchen and formal dining and great rooms, naturally.

On the first floor, the master suite includes one of the aforementioned fireplaces, a balcony and a sauna. The kitchen features a butler’s pantry and laundry. The den/office includes its own private bath and opens onto a courtyard with hot tub. There’s also a gathering room and mudroom.

The second floor includes two bedroom suites with private bathrooms, two additional bedrooms, another bathroom and a lounge/gathering room.

There’s a full, wraparound deck and an attached carport, and two garage spaces.

Copper Ridge is a Coldwell Banker Village Green Realty listing, but other agencies may ultimately bring prospective buyers to the table through the Greene County Multiple Listing Service (MLS). “We’re in a business that requires us to cooperate with our competition. It’s part of our business and it’s a wonderful way to do business,” says Ellis. “There was very little MLS participation in the mountaintop area when we opened our Windham office. Now, three years later, I would say there are really only one or two holdouts. Everyone participates in the MLS. It’s a really terrific real estate tool,” she says.

Ellis says Coldwell Banker Village Green successfully co-brokers with every other MLS participating office on the mountain. “It’s a great tool for sharing information. Properly valuing properties is very important and it creates a real sustainable real estate market. It’s a very responsible way to do real estate.

For more about Coldwell Banker Village Green Realty, and a short video featuring founder Joan Lonergan, visit www.villagegreenrealty.com