I called the general Benoit number after receiving an unsolicited text message from a realtor looking to show my apartment. We had requested that our personal information not be shared with real estate agents and for our property manager to handle communications regarding rental for 9/1 as we are not renewing, but still received a text to both my husband and my cell phone asking to show the unit, with less that 48 hours noticed (required by the city of Somerville). We never consented to playing rental agent on behalf of our property management company and never consented to provide our personal information to offices around town. I called Benoit after receiving the text message asking for our phone numbers to be removed from their records. The person who answered the phone who claimed to the the owner was rude and berated me on the phone, yelling that I did not understand how the rental business worked, after requesting that our personal information be deleted. When I pushed back and asked again, he continued to bark into the phone. Completely unprofessional, unhelpful, and wildly disrespectful of a tenant of 6 years in their current apartment. Would not at all recommend doing business with this organization, they clearly care only about money and don't have any semblance of professionalism, respect, or human decency. read more

All real estate agencies are a little bit slimy, but his one is particularly bad. In their contract paperwork it says that they get to keep the broker's fee upon submission of your renting application, regardless of what happens thereafter. That means that even if the landlord refuses your renting application you're still out the equivalent of a month's rent. These guys also made a whole lot of promises that they couldn't keep. They promised that my application would be accepted and that I would get the apartment, but they were dead wrong on both counts. If you choose to work with these guys make sure to fact check everything they say, because they're lying through their teeth most of the time. read more

Jennifer was very helpful in our search and was quick to respond to the initial inquiry, which is pretty critical in the Boston rental market. She was flexible with her schedule and met us on a short timeline and ran us through all the necessary paperwork quickly, but was never pushy. We ultimately didn't go with the property she was representing, but would work with her in the future. read more

I am a tenant in an apartment that is managed by Benoit. Criag has been our property manager for the last 5 years. He's so helpful! We can always reach him by text/ phone any time. He always has a solution and is very attentive! read more

Brandon Keane was awesome. Contacted him about a listing I found on Craigslist and he responded within minutes. I had a somewhat unique situation with 3 tenants looking for a 2 bedroom and he had a confirmation that same day that the landlord would allow 3 tenants in the apartment. We made an appointment for a showing the next day. We fell in love with the place and had a lease signed within the week. My housemates and I are in our early 20s, one a first-time renter, and Brandon was incredibly courteous, patient, and helpful in explaining to us exactly how the process worked and what information he needed. I never felt like I was being condescended to or taken advantage of, which has happened to me plenty in my apartment searches here in Boston. I only worked with him for the one apartment so I can't speak to the experience of using a realtor at Benoit for an apartment search specifically, but the process of procuring a place was super easy! Plus the office location in Davis can't be beat! read more

Since April 14, 2017, I've been calling & texting Shane Marrion to ask him to take my name & address off his mailing list & still no luck.

My wife and I were looking for an apartment around Davis square. We spent a day going between different real estate agencies. For some reason, most of the agents in other agencies greeted us with a "Why me?" look on their faces. Benoit were different. Maria Raposo was friendly, very attentive and gave great advice and insight. Thanks Maria! read more

This review is specifically about the realtor Carlina Nabatoff at Benoit, but I can also personally recommend Justin: I feel like the best review I could give is to say that I now feel like Carlina and I are best friends. But I can go into detail too. Carlina was incredibly helpful for me throughout my entire rental process. She really was the best realtor I've ever worked with. I started my search in late October, looking for a December 1st move in date. Altogether they were unideal conditions for anyone to look in. She accommodated pretty much any need I could come up with during the search. We met at odd hours, she stayed late with me at the office, helped me charge my phone, took me on many multiple visits to certain locations, collected lists of apartments in my range, and always tried to find exactly what I was looking for, never pushing a house I said I wasn't interested in. 2 months later, I'm happy in my place, and I needed her help with something. She answered me within the hour, dedicating a bunch of time to helping me out. Best of all, she's been super super responsive in pretty much every method she's provided me for contacting her. I've lived in 6 different rented apartments over 7 years of living in Boston. I can look at an apartment and know if I want to live there or not, but Carlina definitely helped me through the whole process too. Really fantastic. I cant say enough, but I'm probably saying too much now. Trust her. read more

As a landlord, I would prefer real estate companies that don't lose my checks.

I owned my home and used Benoit as the property management company. They were incredibly unprofessional. Lied about what my home could be rented for then rented my home to terrible tenants. The tenants had poor credit and Benoit told me it was them or no one. The tenants never paid on time and they broke their lease. Benoit still owes me back rent. I have told my entire neighborhood to never use Benoit. Just to note: I worked with both Shane and Tom read more

Agent Leonard Ferrari is more of a hoopty tbh. After sending a message through one of the apartment search sites with specific questions about a specific property, I got a message from him saying to tell him what I'm looking for and he can tell me about places. I reiterated my questions and set an appointment to view the property. I was a bit baffled by his reply that he would send me the address the night before the appointment, but I went along with it... until 9:30pm the night before the 10am appointment. I emailed asking for the address, and he responded that it wasn't available anymore. Obviously this is frustrating- looking for housing is stressful enough without having one's time wasted. I mentioned this in my reply, and his reply was ruder than ever and rather pompous. In fact he's sent me a second snotty reply just now. Leonard gets one gold star for so efficiently removing all Benoit properties from our list! The last time a guy reacted this bad to me saying I was no longer interested was high school. Yikes! Definitely not a good idea to trust something as important as finding a home to people as childish as this. read more

This review is for Thomas Hulme at Benoit Real Estate. I decided to use a broker from Benoit based off their good reputation and positive yelp reviews, but was highly disappointed. Tom was extremely unprofessional and rude throughout the entire process. I requested to have a breakdown in writing of how the initial expenses were going to be paid - brokers fee, first months rent, security deposit, etc. A completely reasonable request that any other broker in the area would be happy to provide. Tom refused to the point of yelling, insisting that the document was just "temporary" and that he would issue us another lease at later time. After we politely requested to have everything in writing before paying so much money, he refused to continue working with us. Throughout the whole process Tom was extremely aggressive demanding we pay 3 months rent ahead of time before even signing a permanent lease. He also tried to sneak in a rent increase without even discussing it first. He was so unprofessional that I began to question whether he even worked for the agency or we were being scammed, but sure enough his picture is on the website. I am so glad we decided not to rent through him after having a much more positive experience with other rental agencies in Somerville/Cambridge. read more

We called about an apartment that was listed on Craigslist on a Thursday. On paper at least, this apartment is a rarity: a huge 3BR, 2 bath, modern, recently renovated, just off Arlington Center, couple hundred feet to the Minuteman Trail, for under $3K/month. We told them we were free to see it any time the next day or weekend, but they set up the appt. for Monday. On Monday, they told us the apt was rented on Sunday. Frustrating, because we had told them we were free over the weekend, but okay, fine, these things happen. Then, I noticed the same apartment listed on Craigslist again a week later. Since we hadn't been successful the first time, we tried a different agent through Zillow. That agent confirmed that the apt. had indeed been rented. (Zillow can take weeks to update.) And yet...two weeks later Benoit agents are *still* listing the apartment on Craigslist on a daily basis. And at least four different agents are listing it. Clearly they are using a bait-and-switch tactic here, where they list an amazing apartment (even though it's unavailable) just to draw customers in. Is there a chance that the 4+ agents who keep re-posting this listing on Craigslist are somehow unaware that it's already been rented weeks ago? If so, then that means they're collectively inept. So, they're either dishonest and unethical or inept and unprofessional or both. Either way, don't work with them, unless you want to support this kind of underhandedness. There are too few honest agents out there, don't reward the ones that aren't! (I can't wait to read what their excuse is in their yelp rebuttal for multiple agents at their firm re-posting a rented apartment on a daily basis.) read more

My partner and I just worked with Jay Ellis to find an apartment. We ended up getting an amazing place within our price range and in a great location. It was such a painless process! Jay is wonderful to work with and we will certainly go to him again when we need to move in the future! read more

Jay Ellis of Benoit Real Estate in Davis Square is amazing!!! He was very attentive to our needs in finding a great apartment for four of us - both before, during and after we signed the lease. He is both a really decent person and a very nice guy - very professional, genuine, extremely knowledgeable. He has displayed terrific follow-through during the apartment search, and after signing our lease. Jay has also helped us with a lot of information about Somerville, and is both very responsive and proactive. He emphasized that he is a resource for us for the duration of our lease and with his office being right in Davis Square, that is really helpful and amazing. He is so impressive, knows the business and works really hard to get you the right place. We feel incredibly lucky to have found Jay and work with him. read more

I worked with Peggy and was more than pleased with the job she did. I had been looking for a new place for 2 months on Craigslist and contacting different agents from other websites. I was unsucessful until I came across Peggy's contact info. As soon as I reached out to her, she was available. She was very timely in getting me in to see the apartment and we were in touch almost everyday until my lease was signed. She went above and beyond to make my search and even my move, were super easy. I would highly recommend Peggy from Benoit Real Esate to anyone who is looking for an apartment that seems impossible to find. read more

My partner and I had a great experience with Benoit real estate when looking for an apartment. Our agent, Sophia, was warm, friendly, and hilarious but even more importantly she was straightforward about the pros and cons of each apartment. She didn't try to gloss over things and we really appreciated that. It was lovely to work with her and we really like our apartment. Thanks Sophia! read more

My wife and I recently moved to the Boston area from San Diego. We got in touch with Len Ferrari through a referral soon after moving to the area and couldn't be happier with how our home buying process went. Len was very responsive to all of our questions and helped guide us through buying a home in a new and unfamiliar area. He attended open houses with us and made suggestions on areas we may or may not like. After a few weeks of seeing places, Len suggested we stop by an open house we'd initially written off. He thought it had everything we were looking for and we may be able to get a deal on it. He turned out to be right on both accounts. We loved the neighborhood/home AND (thanks to his patience and negotiation) the seller accepted an offer for 20k below the listing price. Other comparable homes in the same city (which weren't as nice IMO) sold for almost 30k more. Considering how crazy the market is in Boston we were amazed how easy the process was for us. We love our new home and definitely recommend Len for anyone looking to buy a home in the Boston area. read more

Benoit RE was great to work with. I worked with Shane to rent a property he personally owned and though I didn't take the place he was very helpful and got me to see the place even while he was on vacation. I then worked with Craig to find the place I'm in now. He was great. Way better than the multiple other agencies in the area I tried. read more

I have used Will DaSilva to find both a rental property (~1.5 years ago) and now my first home purchase of a 2 bedroom condo (this past week!). Will was amazing and a pleasure to work with in both cases. For the recent home purchase, he was available by email and text mostly. Though, we did have some calls for super time sensitive situations like putting in offers. If I had questions (boy did I!), he had answers within minutes to hours with the data to back it up. I started looking for a place this past July. We made three competitive offers in this hellish real estate market that is the Boston metro area. Three times the charm since my third offer was the one to finally get accepted by a seller. Will is sensitive, funny, dependable, and very hardworking. Highly recommended! read more

I have been working with Jay Ellis at Benoit to try to find an apartment the last couple of weeks. As you can imagine, trying to find a reasonably priced apartment in the middle of winter is no small feat, but Jay was very attentive from the start and came up with some great options right away. Jay went out of his way to find us the right place; he even got the keys to an apartment and drove back 10 minutes after our initial showing to show me an additional place at almost 8:00pm. Jay has kept in touch throughout the process, and always answers right away whenever I have questions or concerns. He's made himself available for showings later in the evening and on the weekend, and has been incredibly flexible with my busy work schedule. Oftentimes realtors seem like they are trying to make a quick buck off of you, but Jay was genuinely invested in finding me the right apartment. Thanks to Jay's determination and attention to detail, I have found my dream apartment! Definitely work with Benoit if you're in the market for an apartment, you'll feel like your money is being well spent! read more

We worked directly with Shane, the owner, on listing our condo in Cambridge for sale. He did a terrific job from start to end. Best part of Shane is that he listens closely to what your expectations are and what the possible challenges are. Then he advises you on a strategy and if you agree, he executes it flawlessly even on short notice. Between calling Shane on a thurs after seeing his new office sign along mass ave in Cambridge and meeting him in person on Sat, we literally had our listing by the following Mon, and offers in the week after that. He also helped us analyze which was the best offer since highest doesn't always equate best. One challenge Shane had was that our condo was rented and he had to work with our tenants for the showings. But it was clear that Shane had plenty of experience and knew exactly what to do. read more

We worked with Jay Ellis to try to find our most recent apartment and boy did we find a fabulous new apartment...thanks to Jay! He's great to work with, he found us a great place, he was accommodating to our schedule, he is super pleasant, he is knowledgeable, he had a great with our new landlords, he knew everything about our apartment and what he did not know, he found out swiftly by doing his research. He is a cut above any other real estate agent we have ever worked with--by far! When/if we decide we need a new place in the future, we will most certainly be working with Jay again. He is the best. read more

Benoit helped me find a great apartment in North Cambridge. Shane Marrion, who owns Benoit, did a fantastic job of keeping our property well maintained. He was extremely responsive whenever we had a problem, with fixing coming within 24 hours. He regularly did work to improve the property beyond just regular maintenance and repairs. Highly recommended! read more

Unprofessional inexperienced lazy out of shape agents. Shane is the worst, beware of Shane ! Most of the apartments they market are not even their own listings, they use other companies photos and most already "been rented." Waste of time. A joke of a leasing company. read more

Jay has been the best realtor either my boyfriend or I have used to find a place to rent! My boyfriend and I were moving in together and spent weeks talking to different realtors about apartments for rent. It was exhausting and frustrating as most realtors dragged their feet on answering us back and overall had an unenthusiastic approach to showings. Jay was completely different and we are so glad we found him. Within 15 minutes of my boyfriend reaching out to Jay, he responded and set up a showing of the apartment. Jay went above and beyond and told us more information about the apartment and even talked to us about the landlord. Throughout the whole lease process Jay was supportive and genuinely excited for us when we officially signed the papers. Jay not only made sure we found an apartment that fit our needs but made sure we had compatible personalities with our new landlord. I cannot recommend Jay enough! read more

This review is for Michael Merullo at Benoit. From the very moment I walked into Benoit Realty after working with 5 realtors in 3 days, Michael assured me I was dealing with a professional. He asks all the right questions, pays attention to details, is available after hours, and goes the extra mile to relieve the stress of finding a place to live. I highly recommend working with him, and with Benoit in Davis! read more

this review is for Len. was in in the area for a couple days looking for housing. Len was able to show me a davis square apt that had just been put on market, was able to meet the landlord and sign lease on same day. very satisfied with the process thanks to Len. read more

Craig and his team were great. I am a first time landlord, and a nervous one at that. Within a few days of me calling to get information on listing my place with Benoit, Craig came out to the unit, took pictures, and asked questions about the unit the building, and the other people in the building. He and his team found nice, professional tenants about a week after the ad was posted. Once we approved the application, they did all of the paperwork within 24 hours. They were professional, and easy to work with. read more

We luckily fell into the hands of Jennifer when looking for an apartment near Davis Square. Jen was patient when I got stuck in traffic on my way to the viewing and never made me feel rushed. She took the time to carefully answer all the questions we had - both big and small. We knew we could reach her by email if we had any questions. Finding an apartment can be SO stressful, and somehow we remained calm and excited with Jen by our side. From the first viewing to the day we signed our lease, she was responsive, professional and knowledgable. read more

We recently worked with Jimmy from Benoit Real Estate. The entire process took more effort than it should have. We essentially had to do Jimmy's job for him. There was constant miscommunication, missed deadlines, misinformation, and mistakes in the paperwork. The worst part is that the check for the realtor's fee was cashed before we even had a signed copy of the lease. I cannot speak for the other agents at Benoit, but I would not recommend working with Jimmy. read more

Gerard Contaldi was extremely helpful in finding a place to live in Somerville. He emailed me almost immediately after I bookmarked several locations on Benoit's website and when I went into town to find a place to lease he got me an amazing deal right away. He was helpful and responsive throughout the process and I would highly recommend him. read more

Benoit real estate is an unprofessional company. It has discriminated against families with children and section 8 vouchers. I have tested it out for myself. The agents will refuse to show you a rental if you mention you have small children. Please contact the Massachusetts attorney general for clarification on several suits against this company. I would not recommend anyone this place. Beware. Apparently they have been asking yelp to delete messages, but we will keep posting same review. It's all valid information. Very true. They don't want the truth to be told. read more