To say it's been a privilege to work with Sandy Sicsko and Joe Borromeo is an understatement. They are without a doubt the BEST real estate agents in the San Jose-South Bay area (and quite possibly the entire bay area).
TLDR: They are the most responsive and communicative agents I've ever interacted with (both from a selling and buying perspective), transparent, diligent, incredibly hard-working, and highly experienced. Buying and selling real estate is not for the faint of heart, let alone a small or easy task. This is THE tiger team you want to entrust with your real estate needs. "Sandy Sicsko" has become an expression in our home. "If it isn't Sandy Sicsko level of service, I don't want it!
LONG STORY:
When we bought our condo back in 2018, we were green to say the least in dipping our toes into real estate. Our agent at the time was a coworker's wife, who is no longer practicing real estate...thankfully...because she was terrible. In hindsight, she convinced us (and shame on us for not doing more diligence at the time) to overbid and ultimately overpay for the condo. I felt she put a lot of fear and pressure on us, and we were desperate to get out of renting. She also never came to any open houses with us until we were serious about one, and often slow in respond.
FAST FORWARD TO PRESENT TIME:
We're outgrowing our condo and wanting to upgrade to a single family home. This time, I interviewed several agents in the area and landed on one that used to be an appraiser and also offered a low commission. We went back and forth on whether to sell or rent out the condo, but ultimately decided to sell it. To his credit, he did say the reason he didn't want to push us was because we had gone back and forth on the sell-or-rent decision. But when we finally made the decision to proceed with selling, it was nearly impossible to get some kind of schedule worked out to move out, start some minor renovations with his contractor, stage the house, etc. Nothing moved...for months. Ultimately, we let him go. After that, every agent we reached out to was the same old story; no one stood out as unique or better equipped than the other.
ENTER CRAZY IDEA:
We decided to try and sell the condo ourselves; no agents...we were sick of all of them at this point. The first person I called was Charla Zizzo at READY, SET, SELL - HOME STAGING. She immediately told me I was crazy and referred me to Sandy at Compass (not in an offensive way; more cautionary).
ENTER SANDY & JOE:
I remember grilling Sandy and Joe in our living room (lol) We were very transparent with how we felt previous agents deceived or disappointed us, along with our real estate hopes and dreams. They even brought us a hard-covered, personalized sellers guide to the initial meeting. What stuck in my mind during that first meeting that was proven without a doubt was when Sandy said, "We'll work really hard for you."
SELLING THE CONDO:
We couldn't have sold our condo at a worse time. While it took us longer to sell than we expected, we got there with Sandy and Joe's relentless efforts. They connected with agents selling other units to time our listings together, went door-to-door with flyers promoting our unit, ran ads online, reached out to their network of agents to connect potential buyers to our listing, came early and stayed late for every open house they hosted for us, and communicated every detail, every step of the way. Did we get discouraged at times? For sure. But another service they offer is therapy. They helped us stay focused, patient, and resilient in the lowest of times...and they got the job done in one of the toughest markets and seasons. Lastly, I appreciated their ability to match the speed that we wanted to move--from completing the renovations to getting the place staged and listed to clearing the place out! They have a great team they work with and can recommend (e.g. movers, stagers, contractors, etc.)
BUYING A HOME:
While it was a terrible time to sell real estate, it was a GREAT time to buy...if you could find anything. No surprise that inventory was the no.1 issue for us once we were ready to buy a single family home. I can't recall how many open houses we went to and disclosures we combed through in our 6 month search, but Sandy and Joe were there with us at every step. They came to every open house, shared their observations (both good and bad), always got us answers in lightning fast time, and never once did they pressure us to do anything. Another thing I really appreciated was never skipping a home viewing. We would try to see 3-4 homes every (or every other) weekend, and sometimes during the showing of one, we would reconsider whether to see another one on the schedule. Sandy's perspective was that we're here and it doesn't hurt to look. That's sort of how we found our now permanent home! Miraculously, Sandy was able to squeeze a showing in the night before and the seller's agent also happened to be very communicative as well. read more
