We loved working with Ellen Friedman on our recent purchase of a condo in Jamaica Plain.

We loved working with Ellen Friedman on our recent purchase of a condo in Jamaica Plain. We reached out to her after reading so many positive reviews online of her work. We interviewed a few agents and decided to go with Ellen because her energy and approach seemed like the right fit for us.  When we began our home search, there were still many unknowns about how exactly to buy a place, and about what we were even looking for — Ellen was patient and educated us about the process while leaving room for our personal preferences to develop over time. Although we initially found her because we wanted to find a property in Cambridge or Somerville, we eventually ended up zeroing in on Jamaica Plain and Ellen was incredibly helpful in this market as well.  After our initial coffee, and as our search began, we communicated mainly over email. If we had wanted her to accompany us to open houses, I’m sure she would have done so, but we found we were so obsessed with Redfin/Zillow updates anyway (and we tended to try to see 8-10 open houses in a day) that it worked best to find the properties we wanted to see, go check them out, and then email Ellen any questions or to ask for her advice about specific concerns. I can’t count the number of questions we sent Ellen over email – all of which she responded to with kindness, patience, intelligence and in such thoughtful detail.  We proceeded this way for a couple months, and then something kind of clicked and we got more serious about buying. Things seemed to fall into place, and after seeing a stretch of properties we weren’t crazy about, we found an apartment we fell in love with. It sounds cliché, but we just kind of knew. In some ways, this feeling wasn’t something Ellen could directly influence, but after months of learning from her insights and experience, I think she had helped us trust our gut feeling that we had found something worth pursuing.  When we decided to put an offer in, Ellen walked us through the (at times nerve wracking!!) process with a relaxed but driven energy that we appreciated – she wanted us to get the condo, but not to do so from a frenzied place of anxiety, which we appreciated. At one point in the negotiation, when the sellers came back asking for our highest and best offer, my husband and I had different approaches as for how to respond and Ellen skillfully facilitated a conference call where we all ended up feeling good about our next steps. We always felt like she had a solid strategy that helped us save money without compromising our broader goals.We reached out to her after reading so many positive reviews online of her work. We interviewed a few agents and decided to go with Ellen because her energy and approach seemed like the right fit for us.  When we began our home search, there were still many unknowns about how exactly to buy a place, and about what we were even looking for — Ellen was patient and educated us about the process while leaving room for our personal preferences to develop over time. Although we initially found her because we wanted to find a property in Cambridge or Somerville, we eventually ended up zeroing in on Jamaica Plain and Ellen was incredibly helpful in this market as well.  After our initial coffee, and as our search began, we communicated mainly over email. If we had wanted her to accompany us to open houses, I’m sure she would have done so, but we found we were so obsessed with Redfin/Zillow updates anyway (and we tended to try to see 8-10 open houses in a day) that it worked best to find the properties we wanted to see, go check them out, and then email Ellen any questions or to ask for her advice about specific concerns. I can’t count the number of questions we sent Ellen over email – all of which she responded to with kindness, patience, intelligence and in such thoughtful detail.  We proceeded this way for a couple months, and then something kind of clicked and we got more serious about buying. Things seemed to fall into place, and after seeing a stretch of properties we weren’t crazy about, we found an apartment we fell in love with. It sounds cliché, but we just kind of knew. In some ways, this feeling wasn’t something Ellen could directly influence, but after months of learning from her insights and experience, I think she had helped us trust our gut feeling that we had found something worth pursuing.  When we decided to put an offer in, Ellen walked us through the (at times nerve wracking!!) process with a relaxed but driven energy that we appreciated – she wanted us to get the condo, but not to do so from a frenzied place of anxiety, which we appreciated. At one point in the negotiation, when the sellers came back asking for our highest and best offer, my husband and I had different approaches as for how to respond and Ellen skillfully facilitated a conference call where we all ended up feeling good about our next steps. We always felt like she had a solid strategy that helped us save money without compromising our broader goals.