The merger brings on Katy Thielke Straser’s seven-person team and allows Jones Fridman International to expand its market area into Northern California. The team now represents about $25 billion in career sales.
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Compass’ Jones Fridman International, the recently established team led by top luxury agents Sally Forster Jones and Tomer Fridman, has expanded its footprint into Silicon Valley with its merger with the Straser Silicon Valley team at Compass, The Real Deal reported on Thursday.
The merger brings on Katy Thielke Straser’s seven-person team and allows Jones Fridman International to expand its market area into Northern California. The combined team now represents about $25 billion in career sales across 45 agents.
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“The properties we sell that are $10 million, $20 million, $100 million, a lot of these people are from up north,” Tomer Fridman told The Real Deal. “When we set out to look for a partner, Katy came up constantly in terms of her level of service and her team’s caliber performing in the luxury market. It was a no-brainer that this was going to be our partner up north.”
Jones Fridman International is also led by Isidora Fridman, who co-founded The Fridman Group with her son, Tomer, and who is also a founding partner of Israel Sotheby’s International Realty.
Thielke Straser launched Straser Silicon Valley with operations executive Virginia Nicoletti at Compass in 2020. Since that time, the team has closed $440 million in transactions.
The combined teams will specialize in Menlo Park (out of which Straser’s team will be based), Palo Alto and Atherton. The high-end neighborhoods often attract tech executives and international buyers, according to Straser. In fact, billionaire software engineer Marc Andreessen recently listed his Atherton mansion for about $33.5 million.
The expansion and merger is the first step in the team’s greater expansion globally across top luxury real estate markets, which will eventually include New York, Miami, Nashville, Montecito, Orange County and Aspen.
“The key for us is luxury,” Fridman told The Real Deal. “We’re not just looking to expand. We’re looking to expand in key luxury markets in the country.”
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