The Journey to being part of the top 1% of realtors in Miami is not made alone. Andy Rotondaro discusses how launching his own team has propelled his business to new heights.
"At first, I was concerned that I wasn't going to have enough work to keep my team busy," said Andy. "But what I found is that hiring the right people actually frees you up to do more work and you focus on growing your business instead of task-oriented services".
Studies have found that entrepreneurs lose 30% of their time doing low-value tasks that could be dedicated to building relationships with new and existing clients. When the business starts reaching saturation, delegation, and building a team plays an important role. However, upscaling a business and understanding the importance of delegation don't come naturally to everyone. It takes leadership lessons and hours of practice to let go of being a one-man army and build a team to work efficiently. Applauding the art of delegation, Andy Rotondaro's journey from being an entrepreneur to building a team is inspirational.
Early Story
In 2012-2014, while residing in New York City, Andy began working in real estate, spurred on by his friend, in an effort to combine his two businesses-real estate and fashion. The early years were challenging for Andy as he hustled to break into the business in one of the most competitive and fast-paced real estate markets in the world with his colleague Hottinger. The opportunity for his real estate career set about in 2014 when the Hottinger Team was looking for a representative to move to Miami and start up the team's offices down south.
Challenges To Opportunities
When the world was facing new challenges during the pandemic, Andy said that Florida experienced tremendous growth. He brings forward two reasons for that. Firstly, Florida was seen as the 'free state' for how the government handled the pandemic. Lockdowns were not enforced and mundane things like going to restaurants or shopping were not snatched away from people. Secondly, the growth of the work-from-home environment that took place during the pandemic led many high-paying residents of New York and California to question their high-imposed state-income taxes. Why should one pay over 10% of their income to work from home? (Florida has no state income tax for residents) On top of that, Miami offers some of the best white sand beaches and tropical weather that the US has to offer, all while at the time was being sold at a fraction of the price of other competing major real estate markets.
This surged the growth of the Miami market, and also his business. He began building a team.
The Daro Team
The team was first created in 2019 when Andy teamed up with Viktoriya Ho. Viktoriya had experience selling some of Miami's top new development projects including Four Season Surfside and Fendi Chateau. However, the task of what is known in the industry as a Resale Agent was unknown to her; so the two immediately made a great pair. Roughly one year later, The Daro Team recruited Andrea Arcuri, who had previously worked for The Chad Carroll Group, one of the nation's top producing teams. Together, the trio blended nicely and their success had not gone unnoticed. Compass Florida eventually recruited The Daro Team and they moved over to the nation's #1 brokerage in early 2022. Since then, the team has added Goran Cuk, a Harvard graduate, and Amazon employee to come work for their team. They are also working to add new agents and The Daro Team has plans to upscale their business and open a commercial division as well.
The crew is highly motivated and effective when it comes to the real estate business, and they constantly look to go above and beyond to meet the needs of their affluent domestic and international clientele. Collectively they are fluent in English, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Mandarin, Portuguese, Croatian, Bulgarian, Serbian, and Hungarian. They pride themselves in providing the best real estate experience for their customers; predominantly the residential needs of domestic and international clients throughout Miami and Miami Beach.
When asked about the best marketing strategy and scope for the future, Andy responded that his best marketing strategy is to let Miami sell itself. He predicts that the living conditions and culture of Miami have always been an international attraction. Lately, Miami has also been making moves as one of the top relocations for domestic clientele as well. Andy believes the sky's the limit for Miami as it continues to attract more and more people every day.
