GOING GREEN - 8

GOING GREEN
What are REALTORS Doing about Sustainability?

By Steve Wright

Bartle’s brokerage recruits highly educated people from a diverse background and makes sure all of them get EcoBroker training. EcoBroker is an on-line training course that allows Realtors to attain Green certification.

“We’re certified Green building specialists -- we want our agents to be Greenest of the Green. We’re in classes learning from architects and builders,’’ he said. ”We’d rather sell a not Green home to a Green buyer and teach them to Green it. We look at Green as being equivalent to high end property.”

“Realtors have great influence on the spending patterns of their clients. The Greening of houses has only been going on a few years. To introduce best practices to our buyers, we need more data,” said Bartle, whose firm gives buyers a certificate for a home energy efficiency and air quality analysis worth $250.

Bartle, whose mission is to make San Francisco the most sustainable city in the world, will soon open branches of Green Key Real Estate in other parts of Northern California plus Seattle, Portland and Boulder, Colorado. The ultimate goal is to sell Green Key franchises to like-minded brokers across the United States.

TOMORROW: Janet Rosenberg, a Realtor with Intero Real Estate Services in Santa Cruz California

Wright frequently writes about smart growth and sustainable communities. He and his wife live in a restored historic home in the heart of Miami’s Little Havana. Contact him at: stevewright64@yahoo.com