ZOOM Real Estate in Burwood has long been at the forefront of the market in Sydney’s inner west and the agency has just unveiled its architecturally designed, new-look premises.
The boutique independent agency has been in Burwood since 1983 and was formerly run by John Roozendaal and Peter Phillips.
For the past 15 years, ZOOM Real Estate Burwood has operated under licensee in charge Spiro Mavridis and over the past five years, his wife Ana has increasingly taken more of a leading role in day-to-day operations
Ana Mavridis has a background in the corporate sector and spent 11 years working for a life insurance provider before making the switch to real estate.
Ms Mavridis said she has had a thorough grounding in all facets of the business’ operations and is particularly passionate about championing female leadership in the sector.
“I threw myself in there by working in reception at first and learnt the business inside out,” Ms Mavridis told Elite Agent.
“I think the biggest struggle that I faced when I first stepped into the industry, in addition to learning a whole new industry, was just how male-dominated it was,” she added.
“People kind of instantly associated real estate with ‘an agent must be a male’, ‘men show strength’ and ‘men can negotiate better than women’.
“The feminist in me was like, ‘well no’. Women can do just the same but they can also provide that element of empathy that many men might miss.”
Now firmly ensconced as ZOOM’s Sales Manager, Ms Mavridis has been focused on overhauling ZOOM’s approach to leadership and customer service.
TAKING CHARGE AND MODERNISING
“I’ve started to lead the charge in our office, focusing a little bit more on women in real estate,” Ms Mavridis said.
She noted she was keen to ensure customer service and boutique care, which she felt had “fallen by the wayside a little bit in this industry”, were at the forefront of ZOOM’s offering.
“I also felt that we needed to be a little bit more modern, in the here and now, but without losing that element of care and not having that franchise feel.
“We wanted it to feel warm and welcoming and inviting, so it feels like a nicely designed home, but within a professional office environment.”
Ms Mavridis said it was a balancing act she thought they had pulled off with aplomb.
“We feel that we’ve really nailed the whole look,” she said. “We’ve made it sleek, it doesn’t look as hard and fast anymore.”
Another change she has helped spearhead recently is adapting ZOOM Burwood’s practices to make the transition to a paperless office.
“It was a decision we arrived at not only to provide our customers with leading-edge technology but it’s also something we wanted to do from a sustainability perspective,” Ms Mavridis said.
“It’s something we were working on prior to COVID and now we are now back with a paperless office and a new look to boot.”
Ms Mavridis said she felt the new-look premises, at shop 4, 78-82 Burwood Rd, Burwood, portrayed ZOOM as one of the inner west’s go-to agencies.
“We do have the largest rent roll in the area, we have 1000 properties on the books, so we wanted to convey that to people,” she said.
“We want people to know that, yes, you might perceive us to be young, but we’re not as young as you think and we’re in the here and now and we’re here to stay.”
ZOOM will be hosting its grand reopening on Wednesday, April 28, from 3-6pm. The event is invite-only but you can follow all the action on ZOOM Real Estate Burwood and Ana Mavridis’s Instagram pages at @zoomrealestateburwood and @ana.ismyname respectively..
