Each month, Luxe SF profiles a member of The Luxury Marketing Council. This month we talked to Joe Blue, the charismatic and hard-charging head of The Bay Area’s newest addition to the already-crowded luxury real estate marketplace. Blue tells why he chose to enter the market and how he plans to carve out market share in an environment where competition is fierce and market dynamics unsettled.

LUXESF: Let’s start with background on Blue Realty Group.

BLUE: Blue Realty Group commenced operations June 1st, 2006. My prior background was in real estate working for companies like Bank of America and Cal Fed, mainly as a lender. I decided to start the company because it’s something I’ve always wanted to do, to have my own office and pursue luxury real estate sales in the Bay Area.

LUXESF: How many agents do you have today?

BLUE: We have 10 agents in San Francisco, but we’re currently placing 10 agents in the Beverly Hills office and another 10 agents in the Tahoe office. The offices in Tahoe and Beverly Hills should be fully functional by mid-January.

LUXESF: So your sales geography is the Bay Area, Southern Cal and Tahoe.

BLUE: Yes, but we also have international coverage. We’ve established broker relationships around the world with over 1,800 brokers in 65 countries.

LUXESF: How have you established that network?

BLUE: By joining select global networks such as LuxuryRealEstate.com and attending key international conferences. In fact, I’m going to a conference in Salzburg, Austria, on January 24th to solidify and enhance my European connections.

LUXESF: So, your market niche then is clearly luxury properties.

BLUE: Only luxury properties.

LUXESF: What range?

BLUE: Officially, anything over a million dollars, but preferably two million dollars and above, because a million dollars is median in the Bay Area.

LUXESF: Five years out, what’s the vision for the company? What do you look like? How are you operating?

BLUE: We’re modeling Blue Realty Group after best-of-breed companies like Sotheby’s International Realty. We want to be more than a local real estate luxury company; we want to operate nationally and internationally. Real estate has gone international, and we want to follow that trend. Right now we’ve been working with brokers and customers in Costa Rica, Rio de Janeiro, Canada, Australia and Europe.

LUXESF: Let’s talk about you. How did you get into real estate?

BLUE: I’m originally from St. Louis, Missouri, went to college at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and then attended grad school at the University of Chicago. In 1985-86, I was transferred out to San Francisco from Chicago to run a French chemical company based in San Leandro. Following that, I got involved with the first real estate lending program for Bay View Federal Savings and Loan in San Mateo Country. I was assigned a territory in the South Bay and my function was to visit real estate offices and get them to finance their real estate loans through Bay View. I did that for about a year, and then went to work with Coast Federal Bank. Of the 800 agents in the state of California, I was ranked #3 and achieved that success by financing and refinancing homes primarily in upscale areas, Pacific Heights, Ross, Belvedere and Tiburon. When Coast tried to change our commission structure, all the agents left and I moved to Continental Savings and Loan. After that I was recruited by Bank of America, and then went on to become Regional Sales Manager for Cal Fed, a first-time home buyer program.

LUXESF: Weren’t you involved in politics?

BLUE: I had always been interested in politics even when I was in college. I was a Senate Intern for Senator Thomas Eagleton of Missouri and chairman of the intern corps in Washington, D.C. I got involved in San Francisco politics in the late eighties running a MUNI station called the Forest Hill Station, where we received an award from the State of California for putting together the best transportation organization for a neighborhood. The station in question is the Laguna Honda-Forest Hill Station in the western part of the city. MUNI had big problems with that station at that time. There was heavy crime, kids getting beat up and senior citizens getting robbed. I approached MUNI and asked them to let my organization take it over and run it efficiently.

Then I ran for Supervisor and lost. I licked my wounds, and then became a Director of the Golden Gate Bridge in 2001. I was put there by unanimous vote of the Board of Supervisors and by the Mayor at that time, Willie Brown. After that, I ran for Supervisor again, and I lost again. It’s then that I thought, “Well, after two losses, maybe I’d better start my own real estate company, and maybe I can start winning.”

LUXESF: How are you viewing the current Bay Area real estate market?

BLUE: The upper-end market is hot, and the middle-market is dead. For someone to survive in the foreseeable future, they’ve got to look at the upper-end, and also the international market.

LUXESF: You’re very optimistic about what’s happening?

BLUE: I feel guilty for having this much fun. I love it. It’s exciting. I feel that this business is going to be the wave of the future, and we’re at the vanguard of that trend.

LUXESF: How are you attracting agents and listings?

BLUE: By simple persistence and using the network and connections that I’ve established in the political and business arenas.

LUXESF: When you hire an agent, what are you looking for?

BLUE: First and foremost, that agent has to be hungry. I want an agent who realizes that this is a tough and demanding business. This requires a seven-day-a week commitment. The agent’s whole life has got to be focused on the job. When people ask me “Do you have a social life?” my answer is “No!” When you first start off in the real estate business, your social life should be your business. A lot of people can’t accept that. I’m looking for that agent who is willing to sacrifice it all.

LUXESF: Are you finding agents out there who fit that mold?

BLUE: I’m finding some that fit the mold, but I’ve made mistakes as well. I’ve hired agents who cannot cut the mustard.

LUXESF: Where are you putting your marketing dollars? What’s been your primary marketing thrust?

BLUE: We started off by investing heavily in magazine advertising, but now where concentrating more on the Internet. We had to invest initially in lifestyle media in order to get our name out. Don’t forget we’re a brand new company. Fortunately we had the deep pockets to do that.

LUXESF: What’s your primary thrust now? You said Internet. What did you mean by that?

BLUE: Right now, we can take a property and have it in front of 1,800 brokers worldwide; have it exposed to 20,000 agents; and have it listed on 35 websites within a matter of a week. We can locate a property anywhere in the world within a matter of seconds and be able to match that property to the needs of our clients.

LUXESF: What made you join The Luxury Marketing Council?

BLUE: The Council stands for luxury, and what we are is luxury. That’s our goal -- to get to that 10% of the country that controls 80% of the wealth. So, of course, I was attracted to an organization like The Luxury Marketing Council. It gave us credibility, not to mention all the other benefits, including shared information and networking.