On June 6, 2023, the Womens Council of Realtors Houston held their 2024 elections at the top floor of beautiful Hanover Autry Park near downtown. Susan was the president in 2022 and along with two other past presidents helped facilitate the voting and count the ballots. Current president, Lisa Eurestes, presided over the election, where all of the candidates went in front of the voting members and delivered speeches. In the end, Dena Musfy was elected to be the next president, Allison Salas will be the next First Vice President. Delara Aubon will be the next Treasurer, Rob Arnold will be the next Membership Director, and Eddie Massa was reelected to be the Event Director. It was a beautiful evening to get together at such a lovely venue. Congratulations to all the new officers.
CIPS stands for Certified International Property Specialist and is a special NAR designation for realtors who specialize in working with international clients. It takes 5 days of FULL day classes + certain experience requirements to obtain. Last week June 14-16 and this week June 20-21, the Houston Association of Realtors (HAR) collaborated with Keller Williams Memorial to offer the 5 day institute here in Houston, in person. For the past three years, this Institute has only been offered via zoom, and this is the first time maybe since Covid that the class was offered live in person. The exciting news is Susan became a certified CIPS instructor this year, and she was hired to be one of the teachers, in charge of teaching two of the days.Together with her colleague, Ed Eakin, and one of her mentors Richard Miranda, the three teachers will be teaching 35 Houston Realtors and helping them to obtain this prestigious designation. Those who accomplish the mission will be pinned at a special ceremony at the next National Association of Realtors conference, taking place in Anaheim, California in November. At Annoura Realty Group, Susan already has had this CIPS designation since 2009, and Mariko Fujita obtained it last year. We are super excited that Mik Ebisu is taking the class this time, especially since Susan is one of the instructors!
When Koh and Susan went to Toronto, they ran into a Japanese Cheesecake shop from Fukuoka. It was fluffy while still cheesy and people could buy it warmed up or cold. Today’s news is that there is a new Japanese Cheesecake shop in HOUSTON! It is located in Chinatown at 9188 Bellaire Blvd, Ste C, Houston, TX and it is called Nikko’s Cheesecake. A quick look at the menu shows that you can buy a slice or an entire cake, with the entire cake being just under $20. There are several flavors to choose from- plain, strawberry, Nutella, and caramel. There are also several kinds of fancy flavored teas, topped with cheesefoam (prices for teas are more expensive than the cheesecake!?). If you have been craving Japanese style cheesecake, this is your chance to get some! It’s much different than American cheesecake, which tends to be much heavier on the cream cheese. Japanese cheesecake is slightly more spongy while still has the cheesy flavor!
With inventory still tight, we are finding the market still very competitive. Our saving grace is that we have a portfolio of 90 homes located in popular areas that we have been able to offer our new expats. Our new i-Pro client will get the upcoming Penrice home zoned to Pattison Elementary and our new Kaneka client will most likely get the finally vacated Sun Harbor home in Clear Lake. Meanwhile, we welcomed a new Daikin expat Mr. Hashimoto, who came to Houston to house hunt last week. He is in the electrical design department of Daikin and this will be his first foreign assignment. We are so excited for all the new adventures waiting for him! Susan and Mariko made a drive to visit the new Mayekawa location in West Katy, meeting the HR director and the new CEO, Tomo Hashimoto. We are excited about the possibilty of helping their incoming expats in the future! Our newest Mitsubishi Corporation expat, Mr. Hiroki will come in mid June, but we wrapped up his lease at a brand new apartment near Buffalo Bayou/downtown. And, on June 1, we had the CEO of Kaneka take possession of his beautiful new home in Clear Lake as well as a new Japanese doctor with Baylor College of Medicine start his lease at a popular apartment in the Med Center. Today, the new CEO of Satake kicks off his new life at one of our favorite apartments in the Galleria area. Coincidentally, he is longtime friends with the Kashiwade family, our guests from Yokohama (see previous article). On the sale front, Susan was re-hired by the Government of Japan to sell their mansion inside Farnham Park. Mariko had two sales, one representing a seller doing a 1031 Exchange and one representing a buyer buying an investment home. We love what we do and we welcome anyone who needs help to buy, sell, lease! If you know anyone that needs real estate help, please don’t hesitate to introduce us!!
Last Thursday, Susan’s friends from Yokohama came to visit Houston. We don’t get many personal visitors so we were happy to see them. Susan and Mie Kashiwade have known each other for 25 years, since Susan taught English at Harlequin Air, a charter airline under Japan Air Systems before JAS was acquired by Japan Airlines. Mie was an executive at the airlines and moved to Fukuoka from Yokohama to help lead the organization. Mie and her husband Keizo stayed at Susan’s house and together they went to several places: around Clear Lake, Galveston, two Astros games (one to watch Shohei Ohtani pitch!), then hit the road with their friend and new CEO of Satake, Mr. Moriyama, to San Antonio, Dripping Springs for BBQ, and Austin. It was a very busy 4.5 days but they did so many things together and made some long lasting memories. It is so nice to catch up with dear friends who have known me since I was 25 years old, half my life!
