Ex-pitcher Resop, Raveis Real Estate in North Naples to help athletes move

William Raveis Real Estate expects to score big with a new division that caters to big-name athletes and other celebrities.

The idea for the Naples-based division started with a conversation about a year ago between the owner of the real estate company and one of his newest agents, Chris Resop, a Naples native and former major league baseball pitcher.

The conversation went something like this: Resop told William Raveis, the company's longtime owner and founder, he wanted to create a concierge service for baseball players to help them relocate.

Resop said he knew firsthand the headaches involved in moving after doing it at least 30 times over a 14-year career, and he wanted to make it easier for others to deal with those same curve balls.

"I said, 'Well you need a network, Chris,' " Raveis recalled. "You just can't do that by yourself."

So the two of them teamed up to create a one-stop shop for relocating athletes — and other superstars —  offering them all the services they need under one umbrella, with the utmost confidentiality. Services include everything from providing mortgages to securing movers — on top of the relocation help the division offers with securing leases and making home purchases and sales.

"We make sure the house is financed, make sure the kids and everybody are alright," Raveis said. "The athlete or entertainer doesn't have to worry about anything."

Everyone involved must sign confidentiality and professional behavior agreements. This means they can't spill the beans on the relocation to anyone and they can't take selfies with the celebrity clients, or ask for autographs.

Resop, who played for the Florida Marlins, Los Angeles Angels and Atlanta Braves, as well as overseas in Japan, is the point man for the new Sports + Entertainment division, serving as its vice president and managing director.

Based at the real estate firm's office in North Naples, Resop said he is available 24 hours a day and will do whatever he can to help athletes and celebrities relocate, near and far.

"This is just not down here in Florida," he said. "This is international. We have the capability to help them move internationally."

The division officially starts this week, but it already has created buzz and sparked interest. The Boston Globe published a story about it a few weeks ago, and letters have gone out to baseball players and their agents.

"So far, we've had a tremendous amount of positive feedback," Resop said. "We've had a tremendous amount of inquiries about it. We have been contacted by some of the largest sports agencies in the country over the past week."

The division was introduced to thousands of agents at the real estate firm's annual meeting Wednesday at the Mohegan Sun Convention Center in Connecticut. The company — founded by Raveis in 1974 with a phone and desk in a room above a grocery store in Fairfield, Connecticut — has grown to more than 4,000 agents in 120 offices, including three in the Naples area.

Even before the division was formalized, Resop, 34, was finding a niche with baseball players. In December he arranged a lease for recently traded Red Sox pitcher Chris Sale in the Boston area and sold him a luxury home in Florida.

Sale was OK with the information being shared, telling The Boston Globe, “Chris Resop and his agent network were absolute professionals and found my family exactly what we were looking for."

Over the years, Raveis Real Estate has worked with other well-known athletes, including New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning and former Houston Astros first baseman Jeff Bagwell. But the firm never had a formal program spelling out how transactions and clients would be treated until Resop pitched his ideas.

Those ideas "took off like a rocket ship," Raveis said.

"Everyone is so enamored with athletes and celebrities," Raveis said. "To have a division for just celebrities is kind of cool."

The new division isn't without competition, but Raveis and Resop insist it offers more comprehensive real estate and relocation services and goes to a greater extreme to protect the privacy of its clients.

"The athletes are all normal people," Resop said. "They put their pants on the same as everybody else. It's just they are in the spotlight with every move they make. So privacy is important at home. It's the last little bit of privacy you have."

To protect their privacy, celebrities often will form trusts or LLCs to buy property.

"Once that privacy is gone, there is nothing they can keep private, unfortunately," Resop said.

The Wall Street Journal expressed interest in doing a story about the division but wanted an exclusive agreement to get information about its transactions and clients. So the real estate firm turned down an interview, though it would have helped spread the word about the new venture, said Matt Lane, senior vice president and general manager of William Raveis - Florida LLC.

"We'll never change our privacy policy," Lane said. "Those are the juicy details that everyone wants, but that is why we are going to do well, because we aren't going to give them up."

A percentage of the money made on each transaction will be donated to charity under the celebrity's name. Athletes and entertainers can choose the charity, which will receive no less than 5 percent of the commission earned on the William Raveis side of the transaction, Lane said.

The response to the division from sports and celebrity agents has been "you nailed it," Lane said. An advisory board that included financial advisers, athletes, sports and celebrity agents and Realtors helped design it.

"It really is an industry first, which is really what William Raveis has a mind to do —  to innovate in the real estate space," Lane said.

William Raveis Real Estate is a newcomer to Florida. It opened its first office in the state a little over a year ago at 720 Fifth Ave. S. in Naples. With its headquarters still in Connecticut, it's the largest family-owned real estate brokerage company in the Northeast.

Raveis has a home in Port Royal and splits his time between Naples and Connecticut. He discovered Naples decades ago when he came here on a business trip.

"Do you know of anything greater than Naples around the country? I don't," he said.

Resop doesn't either. He said he is right where he wants to be — back home and loving his second career in real estate. For him, it's a home run.

"This division and real estate in general are something I'm passionate about," Resop said. "I will be doing this for a very, very long time.

"My goals with this are to help out, to be there for these clients, to help them with every move they need to make no matter where they are going."