Testimonials
Had an excellent experience with Kevin Dougherty. Highly knowledgeable. Very professional. Extremely personable. Would and have referred family and friends to him without hesitation. He worked effortlessly for months (due to multiple issues on sellers end) to successfully secure my acquisition of a tremendous short sale property. Cannot speak highly enough about his qualities as a Realtor.
Kevin is exceptionally skilled at executing all types of real estate transactions, but negotiating the complicated ones is where he truly excels. His incredible depth of knowledge—not only in transactions but also in property renovations and marketing—makes him second to none as a realtor!
He and his team at Reef Realty are personable, kind, a delight to work with, and completely on point. The sale of my property was extremely challenging from the start. Kevin provided invaluable counsel on numerous improvements to optimally position the property for marketing. Once it was under contract, he deftly managed challenging and demanding buyers as well as their agent.
Thanks to Kevin’s expertise, he single-handedly closed a deal that, in lesser hands, would almost assuredly have fallen apart.
If you want a broker that is dedicated, on top of everything, follows through, and takes care of you in more ways than you realized were even needed, Kevin is your guy. He performance during my short sale was outstanding and impressive. He truly cares about his clients and it’s no wonder we end up being his friends. I was primarily dealing with a bank. If you are in need of a hero to battle the banks in a short-sale, I would 1000% recommend Kevin. If it wasn’t for his efforts, his round the clock diligence and his determination to help me accomplish my goals, I wouldn’t have gotten out of the tough situation I was in. A big thank you to Kevin and to his team. Simply Fabulous!!
Besides being a good friend, Kevin also did a fantastic job for me in selling my home. He undertook the role right as the market began the downturn. He stuck with it and, through his diligence alone, got the property moved under very difficult circumstances. Many thanks.
I’ve represented Kevin Dougherty on three closings so far, and Kevin has impressed me with his quick decisions and tenacity. He’ll also look for creative solutions to get the deal closed. And Kevin has a good support team to help overcome the many hurdles in the property-buying process. Kevin is clearly an experienced buyer, and I would highly recommend him to any investor who might consider bringing him on as a partner.
Kevin is an incredibly talented and professional investor. With lightning speed he brings in his highly skilled and proficient sub-contractors and within hours, there are answers and solutions, to otherwise challenging issues. Kevin treats the clients with the utmost care and respect, which is an honorable trait for someone with his track record of success. Our last deal required a true “Hail Mary” pass but we pulled it off while working together for the benefit of the entire team! I look forward to many more successful deals with Kevin.
Kevin recently assisted me in purchasing my home in San Elijo Hills. After briefly working with another realtor, I contacted Kevin requesting information on the property. Within 2 hours Kevin had discovered more information that the previous realtor had in weeks. Kevin used his expertise to assist me in putting together a competitive offer which was successfully accepted over several others, while never pressuring me to pay more than I had decided was my budget. This particular property offered many challenges, including my desire for an exceptionally quick closing. Kevin and his team worked tirelessly to ensure that the numerous documents and paperwork were completed and returned in hours, not days, which is common with some other realtors. Kevin provided me excellent advice and counsel on several aspects of the property, and due to his knowledge and hard work we were able to close and get me the keys before I had to leave town again for work. Kevin is a true professional with exceptional knowledge of the San Diego real estate market. In spite of the many challenges of this particular transaction, including my travel schedule and the seller being somewhat difficult to work with, Kevin and his team succeeded in completing the transaction while maintaining excellent communication and assistance to me throughout. The work and diligence to his clients that I experienced from Kevin is unparalleled and I highly recommend Kevin for any real estate transaction.
Well, I almost made what would have been a critical error in judgement. I almost hired my friend’s wife to represent me in my recent real estate transaction because she is really nice, has a real estate license and mostly because she offered to rebate part of her commission back to me. After working with Kevin and seeing how much his knowledge and experienced benefitted me in the end, I see now that decision would have been a huge mistake. Kevin’s knowledge, advice and negotiating skills saved me multiples of the few thousand I would have been rebated from the other agent. His construction experience proved to be invaluable when addressing any physical conditions during the inspection. And his extensive experience in executing a real estate transaction help to point out and avoid all the potential pit falls I might have stumbled in to. Kevin negotiated for every penny he could on my behalf and I was pleasantly surprised to see how he took my transaction so very personally. He paid great attention to the detail needed which gave me great comfort and confidence in working with him and knowing the job was getting done right. I didn’t really know how involved a good real estate needs to be and how crucial their experience is. Now I know and in hindsight, I could have never bought my home without him. I can and do confidently recommend using Kevin’s representation if the opportunity ever arises.
Once again we went back to Kevin to help us execute our 4th real estate transaction with him. And once again he did not disappoint. Our deep understanding of Kevin’s work experience and expertise made coming back to Kevin an easy decision. His upbeat personality and sense of humor makes him easy to work with, but when it comes to negotiating a real estate transaction, he takes his job very seriously and very personally. I always know he’s acting in our best interest and making us a priority. In our most recent transaction, after several counter offers, we got to a place in the negotiations where we were ready to accept. Although we were happy with the negotiated terms, Kevin felt there was a little more being left on the table. Sure enough, he got us another $10k off the purchase price. In the grand scheme of things, $10k isn’t a huge number but it speaks loudly about how he does his job. I highly recommend Kevin to anyone looking for a ‘best in industry’ agent, and trust that he will continue to exceed our expectations with our next transaction.
We dropped about the most complex real estate transaction on Kevin that any of us have ever seen. There was a foreclosure, an eviction, an unlawful detainer action, and a quiet title action all on this one property at one point or another during the transaction. Kevin took everything in stride overcoming all obstacles and even kept the bank from taking the property back on numerous occasions. His advice, experience and his contacts lead us down the right path. We recouped our original investment plus a lot more making it all worthwhile in the end. I know a lot of real estate guys but I don’t know another that would have persevered and ultimately succeeded in achieving our goals like Kevin did on this property. In the end, after the chaos subsided, Kevin presented us with multiple offers and a fast, all-cash close on a very complicated transaction. You would be hard pressed to find better representation.
I unexpectedly ended up in a complex real estate transaction that involved the passing of a loved one resulting in another family member inheriting a property and me acting as the guardian for that family member. So I didn’t actually own the property but found myself in a position where I had to execute a commercial real estate transaction nonetheless. Kevin was able to list the property, market and sell the property and guide me through the transaction to completion…. all in the middle of a global pandemic! The end result turned out great and I would have never been able to do this without Kevin’s experience and guidance. He is a friend of mine and at first I was ambivalent about using a friend for a business transaction, but Kevin went above and beyond my expectations as a broker. He treated the negotiations as if they were his own. There were times when he could have taken the “easy” route and been done with it. Instead he took the hard route and protected my best interests instead. He proved to be an excellent negotiator and found compensation for me that I would never have even requested. He was 100% transparent and highly responsive to my never ending questions. Anyone considering a real estate transaction would be hard pressed to find a better broker.
We were about to list our house with Kevin right when the pandemic hit. With limited expectations we decided to move forward anyway. We all thought the rapid turmoil in the world was going to detrimentally affect our ultimate sales price. I’m an engineering. It’s my nature to need all my questions answered and all my scenarios run through before I am comfortable… especially in globally unstable times. Kevin was able to tackle them all. We followed all his advice and in hindsight, glad we did. To our delight and with Kevin’s guidance, we ended up selling our house for a price that was about $100k higher than all the market data justified. We felt very confident that all Kevin’s advice and actions were in our best interests. And his knowledge base and experience are well beyond all the other agents we know. You think things like that don’t matter… but they do. We’re using Kevin again to purchase our new home and would confidently recommend you do the same.
Kevin is an amazing real estate agent and a really good guy. We originally met at the dog park and liked him as a person before we ever considered him as our agent. We were buying our first home and didn’t really know where to live or what we could afford. No problem – Kevin helped us get pre-qualified for our loan and gave us all the information that anyone would need about our geographic location as well. With his help and guidance, we were able to make really good, confident decisions. His experience provided such valuable insight and we really depended on this knowledge to acquire our financing, understand the buying process, and ultimately find our ideal house. We thought we wanted to live in the hills of La Mesa, but Kevin found us a house in Clairemont that not only fit our exact needs and budget, but was located on a canyon and only 8 minutes from La Jolla Shores. It’s the perfect home that we live in today! I’m still not sure how he did it, but we bought in a strong seller’s market and he got our offer accepted over 12 others. Even after going in to escrow he was still able to negotiate another $20k off our purchase price. When we first started working with him he said his 25 years of experience was going to help us in many way but we took that comment with a grain of salt. He was right. Looking back, his efforts and experience really did make the difference in achieving our goals.
Bottom line – Kevin landed us our dream home! And he did it smack dab in the middle of a brutal seller’s market. Frankly, I can’t believe he pulled it off. Homes were flying off the market and even ours had multiple offers on it. I thought for sure we were going to outbid or pass over for a cash offer. But Kevin figured out a way to really make us stand out. Between his interpersonal magic, his construction experience, and his transactional knowledge, Kevin and the Reef Realty Team demonstrated a level of expertise well above and beyond our expectations. Just one of several examples – Kevin discovered during escrow, the entire waste water system was 1963 original, corroded, leaking cast iron and in need of being replaced. I would have never discovered this on my own. After finding the problem, Kevin was able to negotiate an $11k credit for this item alone and then found a vendor that did the work for only $3k.
I did a real estate transaction previously before I knew Kevin. It was nothing like this. I now have a new appreciation for what an exemplary agent can accomplish. We learned a lot from Kevin and we are literally now set for life. I can’t recommend Kevin and Reef Realty highly enough.
To date I’ve used Kevin’s services for 3 real estate transactions and couldn’t be more grateful for what he’s done for my family and I believe he truly works in the best interests of the client always. I recall when looking for our first home, being enamored with a very nice house on an extremely busy street. He believed so firmly that we would regret the location he said we might need to find a different agent to show us the house. Of course soon afterwards he helped us land a house on the perfect block and in the same neighborhood we wanted. We loved the location and the community of neighbors and in hindsight would have hated the location he advised us against.
His skill in identifying a good fit, good value and projecting a clients needs that they aren’t yet aware of are invaluable. It’s not always immediately obvious but he ends up being spot on with almost almost all of his projections.
He’s been at this for decades, there’s almost nothing he hasn’t seen, so he can essentially project the behaviors of sellers and buyers as if he’s inside their heads. He knows where to probe when viewing properties (think boundaries, easements, structural repairs, associated costs) to protect your interests, and he has the perspective both from his experience as an agent but also his development background to perfectly advise you on what ‘little stuff’ shouldn’t get in the way of the big picture. His skill in this regard is incredibly valuable – especially when there’s big money on the line. Sometimes every small thing feels like a huge deal. He lets you know when it is and when it isn’t.
Kevin is highly competent, analytic, down to earth, and a good communicator. He is patient with the inevitable client neurosis and he gets the job done right.
He encouraged us to pursue a complicated short sale with significant associated legal costs for our first house because he knows the markets and that this particular property was still a good value. He navigated us through the process without our incurring any additional fees despite his significant additional effort. Less than a decade later (as he projected) we sold the house when our family grew out of it for a roughly 60% return. This massive return was a direct product of Kevin’s encouragement to pursue the short sale followed by him expertly marketing the home for sale and getting us well over list price on its sale, which at the time was not the norm. This substantial return ultimately allowed us to pursue and purchase a larger house with a huge lot.
During negotiations on our new house, he told us when to counter and under what terms. And he told us when to stand our ground. We got the new house with Kevin’s expert guidance that would otherwise been well beyond our means.
If we ever had to buy or sell again, I wouldn’t hesitate to enlist his services for a 4th time and beyond. You cant put a price on someone who is experienced beyond belief, unquestionably loyal to your interests as clients, understands the market and has a keen eye for evaluating property fit, value and design potential.
You hear realtors boast of their levels of experience all the time. Often it’s just rhetoric – but not in Kevin’s case. I didn’t know his 25+ years of experience in real estate was going to be so obviously helpful but it was. Especially in today’s challenging buy-side housing market, Kevin’s understanding of all things real estate from construction, finance, and legal literally translated to real strategic value and real dollars. In our recent transaction the seller had a rookie agent. It was so advantageous to have Kevin’s representation as our buyer agent to work with a newbie to the industry. A lesser agent would never have overcome the hurdles he did. We highly recommend Kevin’s service and would work with him again without hesitation.
Kevin took what is an overwhelming process, and made it as seamless as possible for me! I had no idea how involved a real estate transaction could be. Thank goodness for Kevin’s guidance and expertise. I have to admit, I was really nervous and even freaked out at a couple points during my transaction. Kevin was part counselor, part contractor, and all real estate broker extraordinaire!
I almost used a technology company that automates the entire process. So thankful that I didn’t. There were so many times where Kevin’s human intervention was so helpful and very much needed. Each step of the way came with Kevin’s detailed information and advice that helped me understand the intricacies and ramifications of each decision. His assistance with making the right decisions was invaluable. And his experience and attention to detail played a significant role in the success of my transaction as well. It’s obvious to me now that without his help, the cost (and stress) of my transaction would have been much greater.
Even after the transaction was complete, Kevin went so far above and beyond the call of duty. I planned on remodeling the kitchen immediately after we closed escrow. He brought his engineer, contractors and vendors to the equation and explained the entire remodeling process that I was about to embark upon. And now that I’m in the middle of it, I can see how much I didn’t know. He’s been a wealth of knowledge and experience in all facets of this process. I have total confidence in recommending Kevin and his staff for any and all real estate related matters. It is very clear now to me now that my net results would have suffered greatly without his help.
When the time came to sell my condominium, I knew I was going to call Kevin over at Reef Realty. He helped me purchase my first home in San Diego over thirteen years ago and it was great experience back then.
This time around I felt the stakes were higher because the market was starting to turn and I needed to sell my existing condo before I could purchase a new home. Kevin suggested a course of action that, at first was not appealing to me. He said we should sell the condo ASAP regardless of whether we had a new replacement home lined up for me or not. He did explain that this might leave me “homeless” for a period of time but based on the market conditions was confident in his advice. I reluctantly agreed thinking of what a hassle finding an interim house would be if forced to go that route. Who wants to move twice?! We spruced up the condo, put it on the market and got top dollar for it at the tail end of a strong seller’s market. Since that time the rates have consistently risen and market has been in decline. Our timing was perfect and Kevin’s advice was spot-on!
We eventually did find a new home and the purchase was exceptionally difficult as it was a bank-owned property by an out of state bank. Kevin warned me of the many obstacles we could potentially face in a transaction such as this one but I fell in love with the house so we went for it.
The process began in November 2022 and we closed March 2023. The many hours of documentation and communication Kevin spent with the bank was above and beyond. I write with absolute certainty that if Kevin had not taken all the steps he took (that I had no way of knowing were necessary let alone required), that purchase would never have happened.
Yes, I did end up “homeless” for a few months but rented a small unit and in the end it really wasn’t that bad. We sold at the peak and then bought at a low. We ended up having plenty of time to find the right replacement property and vigorously negotiate the purchase of my new home which in the end took all those months. But again, because of the timing we were now turning toward a Buyer’s market so I got to take advantage of that too!
Considering the perfect timing of the sale and the equally perfect timing of my new purchase, I think I saved $50 – $100k compared to a scenario where I didn’t follow Kevin’s advice.
Kevin’s knowledge of everything real estate is so far above his peers and colleagues, its recognizable upon meeting him. You know you are going to be working with a person who has integrated real estate into his life and authentically enjoys it. He is genuinely devoted to his clients giving his all to ANY type of real estate transaction. He oddly enjoys reading contracts word for word, line by line to ensure there are no surprises. His communication is thorough throughout the process which I found crucial. His level of professionalism and steady, consistent demeanor made every meeting and conversation productive and provided me with a clear understanding of what was next.
In addition to Kevin’s years of real estate experience and the hundreds of transactions he has completed, he is also no stranger to renovations. Even after our transaction closed, he was still always there for me. He was happy to share his personal list of subcontractors and tradesmen. Those contacts have proven to be very valuable as I am performing a pretty extensive remodel on this property, which was always in my plan. Kevin still makes himself available to me and offers valuable advice and resources for the renovations ahead.
Kevin said from the beginning, “real estate transactions can be painful”. He was right but did everything in his power to bear the brunt of that pain and alleviate most of the discomfort. If not for Kevin, I would not have my new home today. I highly recommend him to anyone considering a real estate transaction.