The Nugget Newspaper - News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon

Coldwell Banker Bain is changing its presence in Sisters. The real estate office at the corner of Cascade Avenue and Oak Street will close in February — but its brokers will continue to serve clients in the community.

They will be based out of Coldwell Banker Bain’s office in Bend.

Broker Jennifer McCrystal expressed some wistfulness that the real estate office that has had such a big presence in Sisters for decades will no longer be there, but impact on the business will be minimal.

“There’s not a lot that will change for me,” she said. “Nothing is going to change for my clients. My license will hang in the Bend office instead of the Sisters office, because the Sisters office won’t exist anymore.”

Coldwell Banker Bain President Bob Burns told The Nugget that the decision to close the Sisters office offers a better allocation of resources and “better investment in our clients and brokers.”

Like McCrystal, he foresees no impact on clients.

“The experience, from a consumer perspective, should be pretty seamless,” he said.

The real estate business has changed since the days when clients perused properties in photographs on the windows of a real estate office and came in to meet with brokers. Clients meet with brokers onsite at a property, at a coffee shop, or virtually.

“Less and less business gets done in the office,” Burns said.

He said that an experience last summer when he visited Sisters for the Sisters Rodeo weekend demonstrated to him that there wasn’t a lot of foot traffic and that resources might be better mobilized by bringing them to bear out of the Bend office.

“Even then there really weren’t walk-ins even on that big weekend, when there were a lot of people in town,” he said. “That really brought it home to me.”

The Coldwell Broker Bain brokers who focus on Sisters will continue to do so, and Burns said the company also will continue to be active here.

“We remain committed to Sisters as a market and as a community,” he said.