Dave Edwards, Treasure Valley Dave
Treasure Valley Dave… sure, yeah that’s me, Dave Edwards, and I’m in the Treasure Valley… that area around Boise, Idaho. But “Treasure Valley Dave” has become so much more than just me. What started as a way to bring in a little extra money every month by being a real estate agent has become, surprisingly quickly, a team helping people find a better quality of life.
I lived and struggled for many years in California. Our family business taxed and regulated to a slow, grinding death. Then my retail sales career ended in a flash on the morning of 9/11. Then my stable government job, nothing to make me rich, surprised me with a pay crash after the market crash of Oh-Eight. And those years marked the evermore societal slashes of crime, homeless, traffic and the cost to live. Having lived around the world and grown up in the Midwest, I was aware, as any thinking frog should be, that the societal temperature in California was nearing a boiling point.
Not yet ready to leave, held in place too long for the gilded cage of retirement, we did our research and due diligence for our new, promising state to call home. Tennessee was our new home… at least from our internet research. Next stop; our fact-finding trip! Forty-five minutes in the Nashville area… um yeah NOPE. Not feelin’ it. How could the internet get our hopes up and drop us like a hot potato?
On the dejected drive back to California, pretty much as a way to salvage some value from this trip, we ventured into Idaho to see what Napoleon Dynamite (you know, that movie) was all about. Yeah… we were feelin’ it.
Back in California, still some time before retirement, we began making our plans. We had no idea what to do to relocate… we just did what seemed to make sense. We had no idea where to live in Idaho or what we would do. We did, however, have a strong, unshakeable sense that the people in Idaho were friendly and welcoming and honest and created the kind of place we wanted to live.
Why Dave Got Into Real Estate
“So that’s when you started a real estate business so you could help others, right?” Well not so fast… I still had a lot of learning to do. I had never been a real estate agent before. I’d been in the military and a small-business owner and worked in a police department and been a long-haul trucker… but I didn’t know beans about being in real estate.
But I learned. Oh boy… did I learn. I did all the classes and all the training and did real estate the way all of the coaches and mentors say to do. I did real estate the way that almost all real estate agents do right now. I know for them it’s all about the numbers; the calls made, the doors knocked, the internet leads bought, the seconds it takes to call a fresh internet lead… how many automated emails and texts will the agent’s computer send out over the next 30, 60, 90 days! It’s all numbers… and the client is too often just a part of the equation. I know… I did this; stressful, unfulfilling, being someone that I was not. “Dang, Dave… rough times. What happened?” Yeah it was… and things didn’t change over night. While I was still picking up dog poop in clients’ yards, I began connecting with people back in California who were frustrated there just like we had been. The best way that I connected with these kindred spirits was via video. People saw in these videos a down-to-earth, not slick man and his family that DID what they are dreaming to do. I shared my experiences, my mistakes, my celebrations with these beat-down yet hopeful souls.
Since those days, I continue to make videos to reach those across the country who are looking for that better quality of life. “Treasure Valley Dave” has gone from being just me and a camera to a eager group of folks who have also made that same relocation journey. Our team culture and philosophy is one of caring about our clients… our new friends! We hold their hands during the rough times and we celebrate together the joy. We are honest and share the bad news as well as the good. We unpack the hype and sensation from the internet and make sure our clients make their decisions from a place of honest information and informed opinion and not fear and lies. We treat our clients like we would want to be treated. Our clients are not numbers… they are our new neighbors.
“Treasure Valley Dave”… yeah that’s me… but it’s also a client-centered team of great, caring people… and it’s also the family of friends and neighbors that we’ve had the honor of helping in their journey to a better quality of life.
