How Two Premier Agent Partners Helped a Buyer Close on a $19M Oceanfront Home

Justin Lott was out of town when the call came in, but he had a system in place. 

Lott, a Zillow Premier Agent partner at eXp Realty in Jacksonville, Florida, had asked Richard Peterson to act as a covering agent while he was away. And the connection call from Zillow — a lead asking about a $10 million listing — was an opportunity no one would want to miss.

“I was at Disney with the family when it came through,” Lott says. “I'm just glad that Richard was there taking calls for me.”

The challenges

Since the buyer lived in New Jersey, arranging a quick in-person viewing was complicated. While they were making travel arrangements, the property went under contract with another buyer. 

“He canceled the flight, and we didn't have another property in waiting,' Lott says. But because Peterson had learned the buyer's motivations during the initial interaction, he and Lott knew what to look for: an oceanfront home on Ponte Vedra Beach. They’d learned specific details like desired size and finishes. And crucially, they also knew the buyer was ready to purchase something immediately.

'It was a scramble to find him something else,” Lott says. “And there wasn't anything else in that $10 million range. Even if you went $3 million up, or you went $3 million down, there was nothing comparable. There was only one other property, and it was at $21 million.'

Knowing the property matched much of what the buyer was looking for, Peterson sent the listing in a text and simply asked, “What do you think of this one?”

“Interested,” came the response.

“I like to reference Wayne Gretzky, who famously said that you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take,” Lott says about taking a chance by sending the higher-priced listing. “So then it’s up to us, as far as, okay, what’s it going to take to get him on a plane to come see this property in person?'

The buyer was still out of the state

Knowing the buyer’s motivations, the duo devised a way to convince him to travel for an in-person viewing. 

“What's the biggest draw of an oceanfront property? It's obviously the location,” Lott says. “When you're living at that property, you want to see that sun rise up over the ocean, you want that morning walk along the beach.” 

So Peterson drove to a public access beach near the property before dawn, walked a mile to a vantage point near the property, and recorded a sunrise.

“It's not in the manual,” says Lott. “It's not just feature-dropping, it's not just ‘Look online at the pictures.’ This is what you're going to see at 6 a.m., give or take, every single day.”

Once the buyer saw the video, he booked a flight to view the property.

The buyer wanted a last-minute cut to the offer price

Despite a list price more than double the initial property’s price tag, the buyer showed committed interest after the showing. Following a subsequent tour of a nearby off-market comp, he was ready to start due diligence on the Ponte Vedra Blvd property.

But another hurdle appeared just prior to acceptance. The buyer asked Lott to reduce the offer price late in the due diligence process — despite two appraisals that valued the Ponte Vedra Blvd property above the sale price. By this time, the seller had another written backup offer. This is where area expertise served the deal.

Lott explained the nuances of the area, like speed limit changes along the road, and why certain comps that the buyer had spotted were valued lower than the property they were negotiating. “I explained the difference in geographical locations, why they would be priced lower, and then why properties to the north typically are priced higher. Once he understood that difference right there, he was more comfortable.”

If we would've come back and asked them to shave another million off the purchase price, I don't think it would've happened,' Lott says. “With a backup offer in writing, I think that would've killed the deal.”

The results 

In September of 2023, the home closed at $19 million. At the time, it set a regional record for sale price, but Lott was sure he got his client a solid deal.

“I felt strongly that he was making a good investment,” Lott says. “Even though it sounds crazy when you're literally breaking the record. A week before closing, he was still a bit nervous. I said to him, ‘I’m confident that you are not going to be sitting in the number one position for too long. Someone else is going to break your record. You're going to have equity in this house, trust me.”

A few months later, Lott turned out to be right. A nearby home sold for $3 million more at the same price per square foot. “I just texted him two weeks ago and said ‘Congratulations, you're no longer the record holder.”

Looking back on the deal and his career, Lott says he thinks both flexibility and system-building are crucial to success as an agent.

“It's important to remember that you just never know when that call's coming in,” he says. “Whatever you have in your schedule, you have to be flexible. You’ve got to be able to pivot. But just as important is having systems in place that aren’t flexible. If I hadn’t prepared and had someone in place to field that call, it would've been another agent.”