J.D. Songstad

This is incredibly long overdue review, but we worked with J.D. Songstad in Sept/Oct 2016 to buy our first home. My husband and I had been casually looking at condos for several months and when we finally decided to get serious, we weren’t sure how to proceed. We found J.D. through Homelight and were so happy we did. Immediately after our first phone call, he sent us an extensive list of potential properties and we were seeing places within a few days. He gave honest opinions when we asked, had a solid understanding of current market trends and respected our budget. He catered to our schedules and when we decided to put an offer in on a place that first week, he spent all of his Friday evening taking our phone calls, providing us with sample introduction letters, and talking us through the process we were undertaking. He was patient and very attentive – he really makes you feel like you are his only client even though we knew how busy his schedule was. When our offer was accepted, he continued to explain next steps and made sure to ask thorough questions during the inspection process, as we had never been through one before. Through no fault of his own, the escrow process ended up being rather contentious due to some issues with the seller, but he shielded us from the brunt of it and really helped make a tough situation better. In the end, we came out with a new home that we love and we credit J.D. for helping make it possible. We’d absolutely work with him again in a heartbeat and would highly, highly recommend him to anyone!

We had an excellent experience with JD. His technical know-how of the sale process was the key to us receiving and retaining the highest price per square foot ever in our complex.

tl;dr JD is truly an incredible real estate agent. He’s detail-oriented, patient, extremely responsive, and really knows his stuff, especially the Westside, very well. Would highly recommend and would definitely engage him again if we have any other real estate needs come up. Long version: My fiancé and I were looking for homes on the Westside and had spent 3 months by ourselves looking at open houses. We were ready to find an agent to work with us. After a bumpy experience with an agent who sold my NorCal home (project management was not his strength, and he wasn’t detail-oriented at all), I resolved we needed to find a great real estate agent for our home purchase in SoCal. We we ended up phone screening 3 agents and also interviewed them in person, each for 1-2 hours. JD really stood out - from our conversations with him it was clear he knew the area well, was extremely detail-oriented and wasn’t bothered at all by our numerous detailed questions, and he made it clear he was responsive and available a lot of the time, including after normal work hours. That was huge for us as we both work full time so we needed someone who could work with us in the evenings. We are so so glad we went with JD. He was extremely patient and responsive throughout the time we worked with him. He emailed us listings immediately after we signed the contract with him and we picked out 4-5 homes to check out during open houses on the next Sunday. Unexpectedly, we fell in love with one right away (after seeing homes for 3 months we knew what we wanted right away). The next day, Monday, JD was extremely patient as my fiancé and I debated if we wanted to put an offer down and if so, how soon - we were waiting on the sale of the other home to get the funds we needed. He gave us great advice and that we shouldn’t be scared to put an offer down if it truly felt like the one, and we might as well try so we have no regrets, even with a contingent offer. Just a note about contingent offers - it’s nearly impossible to get a contingent offer accepted in the current LA home market (we were warned of this by the multiple agents we interviewed when we mentioned we had to wait on a sale to get funds). That night at 9pm after we had some time to talk through the decision with our families, we made our decision to go ahead. JD patiently made himself available, and we worked on the contingent offer and got it out right around midnight. (THANK YOU JD FOR BEING SO FLEXIBLE WITH YOUR TIME!!). JD helped us navigate the offer process really well and even though two other higher offers came in, the seller took ours! Part of that was thanks to JD’s stellar reputation in the housing market here - the listing agent had had a great experience with JD previously and knew he brought good clients who would make the sale as hassle-free as possible. So, the lesson here is go with a reputable agent that other agents in the area know and will want to work with. JD is one of those :) Throughout all steps of the process JD was clear in telling us what we could expect/what was coming next and extremely responsive (typical email response time was immediate to within a few hours). Would highly recommend JD and we plan to work with him again if we have further LA real estate needs in the future!