In our January blog post, we announced some of our goals for 2022. These goals included expanding our community footprint, offering additional floorplan options, continuing to grow our REALTOR relationships, giving back to the community, and growing our team. Growing our team allows us to expand our footprint in and around the Triangle to meet the need of the current, ever evolving real estate market as well as to offer a higher level of service to our clients. We are excited to announce that we recently hired three industry leaders to join the Herring Homes family. As part of the hiring process, we ensured that each new team member not only understands, but also reflects our mission, vision, and values when engaging with clients or other team members. We are happy to introduce Renee Drake as our Vice President of Sales and Marketing, Valerie Andrews as our Director of Design, and Jon Kent as our Director of Purchasing. We asked Renee, Valerie, and Jon a few questions to learn more about themselves, their families, and what brings them to Herring Homes. Here is what they had to say:

Renee Drake moved from Kingston, NY to Raleigh, NC in 1986. She attended high school in Raleigh and college at ECU, earning degrees in Professional Spanish and Communications. She then moved to Wilmington, which is where Renee was introduced to home building and sales. As a local business owner, she had several clients who were builders and developers. One suggested she would be excellent at selling homes and asked her to come work for his company. He felt so strongly about her potential that he even paid for her real estate license! She has been in the new home industry ever since. In 2010, Renee and her husband accepted opportunities in Raleigh and relocated to the area, making Wake Forest their home. Subsequently, her passion for new home sales and sales management has continued to grow and has been recognized both locally and nationally. Renee came to know several Herring Homes team members upon returning to the area and has enjoyed watching the business expand and thrive. She is excited to join this great team and contribute to its upward success. With each passing year in the new home industry, Renee believes one must creatively and resourcefully adapt to the ever-evolving environment. She loves to be part of that critical thinking process and finds that being able to not only provide an essential need to the community, but finding ways to do it better, is very rewarding. Outside of work, Renee is happiest when spending time with her husband and their seven-year-old son. She also enjoys working in her yard. Like home building, landscaping is hard work, with visual results. The gratification you feel at the end of the day is every bit as satisfying.

Valerie Andrews was born and raised in Coral Springs, Florida and loved growing up near the water. She and her husband moved to North Carolina when he was accepted to medical school at Duke University, and they have been here ever since. While Raleigh, North Carolina is not on the water, Valerie is thankful that it’s just a short drive to the beach and that, unlike Florida, she gets to experience all four seasons here. She has her bachelor’s degree in Advertising and Public Relations from the University of Central Florida as well as an associate degree in Interior Design from Wake Technical Community College. Not long after Valerie graduated from Wake Tech she was hired as an intern for Capitol City Homes, a regional homebuilder, and after a few months became an interior designer. Valerie has won numerous gold, silver, and bronze Parade of Homes awards for her home designs and we know she will bring that same award- winning style to Herring Homes. She is excited about the opportunity she has at Herring Homes to form new relationships, gain even more knowledge about trending products and materials, as well as getting to branch out and be more creative while designing CustomCrafted homes. One of her favorite parts of her job is getting to design homes as beautiful and unique as their owners. When she isn’t at work, she loves to be anywhere that is near the water – beach or lake. On the weekends, when she’s not at her family’s lake house she is often at the baseball field watching her son play.

Jon Kent is originally from Massachusetts, but he grew up in Maine. After attending college at Colorado State, he moved to Florida where he later met his wife. They moved to North Carolina in 2009 and settled in Youngsville with their Frenchie. Jon got started in the home building industry when he was only 15 years old by learning to frame houses. Since then, he has been involved in several facets of the construction industry. He started his purchasing career in Florida in 2004 and except for 2 years, has always been focused on the purchasing side of the home building industry. Like Renee, Jon has known and worked with many of the Herring Homes team members for years and is excited to get the chance to work with them again. Outside of work Jon enjoys spending time with his wife renovating their townhome, woodworking, and spending time outside fishing and playing golf.

We are excited for Renee, Valerie, and Jon to join the Herring Homes family and we know that our current and future clients with love working with them. We are going to continue to work on our 2022 goals but don’t be surprised if we revisit our goal of growing our team later this year and introduce even more new team members. We know that having the best team possible allows us to better serve our clients.