Masters of the House

One move he doesn't regret was the move to Cape Coral in 1985. Though he originally came here with plans to develop an alpine village-themed shopping center, those plans fell through and he soon got his realtor's license. He's now an agent with Century 21 and has a staff of five. By the end of June, Schneider-Christians and his team had $18 million in closings, which represents 58 transactions. Nearly all of those were in Cape Coral, and nearly half were to German and Austrian buyers.

Schneider-Christians, who often gives motivational speeches to other realtors and area business leaders, credits his success to three qualities: persistence, honesty and integrity. "It is about doing what you promise to do, and being available for your clients," he says. "It's a service industry. Provide a good service with all these traits, and you'll be successful. Be on time-Germans love that. If you say you'll do something at 8 p.m., do it at 8 p.m. Do what you promise, or maybe do it even better than you promise."

Years ago, Schneider-Christians attended someone else's motivational seminar for realtors, and picked up a pointer that he's used ever since. "The seminar promoted image and image-building for realtors," he says. "I did a lot more personal marketing afterwards, and developed my own letterhead, brochure and logo, which I've used ever since."

But image building alone won't make the difference, he says. "If you are successful, you need to give back to the community," he says. Schneider-Christians serves on the boards of several foundations, the chamber of commerce, and nonprofits. "Your name spreads around, and people want you involved in their organization," he explains. "They see that you do good things for the community. I'm not always the top realtor, but I am one who is known as a community person as well as a realtor. Both are important."

Schneider-Christians predicts the real estate market in the region will stay rosy. But, he's concerned about the infrastructure-how the county will handle the need for new schools, roads, hospitals and even jails to provide for the booming population. "The future is shining at the moment," he says. "It's great for builders, realtors, brokers, bankers, even lawn-care companies-everybody makes money in Cape Coral. But the more people move here, can we solve these issues? Three, five, 10 years down the road, can we match the demands of the people coming?"