Yes, experience matters. Especially the experience of moving here.
Every long time Realtor in Chicago is always going on about how much experience matters experience. To that point, I agree 100%.
I have fourteen years of experience in real estate. I understand the business, the negotiations, the emotions, and the unexpected problems that can arise during a transaction. That experience is important, and it cannot be replaced by market reports, listing data, neighborhood guides, or technology.
But experience is not one single category. The experience that matters depends on what the client is trying to do.
To clarify, I am relatively new to Chicago, but I am not new to real estate. I moved here from Washington State in 2026, bringing fourteen years of real estate experience with me. That combination gives me something unusual in Chicago:
years of professional real estate experience and fresh, firsthand knowledge of what it takes to move here from somewhere else.
A Realtor who has worked in Chicago for twenty years will know things I do not. That agent may have sold more homes here, worked through more Chicago market cycles, and developed a deeper history with individual buildings and neighborhoods.
I respect that experience. I am not going to pretend it does not count.
But if you are moving to Chicago from another city or another state, I bring a different kind of experience.
I recently made the move myself.
That is not a slogan created in a marketing meeting. It is true, it is recent, and I can back it up with some stories are even strange to me still.
Knowing Chicago Is Not the Same as Moving to Chicago
A longtime Chicago resident can tell you about neighborhoods, commute times, architecture, restaurants, schools, parks, and housing. Much of that information is also increasingly easy to obtain.
Market reports, listing data, maps, videos, neighborhood guides, and AI can give buyers more information than ever before.
Information is valuable, but information is not the full experience of relocating.
For me, moving to Chicago meant trying to understand a massive, unfamiliar city while making a complete life move to Chicago. It was the classic, you don’t know what you don’t know. I didn’t not know a lot! It meant comparing neighborhoods that I had visited only once or never. It means learning which questions to ask before I knew enough to ask them.
It also means receiving advice from people who already understand Chicago and may have forgotten what it feels like not to understand it.
I have not forgotten.
I had to develop my own understanding of the city, establish new routines, decide where I fit, and learn how Chicago feels in daily life rather than how it looks on a map.
I know the difference between researching a move and actually making one.
The Questions Behind the Real Estate Questions
Out-of-town buyers rarely need only a list of homes. They are usually asking a much larger set of questions.
Will I feel comfortable here? Which neighborhood matches the life I want? What will surprise me after I arrive? How quickly will Chicago begin to feel manageable? What am I overlooking because I do not yet know the city?
Those are not simply market questions. They are relocation questions. I know this because I just did it.
They involve uncertainty, identity, routine, and trust. A buyer may be choosing a condominium, but that decision is connected to a new commute, a new social life, a new climate, a different pace, and an entirely new sense of home.
I understand those questions from both sides. I am a real estate professional, but I was also the person arriving.
I know what it feels like to have decades of life experience and still be new to a city. I know that a sophisticated buyer can be confident and uncertain at the same time.
Recent Experience Has a Special Value
There is a reason recency matters.
People naturally adapt. After living somewhere for many years, the unusual becomes normal. The confusing becomes obvious. The details that once required an explanation disappear into the background.
Because my move is recent, I still notice those details.
I remember what needed context. I remember which assumptions did not transfer neatly from another market. I remember the difference between what I expected and what I experienced after arriving.
That perspective helps me communicate with people who are still on the outside looking in. I do not assume they already understand the geography, vocabulary, customs, or tradeoffs of Chicago real estate.
I can meet them where they are because I was there recently.
I Do Not Need to Win Every Category
My message is not that I know more about every Chicago block than an agent who has spent an entire career here. That would not be believable, and it is not necessary.
Longtime Chicago agents will win in many categories. They may have completed more local transactions, developed longer relationships, and built a deeper memory of the Chicago market.
But when the category is understanding the experience of an established adult moving to Chicago from somewhere else, I have an advantage that is unusually relevant and impossible to manufacture.
I lived it.
That is the category I own.
Experienced at What?
Real estate often reduces experience to a number: years in the business, homes sold, or volume closed. Those numbers matter, but they do not answer every question a client should ask.
The better question is: Experienced at what?
If you are moving to Chicago, you may want someone who understands real estate and also remembers exactly what it is like to arrive.
I bring fourteen years of real estate experience, decades of business judgment, and the perspective of someone who recently made the same kind of move my clients are considering.
I understand the real estate transaction.
I also understand the relocation behind it.
Experience matters. Especially the experience of moving here.
Plenty of Realtors can show you Chicago. I can help you move to Chicago.