Catskills - Sullivan County - Ulster County Real Estate -- Catskill Farms Journal

My companies, and me personally, donate a lot of money to local business and causes.  A $1000 to the Eldred Lions club, a $1000 to the Barryville Chamber of Commerce, $1000 to the local Eldred library, couple thousand to NACL- and a few more I can't think of.  Today I'm going to an event at the Boys and Girls Club at the Monticello Motor Club.

I even consider my advertising in the River Reporter, or the Homestead School pamphlet and the like to be donations cause I'm not getting any business from that stuff - it's just nice to co-brand and support local organizations that work hard and offer unique services, whether I agree with them or not.

But based on the continued (actually increased) community manipulation that The River Reporter serves up as news, I've withdrawn my advertising support, since in the end, my support was to support their work, and their work sucks.  For 10 yrs I've been buying $8-10k a year in advertising from them with probably a return of little if any business generated from the advertising.  I mean I don't have to agree with them to want to support them, but I can't support an organization that is going out of its way to misinform, mis-educate and manipulate - It's actually just like Fox News - all the news is put through a filter prior to reporting, and that slant is incorporated into every nuance, texture and detail of a story.  And since the local radio station, WJFF, who I've been supporting way before I could afford it, allows Fritz Mayer of the River Reporter to give weekly radio newscasts (propogandcasts), I've stopped supporting them as well.

It was all fine and dandy to have this nonsense playing out when the issues were small, but Sullivan County and the little towns like Narrowsburg actually are faced with pretty serious issues as of late, and the residents and readership of the River Reporter deserve more respect for their intelligence.  The position of trust is even more important because people don't have any other source of news.

So, how do you save $15k a year?  Stop supporting things you don't believe in.

I've been told more than once that I have a good head for marketing.  Actually, some people use the word 'genius' but since I'm trying not to play into the hands of those who want asshole validation, I thought I would tone it down a little.

I guess I do have a knack for it since we have branded ourselves like no other company in the Catskills, possibly the region and maybe even the country.  It's a brand that stays fresh, understands its market and stays true to its mission.

I mean we don't go for the lowest common denominator - we aim to skim the cream off the top.  We are picky who we want our message to reach, and by consequence, those who the message is not for are not engaged in the least.  It's a laser-like message with a sweet small niche of a target audience.

I've been riding around in my car with hundreds of buyers and would-be buyers over the past 10 years and I got to know them well.  I get what they are looking for and it's not just a floor plan.  It's an idea, a sophisticated thought, an inspired ambition.

So when I tell Brandi off, or I joke around about being an asshole, I know who I'm speaking to, who I'm aiming for.  And our brand has always been to connect uniquely, personally - in our message, in our process, in our goals and product.  I know my clients can take a joke, get some raw humor, understand a business journey, appreciate the unvarnished reflections.

In the end, our brand is intensely personal, to both me and our clients.  And that is a very hard thing to pull off, and nearly impossible to feign.

And the proof of our success of marketing realness would have to be the proof in the pudding (or possible the new bay front condo in Miami Beach I just bought).

Scott and Erika over at Yankee Lake sent us over a nice note today after we did some punch list work -


Dear chuck

Thanks for sending the guys over. You have the most professional people working for you. Brian is terrific and Tito is a real perfectionist. Again we love the house and after hearing all the horror stories from our friends with reference to their contractors we feel really truly blessed to have found you to build us this fantastic new home!

Our best

Scott and Erica

The Big Big Barn in Narrowsburg is just finishing up Phase 1, the house and barn project.  With 17 acres and a lake, I expect Phase 2 to center around the grounds.

That's the house up above and the garage down below.

It took us about a year to put these babies up and considering everything that went into them, that's pretty speedy.

The 4 door garage with space upstairs turned out real nice.

Lots of deck, some covered, some screened, some elevated.

With 17 acres there was a lot of different places to put the house.

Here's the mudroom, with a bench, a roof panel backsplash, double closet, local stone, natural ceiling.

The hole house is about openness and light.  We used 3 residential garage doors that operate real smooth as the defining house accent.

Lots of stone on the inside and the outside.

This is a shot of the master bedroom, which is open to the rest of the house.

Stainless steel hanging orb..

And a swanky shower.  We used 3x6 subway tile with black grout in all 6 bathrooms.

From the bath, the barn.

Drawers from the vanity out cause we just did templated a concrete countertop, which turned out really good.

Here's the upstairs of the garage.

And a frontal on the garage doors.

Floor to ceiling subway tile.

And a phone pull string toilet.

2 good bedrooms on the first floor, each with a bath.

And a kitchen that sprawls in a few directions.

We went back and forth on the garage design  - glad we ended up where we did.

Master Bath toilet.

Exposed spiral ductwork.

Going down in the basement...

With polished concrete floors, a pool, wine room and media room.

In a way, it's harder to build a small home than a large one.  But we had a lot of fun here and really turned out an architecturally unique and modest homestead to be enjoyed for years to come, I'm sure.