On our approach

Three convictions that have shaped this practice since 1994.

Hartwell & Reade was founded by Robert Hartwell in 1994, a year after he sold a printing company he had spent twenty years building. The brokerage was, for the first three years, a one-person operation, run from the front room of his house on Madison Street in Sag Harbor. We have grown since — slowly, and on purpose. Today we are six people: two principals, three brokers, and one office manager who has been here since 1998. We do not intend to grow further.

What we have learned, over a hundred and seventy seasons on the East End, is that residential real estate at this end of the market is not a volume business. Every property is meaningfully different from every other property, every buyer is meaningfully different from every other buyer, and almost every transaction has at least one moment when it is going to fall apart unless someone in the room knows what they are doing.

What we offer is the time to be that person, in that room, on every transaction we take on. We work with between four and seven sellers at any given moment, never more, and we turn down listings — politely — when we are at capacity. This is the entirety of our approach. The rest, as Robert sometimes says, is just doing the work.