Good Neighbor Podcast: North Shore
Bringing together local businesses and neighbors of North Shore
Good Neighbor Podcast: North Shore
EP #60 - Dan Bernal: When Life Leaves You Homeless, Sometimes That's When You Find Your Calling
Dan Bernal's journey into real estate began unexpectedly when a failed property deal left him homeless with his newborn baby. This challenging moment ignited his dedication to client advocacy, which has shaped his 20-year career in property sales. Now a Senior Agent at Atlantic Coast Homes, Dan is known for his expertise and community-focused approach in Salem, Massachusetts and the North Shore area. He emphasizes the importance of working with seasoned professionals over family connections, likening real estate transactions to critical investments requiring genuine expertise. His candid insights on the Good Neighbor Podcast shed light on Atlantic Coast Homes’ mission to enhance neighborhoods through thoughtful development and restoration.
Beyond real estate, Dan has spent 35 years as a semi-professional guitarist, energizing audiences across the Northeast with danceable rock and soul music. This dual passion reflects the multifaceted identity of local business leaders who enrich their communities. Through Atlantic Coast Homes, Dan combines technical knowledge with emotional understanding to help clients navigate life-changing real estate decisions. To learn more, visit their website or Facebook page, where their client-first philosophy continues to transform the local real estate landscape.
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Yvonne Godfrey.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast. Today we have the distinct pleasure of introducing Dan Bernal. He is the Senior Agent of Atlantic Coast Homes. We are thrilled to have him with us. Dan, how are you doing today? I'm doing great. It's wonderful to be with you.
Speaker 3:Awesome to have him with us. Dan, how are you doing today? I'm doing great. It's wonderful to be with you awesome to have you here, dan.
Speaker 2:We're excited to learn more about atlantic coast homes. Can you share with our listeners something about the company?
Speaker 3:sure, the company is, uh, sort of hyper local to salem, massachusetts, but uh, we do business all over the north shore. We kind of do business everywhere. I have a listing coming in in Boston, but but it's largely focused in and based out of Salem, massachusetts. There's a lot of development and restoration stuff that's done through our office. So we have a bunch of developers that work for us and I'm more on the agent side. I do more of the transactional stuff.
Speaker 2:So how did you get into this business, Dan?
Speaker 3:Oh, that's a long story. I'll try to keep it as tight as I can. I tried to buy a house when my wife was pregnant with our first child and we got left without a home because we gave up our apartment and the home that we were trying to buy did not come through and our real estate agent just wouldn't answer the phone anymore. So I had to move all our stuff and move all of us, with my little poor baby sitting in a cradle in an empty living room, and I got my license to represent us and from there, 20 years later, here, I am still doing it.
Speaker 2:Kept going.
Speaker 3:Never looked back.
Speaker 2:Beautiful, beautiful, excellent, so what are some myths or misconception that you've discovered in this industry?
Speaker 3:a myths or misconception that you've discovered in this industry. In this industry, a lot of people tend to work with their siblings or their cousin or someone they know that has a real estate license. It's very easy to get a real estate license. It's very difficult to stay in the business for any length of time and make a living out of it. So one of the misconceptions is call your brother's sister because she has a real estate license. She may have done two deals in the last three years and you are making the largest commitment to anything financial that most people ever make, and they usually only make it once or twice. So that is a big misconception is that you should just work with someone who you're related to or that you know. You should work with someone who's an expert, someone who's who does this seven days a week, eight days a week, nine days a week. That's where the safety and the power is.
Speaker 2:Working with family and friends could be wonderful.
Speaker 3:It can be, but do you take your kids to your cousin who's in medical school if they're really sick? No, you take them to the hospital, to the best expert you can find for whatever is wrong with them. This is on that level, because this is a huge investment.
Speaker 2:Couldn't have said it better, thank you.
Speaker 3:My pleasure.
Speaker 2:So, outside of work, what do you do for fun, dan?
Speaker 3:I have been a semi-professional musician my entire life. I only got off the road recently because I have three kids, but even up until a couple of years ago I was still doing real estate all week and playing gigs all over the Northeast on the weekends.
Speaker 2:Perfect. What instrument do you play, Dan?
Speaker 3:I play guitar.
Speaker 2:Love guitars, nice, nice.
Speaker 3:I've been doing it a long, long time.
Speaker 2:Love it, love it. What kind of genre do you play?
Speaker 3:We were doing sort of danceable rock and roll and soul R&B, so a lot of Michael Jackson and Prince and stuff like that, Things that get people's booty shaking. You know that's been my weekends for 35 years.
Speaker 2:Very entertaining. Yes, very much so. That's that's been my weekends for 35 years.
Speaker 3:Very entertaining, yes, so changing really long hair and oh my, oh, yeah, well, I had more hair then what a picture that sounds great, sounds wonderful.
Speaker 2:So changing gears. Dan, can you describe one hardship or one of life's challenge that you rose above and can now say because of it you're better and you're stronger? What comes to your mind?
Speaker 3:Well, first of all, the way I got into this business when we had a house hunger agreement and this was during, like right before the crash, and it just like I said, our agent just stopped answering the phone and we had already given up our apartment and they wouldn't renew our lease. So we had no place. We were basically homeless with a with a three-week-old baby, and I had to move all of our furniture onto my buddy's pickup truck on my own back, while my poor wife was sitting in an empty living room with a cradle and our newborn son. So that that's what comes to mind, and we did overcome it, and I never expected this to be a career. I just thought I would represent us because I didn't trust anyone anymore, and that's why I do what I do, which is I don't. I am an advocate for the people I work for and I will never let anything like that happen to anybody ever.
Speaker 2:That's a beautiful story. I mean, who would?
Speaker 3:have imagined. It's unfortunately true.
Speaker 2:Yeah, who would have imagined? You know, a situation like that was the door for your future and your career.
Speaker 3:You never know what the catalyst is going to be.
Speaker 2:Yeah, beautiful. Thank you for sharing.
Speaker 3:My pleasure.
Speaker 2:So, dan, can you please tell our listeners one thing they should remember about Atlantic Coast Homes?
Speaker 3:Yes, I ran into the broker who started Atlantic Coast Homes. Before he started Atlantic Coast Homes he was working for a different brokerage and we just sort of kept bumping into each other and we kind of became I wouldn't even say friends, more like we just you know the players in this field, there's, there's you could, if I threw a rock out the window right now, I would hit a real estate agent. But that doesn't mean they're part of the actual fabric of the business, and he was and I was. So we just kept bumping into each other and it took 15 years or more.
Speaker 3:But eventually he was like why don't you just come work at my company? I don't do much of this, you know transactional stuff anymore. I'm building stuff all the time and it just it was a good time for it and, uh, we both became family men during that time and both both had a bunch of kids and and our kids are friends now. So I it was. It was really just that he he is more of a developer, but the company is really entrenched in this area and I get to be a part of that and it's it's, it's, it's very rewarding.
Speaker 2:Friendship continues.
Speaker 3:Friendship continues, but also good business continues, and that's that's a big part of it.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. The combination of the two is just wonderful.
Speaker 3:It is Absolutely.
Speaker 2:So how can our listeners learn more about Atlantic Coast Homes, Dan Do you have a website?
Speaker 3:We do. We have a website. Our Facebook page is a lot more active. All you have to do is search Atlantic Coast Homes. You can always search my name, dan Bernal, and you will get two people on Google. It's me and Nancy Pelosi's chief of staff in San Francisco, and we oddly look a little similar, except for our hairstyles. But those are the two people that'll pop up and you'll always be able to circle back around and find me and us. We are ubiquitous to this area.
Speaker 2:Well, Dan, we really appreciate you being on the show with us today. We enjoyed your answers and your responses and wish you and Atlantic Coast Homes all the very best moving forward.
Speaker 3:Likewise, I really appreciate your time and including me on your show.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPNorthshorecom. That's GNPNorthshorecom, or call 857-703-9406.