When Donna McCullough-Mitchell attended the Institute for Luxury Home Marketing last year for some specialized real estate training, the long-time agent and broker says her eyes were opened to a largely untapped niche market. “I had been working with a high-end residential community in Gatlinburg and had a good experience with luxury lot and home sales,” McCullough-Mitchell recalls. “I thought I could take those skills, apply them to a larger area and provide those services to all of East Tennessee.”

 That moment of inspiration led McCullough-Mitchell and her daughter, Kimberly Estes, to start their own company, East Tennessee Luxury Properties, which specializes in representing buyers and sellers of upscale homes and home sites. The duo opened an office in Maryville last May with nearly $20 million in listings right off the bat and have since focused on delivering a level of services befitting the high-dollar values of their inventory. “We’re not the first company to deal with high-end properties, but we are trying to create a business that caters to that niche,” McCullough-Mitchell says.

When Donna McCullough-Mitchell attended the Institute for Luxury Home Marketing last year for some specialized real estate training, the long-time agent and broker says her eyes were opened to a largely untapped niche market. “I had been working with a high-end residential community in Gatlinburg and had a good experience with luxury lot and home sales,” McCullough-Mitchell recalls. “I thought I could take those skills, apply them to a larger area and provide those services to all of East Tennessee.”

 That moment of inspiration led McCullough-Mitchell and her daughter, Kimberly Estes, to start their own company, East Tennessee Luxury Properties, which specializes in representing buyers and sellers of upscale homes and home sites. The duo opened an office in Maryville last May with nearly $20 million in listings right off the bat and have since focused on delivering a level of services befitting the high-dollar values of their inventory. “We’re not the first company to deal with high-end properties, but we are trying to create a business that caters to that niche,” McCullough-Mitchell says.

Many of East Tennessee Luxury Properties’ buyers live in other markets, and in such cases, McCullough-Mitchell and Estes help potential buyers make travel arrangements when coming to view East Tennessee properties. This means planning ahead of time for everything from hotel or luxury-inn bookings to car and limo rentals.

McCullough-Mitchell makes sure she is personally on hand for all showings, which are by appointment only. “There are so many details involved when showing a luxury home,” she explains, pointing out an example of the typical booklet that potential buyers receive when touring a home. “Each information package has pages and pages of features and illustrations.”

 Another element that distinguishes East Tennessee Luxury Properties is its networking capabilities. At the national level, this means partnering with brokers all over the country to cross-market properties to both local and out-of-town buyers. Currently, the company is giving local exposure to properties in Florida, Kentucky and Illinois, to name just a few markets, which in turn means that buyers in those areas are seeing East Tennessee listings.  “One thing we learned in our training at the Institute for Luxury Home Marketing is that you don’t limit yourself to just your immediate neighborhood,” says McCullough-Mitchell.

 Locally, her agency has teamed up with a network of home-related businesses to provide customers and clients with concierge-level service. This end-to-end solution for buyers and sellers, known as the East Tennessee Luxury Network, puts them in contact with recommended businesses such as contractors, architects, interior designers, accountants and more. “We only network with top-quality business owners who take pride in what they do,” says McCullough-Mitchell.

 Two of her property listings—The Enclave at Cove Mountain and Rock Point at Rarity Bay—have hosted open-house wine-tasting events showcasing the agency’s affiliated service providers. “We sent out 800 invitations to local Realtors and qualified, potential buyers, which not only helps us market our homes to buyers but helps those partnering businesses educate the public about what they have to offer. It gives them exposure at no cost to them.”

From a marketing standpoint, East Tennessee Luxury Properties takes service to new levels with a strategic, state-of-the-art approach. For starters, much of their advertising is done in national, niche-market publications such as Unique Homes and The Robb Report. In fact, an article in an upcoming issue of Unique Homes uses McCullough-Mitchell as a source in discussing the up-and-coming East Tennessee luxury-home market. “The rest of the country is starting to discover what we have to offer in this region,” she says. “East Tennessee has lower costs of living, beautiful lake and mountain views, and the high-end properties are close to shops and service providers.”