Elizabeth DeWoody of Palm Beach Advisory at Compass, a founding agent of Compass Palm Beach, knows her clients and knows that most of them aren’t looking simply for a home, they are looking for a long-term investment.
DeWoody serves the luxury market in Palm Beach, coastal West Palm Beach and neighboring areas. She has now sold over a half-billion dollars of luxury homes since 2021 and says that her success has been attributed to her understanding of the entire market and reaching buyers from all over the world.
“I’m very boutique, very white-gloves, hands-on luxury,” says DeWoody.
7,630-square-foot home comes with 100 feet of ocean frontage and a deeded beach parcel.
What she believes sets her business apart, she says is the fact that she grew very quickly through her data-driven approach to business that she developed while working for Fortune 500 companies Procter and Gamble and Johnson and Johnson. She worked in marketing and sales management and says that the key to her agencies’ early beginnings was her ability to quickly embrace technology and use it as a strategic tool to reach buyers and sellers in the Palm Beach market. DeWoody adds that she believes marketing and sales management skills can translate to any kind of product one is trying to sell.
“My approach to luxury real estate is that this product is the same as it would be for any luxury product,” says DeWoody. “It’s very professional. It’s very data-driven. And it’s very measured.”
She explains that customers have appreciated her approach. Her clients tend to be savvy professionals and appreciate that she’s not simply selling houses and beautiful architecture. “I am selling an asset, an investment, and a home,” she says.
DeWoody also understands the market more precisely than her competitors, simply because she is a local, born and raised, “proud Floridian.” A wife and mother of two boys, who enjoys boating, functional weight training, walks on Flagler Drive and spending time with family and friends in her free time, DeWoody explains that she understands the dynamics of the people who are moving here from all across the country. She adds that because of her base having always been in Florida, she has access to private schools and private clubs that her clients are interested in, and she believes that being a proud local has provided her an advantage over the other top brokers on the island.
In just seven years, DeWoody has grown her business to consistently deliver over $100 million dollars in sales annually and is amongst the top 150 individual sales volume-producing agents in the country year after year. She attributes her ability to grow fast to her training and the work ethic she cultivated at Procter and Gamble and Johnson and Johnson. DeWoody realized she had to act fast and differentiate herself in order to compete in the Palm Beach Market. When she discovered the Compass was expanding to Palm Beach, she jumped on the opportunity to be the founding agent of the Palm Beach office.
asking $13.9 million.Studio 910 PB
“I went with Compass because they were new and innovative. Compass helped me improve how I bring information to my customers through technology. And from a seller standpoint, the reach I now have with Compass is far better than any other brokerage firm,” explains DeWoody.
“I can now deliver faster, more accurate information to my customers than any of my competitors,” she adds.
Compass is now the number one independent brokerage firm in the country, she adds.
She says the key to her success has been her openness to change with the times and understanding the marketplace and opportunities when they come. She also has a passion for the entire business, she says.
“I like the deal. I like marketing and putting deals together, creating a need and selling that need, and putting the buyers and sellers together through our incredible resources and technology,” she says. She touts an in-house luxury marketing team that focuses on each individual listing’s needs and targets luxury buyers.
DeWoody explains that she first went into real estate because of the location of Palm Beach and how she saw the area expanding.
“I saw this as an amazing product that I could sell and not have to be on a plane and travel,” she says. “I could be a mom and also deliver great service, a great product to customers from all over the world.”
She has now had her agency for seven years and has been named by The Wall Street Journal as top 150 in the country, 29 in Florida and six in Palm Beach. Besides a support staff, Palm Beach Advisory is simply a one-woman show, but that is the way DeWoody says she prefers it since she likes to be at the front and be the point person for all of her customers.
In addition to her real estate accomplishments, she is also a breast cancer survivor who actively advocates for cancer research, early detection and care. In 2007, she was the chair of the Susan G. Komen South Florida Race for the Cure, which raised a record-setting $1.7 million. She has also sat on the board of the South Florida affiliate of the Susan G. Komen Foundation and has served as the board’s development co-chair. She currently is on the board for the Sari Center, a nonprofit comprehensive cancer support center in Palm Beach Gardens.
“I’m forever grateful for the awareness, especially for younger women, that has grown,” DeWoody says.
A graduate of Florida State University, she also received her MBA from the University of Miami.
She truly believes that Palm Beach is a special place, unlike any other luxury market due to its safety, in particular.
“It has always been the weather, taxes and beauty, but now it’s the safety,” she says, adding that now with all of the development and infrastructure in downtown West Palm Beach, it’s a spectacular place to live and one of the fastest growing cities in the United States.
DeWoody says people have been flocking to the Palm Beach area because of the opportunity, growth and the forward momentum of the community.
“The pro-business environment is really amazing,” she adds. “I just absolutely love meeting all of these incredibly successful, smart, amazing people who are moving here.”
DeWoody feels that Palm Beach is the place to be.
“Everything you can find in a big city, you can now find here,” she says. “It’s beautiful.”
For more information about the agency and its listings, please visit elizabethdewoody.com, and don’t forget to check out her blog which is linked on the site with articles about Palm Beach and family-friendly activities in the area. You may also call the agency at 561-308- 0931, or email Elizabeth.dewoody@compass.com.
PARTNER CONTENT
This article appeared as the cover story of the March 2024 Behind The Hedges in Dan’s Papers and in the April 2024 issue of Dan’s Papers Palm Beach. Read the full digital edition here.
