by Michele Newbern Gillis
Staff Writer
The St. Augustine chapter of the Women’s Council of REALTORS has struggled to maintain membership, and its new president, Watson’s Sue Chitwood, says she wants to change that.
“We want to build our membership,” said Chitwood. “The first year we started it we had a tremendous amount of members, and slowly but surely it has slacked off. It’s hard to keep momentum in a chapter.
“First off, we want to have some fun. Second, we want to have interesting speakers that pertain to being business women. That’s the main goal for me is to get some exciting, interesting and good speakers in here.”
One change that Chitwood has made to increase membership is to change the meeting place and day of the meeting. When the group first started, it met on the first Monday of the month at the St. Augustine/St. Johns County Board of REALTORS® office. Then it moved to the Ponce De Leon resort, but that establishment is closing. Now, the meeting is being held at Marsh Creek Country Club on the second Friday of the month.
“I’m hoping this is a better central location,” said Chitwood. “We also changed the date to Friday instead of Monday. We are trying to find out what will work for the REALTORS® in town. Members in the chapter said they wanted to change the date and the location. We hope these changes will increase membership.”
Challenges she has faced so far as president is to get people in her group to volunteer.
She said the national WCR’s theme is “The Task is To Ask” so she will be utilizing that theme and carrying it through everything that they do.
“We will be asking our members to participate and asking people to join,” she said.
As president, she is busy getting her committees set up and delegating responsibilities to them.
Being a president is not new to Chitwood.
“I had been the president of the American Business Women’s Association before, so it wasn’t something that was unfamiliar to me,” said Chitwood. “They needed someone to take the position; I was asked and I accepted. You try to do as good a job as you can, but it’s tough holding this kind of a position, trying to run a full-time job and have a family.
“I’m not where I want to be yet as far as having myself organized, but I think I’m doing OK. I get a lot of compliments and I think everyone is happy with what I’m doing.”
One of her goals with the group is to support The First Tee through a golf tournament and the Empty Stocking Fund with their High Tea and Silent Auction event.
Past president Pat Smith, also of Watson Realty, has been a mentor to Chitwood.
“She is an extremely organized person and it’s hard to follow in someone’s shoes that is organized like that,” said Chitwood. “We are in the same office so she is always there for me.”
One thing that Smith started and Chitwood will not finish is the local chapter’s Web site. It seems there are just not enough members to warrant creating a local Web site yet.
Chitwood will be involved in the state and national WCR meetings.
“You go to the functions and learn what it is they are trying to share with you and then you bring it back and try to implement it into your chapter,” said Chitwood.
Chitwood has been a real estate agent for three years with Watson Realty in St. Augustine.
She started out in property management when she was in her 20s. She left that business to raise her family and then decided to get into the mortgage business, where she was for 10 years.
“It was a natural transition for me to go from mortgage lending to real estate,” said Chitwood. “I love it and I wish I had done it 10 years ago.”
Chitwood sells all over St. Augustine and boasts her specialty is to make people happy.
“The thing I really like about real estate is helping people realize the American dream,” she said. “I know everybody says it, but honestly it’s the truth. I get so much enjoyment out of getting to know what people want and helping them find it. When that happens, it is so fulfilling.”
Chitwood was born in Illinois, but moved to St. Augustine when she was nine years old.
She is married to Daniel, a deputy sheriff with the St. Johns County Sheriff’s office. She has four daughters, Stacy, Marcy, Erin and Karin and four grandchildren, Kayla, Karly, Ethan and Kyler.
When she is not working she enjoys spending time with her family and her church, Anastasia Baptist Church.