Real estate partners sell Weiser office

Horner-West real estate business was founded in 1925 in Weiser

The stately building that housed the Realty World Horner-West Real Estate office on East Main Street in Weiser has been sold to a real estate professional who is already familiar with the local market.
 Malia Bumgarner, an associate broker and sales agent with Creed Noah Real Estate Company, bought the building from longtime owners Darwin Adams and Arlene Gillispie. 
 The Realty World franchise was not part of the sale, which closed last month.
 Bumgarner plans to open a real estate office in the near future with a new name and signage as soon as some logistics are worked out. She is currently selling real estate out of the Creed Noah real estate office in Cambrige, a business founded by her parents, Creed and Mary Noah.
 Bumgarner said the Weiser office will be a satellite office of the Cambridge office. She has lived in Weiser for the past 16 years and has been working in the local real estate market for almost 17 years.
 “I have worked with Darwin and Arlene a lot over the years,” she said. 
 Prior to the recession a decade ago, and the subsequent sharp downturn in home sales and values, she ran the Creed Noah real estate office in Weiser for nine years. There are three people working in the real estate company right now and she hopes to attract some additional sales agents to work at the Weiser location. 
 Gillispie and Adams had been partners in the Realty World Horner-West office for more than three decades prior to selling the building to Bumgarner.
 Gillispie is moving to Oregon to be closer to family. She is working on getting her Oregon real estate license but doesn’t plan to open her own business, she said.
 “I think Weiser is a wonderful town, and I’ll miss it,” she said.
 Adams, who has been in the real estate and insurance business for 48 years in Weiser, said he is retiring and plans to “kick back and go fishing.”
 Adams knows the long history of the Horner-West business and the two men who founded the company in Weiser. 
 The original principals in the business, Lige Horner and Oakley West, opened the office in 1925 selling real estate and insurance. Over the many years, there have been a few different office locations around town, including the old Washington Hotel. 
 The business survived through the Depression and hard times and World War II. Horner served in the war and when he came back the business was booming in Weiser, Adams said.
 Adams bought Horner’s portion of the company in 1971 and went into business with Rod Panike, whose dad, Lester, had bought out West. Gillispie joined the business in 1985 and the three were partners for a while. 
 Adams and Gillispie bought out Panike, who owns Select Properties in Weiser, and they split the real estate business from the insurance business in 1986. They acquired the Realty World franchise and kept the Horner-West, renaming the business Realty World Horner-West and focused on the real estate sales. 
 Gillispie said the Weiser real estate market has always been a little slower than Boise. Currently, there is not much in the way of new construction going on, but that could change. Payette and Fruitland are seeing residential development that could eventually bring growth to Weiser.
 In the real estate business, there are cycles that drive the market up and down, she said.
 “We’ve survived all those,” she said.
 

Category:

Signal American

18 E. Idaho St.
Weiser, ID 83672
PH: (208) 549-1717
FAX: (208) 549-1718
 

Connect with Us