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After more than 50 years as a fixture of the local real estate scene, Chris Gryllis has decided to take a step back from the business world.
On Monday, his long-standing Chris Gryllis Real Estate agency relaunched as Ray White Commercial Central West under new owners, Scott and Carla Timbrell.
While Chris and his wife Mosha, are looking forward to having the freedom to travel and do other things, Chris says he is not quite retiring just yet
“I will be staying on indefinitely, as required,” Chris said. “Because I have a lot of clients, who are my good friends, and if I can be of assistance, then I'll be here to assist.”
Originally from the Greek island of Patmos, Chris had immigrated to Australia in the 1960s and worked alongside his brothers in local restaurants and cafes for a decade until he was given his first start in real estate in February 1974 by Bob Moneghitti.
When Bob sold his business two years later, Chris applied for his real estate license and went into business for himself.
“My first ‘office’ was at the back of a takeaway food bar,” Chris recalled, adding that he continued to cook hamburgers at the Orange Food Bar each night in those early years.
“It wasn’t really an office, it was just good enough to accommodate two people!” he continued.
In 1977, Chris moved to 298 Summer Street, the office he occupied for nearly 48 years until moving to the current premises in McNamara Street two years ago.
“It has been a wonderful journey,” Chris said. “I never want to be the biggest real estate agent in town, and never was. We made a nice living and a good life, and I'm very grateful for all that.
“And I’ve been really lucky, because my wife has helped me all the way, and I was surrounded by good staff over the years.”
Real estate also gave Chris the opportunity to get involved with community affairs, and he considers it an incredible privilege to have served Orange for 27 years as a local councillor and deputy mayor.
“I value that more than anything else other than my family, of course,” he said. “I’ve enjoyed doing what I was doing, and even now I still enjoy what I'm doing. I’ll be 82 soon, and nobody is here forever… It's good to make a decision and make the change yourself and not have someone else do it for you.”
New owners Scott and Carla Timbrell say they look forward to building on the strong foundations Chris has built over the past 50 years.
“Chris has got a great reputation and has so many amazing clients, so it will be just working with that and bringing it into a new age,” Carla said.
“We don't want to change what he's already done; he's built great foundations, but it's trying to take it to a bigger scale… as Chris says, it's ‘the old meets the new’, it's a new era.”
The Timbrells moved to Orange three years ago with the intention of launching their own commercial real estate business in the Central West.
Scott brings more than 15 years of experience in commercial real estate to the new venture, while Carla has been in the property game for over a decade.
“We actually met working at the head office of Ray White,” Scott said. “I was selling commercial, and Carla was working in project marketing at the time.”
With a strong connection to the Ray White brand and the White family, Scott said it simply made sense to be part of the Ray White Commercial network.
“They're really good at supporting their franchisees… the level of support, systems, processes we’re able to tap into, it really gives us a leg up and puts us in a really good position as a new business,” he said.
“And their family values really resonated with us, being a fourth-generation family business,” Carla added.
“They see a lot of potential for growth as well. We’re lucky enough to have them back us, and we are definitely keen to grow the footprint from Orange.”