Our "Green" Initiative

View our newest green business practices

We are fortunate to live and work in this extraordinary part of the world. This good fortune carries with it a responsibility to respect and care for our environment. With offices across Utah, Summit Sotheby's International Realty, continues to include environmental accountability as a high priority in our day-to-day business practices. We are excited to share with you some of our most "green initiatives".

So how does a real estate company go "green"? Our most recent green initiative has been the dramatic reduction in use of paper. Real estate transactions involve complex contracts and an almost endless number of legal and financial forms. That translates to a lot of paper which, in turn, consumes additional office supplies, including folders, toners, ink cartridges and more. Based on current technology, we believe this historical use of paper products is no longer necessary. Candidly, this "old-school" use of paper is - and should be - on its way out. We strongly believe that a "new era" of digital transaction management is here. Listed below are some specific green initiatives that we are proud to present to you.

• Yard Sign Flyer Boxes: Unrecyclable "flyer boxes" attached to yard signs are being phased out. They will be replaced with a recyclable metal "green flyer". This metal flyer will have links to view more information on our website and our Summit Sotheby's International mobile app. Paper will no longer be needed for flyer boxes.

• Weekly Sales Meetings:  Paper handouts are no longer distributed to the over 100 agents and staff members who attend our weekly sales meetings. Instead, we review documents on a screen and then post them to our intranet site.

• Paperless Transaction Files: File folders bursting with paper copies of every real estate transaction are being eliminated. With sophisticated scanning technology and a seamless integration with our transaction and document management system, we are able to maintain all transactions digitally. This also allows clients to access their file in real-time from anywhere in the world. 

• Fax Machines: Our traditional paper fax system has been converted to e-fax to avoid unnecessary printing. In a real estate operation of our size, this saves an enormous amount of unnecessary printing.

• Used Paper: There is still the occasional need for paper. For this remaining paper-use, we have engaged the services of a document destruction company that shreds and recycles all the paper-related products it collects from our office. So even the paper we do use is never wasted.

We hope you find this update regarding our green initiatives helpful and informative. If you have additional green initiatives you would like us to consider, we certainly encourage your comments.