New business focuses on homeowner associations

If you want something done right, sometimes you have to do it yourself.

Blake Harper felt management of his homeowners association wasn’t up to par, so he and his wife, Jennifer Wagner, co-founded KTFG Real Estate.

“It’s a matter of choice, service and competition,” he said. “We were not satisfied with the management of our HOA. The service was lacking, the follow-through was nonexistent and many balls were dropped. We shopped our association around to different management companies in town. We decided that we were dissatisfied and unable to find a better alternative.”

Harper, a landlord for different properties since 2006, is also an executive for a national restaurant chain .

His day job includes site selection, commercial lease negotiations and real estate portfolio management, and she practices real estate law and is also the associate director of bioethics research for Geisinger Health System.

Their night and weekend work consists of building the new business.

Their first client was Amitie Two Condominium Association where they own a unit. They’ve since branched out to another homeowners association and have signed agreements with “smaller” landlords.

Their focus is on homeowners associations, which they believe are underserved.

“A lack of choice has resigned many homeowners associations to accepting the status quo,” he said. “Unpalatable as it may be, homeowners association boards are forced into accepting the devil they know. KTFG offers those HOA boards the opportunity to change they way they’ve been doing business, to reject the status quo and improve the quality of their association.”

They are also offering management services of second homes for people who don’t live in the area.

“We might fail, but we might succeed too,” Harper said. “In either event, State College is the beneficiary because increased competition in the property management market will improve conditions for tenants, property owners and the community as a whole. Lack of competition in any market creates stagnation and all their entities suffer as a result.”

This story was originally published March 4, 2016 at 6:58 PM with the headline "New business focuses on homeowner associations."