WESTLOCK – After 56 years in Westlock and operated by three generations of the Muller family, Muller Realty has been sold to new owner Stacey Price.
July 1 marked the official opening of PriceLock Realty, which will operate from the same location (10408 – 100th Avenue) with Price, who’s been at the office since March 2018, working alongside now past owner Trent Muller.
Carl Muller started Muller Realty when he purchased the realty business of Verdun Baxanadall in early 1966. Carl’s son Barry began working with his father shortly after and purchased the business from him a couple of years later. Barry’s son Trent then began working in the family business in 1991 and for a short time, all three generations of the Muller family were involved. Trent says his dad worked hard at the business and kept the Muller Realty reputation going. In 2003, Trent became the broker at Muller Realty and in the following years his dad decided he wanted to slow down and sold the business to him in 2007.
Following the sale, Trent will work as an employee with Price as owner and manager as he will continue as broker for the meantime, looking after the deals and the trust accounts — Price will eventually become the broker at the office. The two have been in discussion about the sale for some time, as Trent wants to slow down himself a bit and spend more time with his wife Chelsie and their daughters, Bre, 16, and Trinity, 13.
Previous to real estate, Price worked at Westlock Veterinary Clinic for several years as an assistant and “loved the job there and loved the people I worked for.”
But despite working tons of hours at the clinic, as a single mom with three children, she was still struggling financially. She had bigger dreams for herself and family and felt she had to find something that ideally, the more effort she put into it, the more reward she could get out of it.
That led her to realty.
After speaking with local realtors, she decided to get her licence and has since put in 1,500 hours of online work. That completed, she began working at Muller Realty as an associate and now, a little over four years later, she and Trent are changing roles.
“First and foremost, I want to stress that I am truly honoured and feel very privileged that I was even given this opportunity,” Price said. “And now that it’s coming to be real, essentially I would like to continue on with the legacy that the Muller family has established over the last 50-plus years.”
She added she doesn’t have any big changes in store, beyond the change of ownership and name change — even the phone numbers are staying the same.
“The whole culture and atmosphere that I want to continue is same great people, same great service.”
Price noted her daughter Letitia, who just passed her exam as a realtor, will be joining with her and one new front-end person has been hired to join the existing staff. Like her mother, Letitia originally trained for a career in agriculture and has a diploma with a major in dairy.
“I’m excited to have her join with us and keep the family atmosphere,” said Price. “I hope to continue and build the business and feel very confident moving forward taking over a business that has such wonderful administrative staff; they are truly a huge benefit to the business. They are wonderful.”
Price also gave a shout-out her sons Andrew, 20, and DJ, 17, as well her parents for all their support. DJ, she added, designed the new PriceLock Realty logo.
“They’ve been so supportive of me starting a new career and there have been some sacrifices we’ve all had to make to get here,” she concluded.
