Buxton Inner West has expanded in Melbourne and will double its numbers after acquiring neighbouring Hodges Yarraville.

Managing Director and Senior Auctioneer, Tristan Tomasino, said the move would allow them to improve efficiencies as well as grow their rent roll, which is a key asset for the real estate business.

“It was always on our radar to try and buy another business or rent roll in the local area,” Mr Tomasino said.

“We negotiated around Christmas last year and signed the agreement and then it all came to fruition early this year, which was really exciting.”

Mr Tomasino said the business has been focused on growth for a few years and the acquisition will help them expand their reach.

“We’ve always managed around 400 properties and sold anywhere from 120 up to 200 properties a year, with a team of about 11,” he said.

“Our long-term goal was to get to 1000 properties under management.

“That would pretty much take us to be the second-largest agency in the area.”

Being born and bred in the area, Mr Tomasino said he loved operating in the Inner West.

“We just moved into a new office space about two years ago that we spent a lot of money on doing it up and fitting it out, and our brand has got a good name in the area,” he said.

He said the acquisition would double the size of the team.

“It’ll take us to nearly 20 employees and a lot of the staff that we’ve brought in have got tremendous experience, and they live in the area as well,” he said.

“We’re really heavily involved in the community, but we also think, from a service offering point of view, it allows us to really scale, while making sure our clients get the service they deserve.”

“And I’ve already noticed that the last two months with the people that you can put on, the scalability of it is really exciting for us.”

He said the move had also allowed them to enhance their technology offering and hire more help from overseas.

Looking forward he said that his plan was to continue to grow.

“We’ve got the right set up and people to open another office,” he said.

“I think the main thing for us this year is to obviously just make sure that our current clients are happy and we’re hitting the goals that we want to achieve by the end of this year.

“We’re not far off a thousand properties, so it’s the goal for now.”