Connecting the Community: Sunriver
Sunriver has always been a vacation destination, even for those of us who were at home in Central Oregon. My connection to it goes back further than my own childhood, though — my mother and her best friend, Molly McCallum, were two of the very first sales agents at the Resort. They showed property and wrote contracts out of a VW van!
As a kid, Sunriver meant bike trails and the big pools — the kind of summer day that felt endless. As a teenager, it meant tagging along with friends and their families, soaking up a little more freedom each time.
As an adult, Sunriver became something else entirely: the job of a lifetime.
I was hired to launch Caldera Springs, a new community adjacent to Sunriver and Crosswater, while also leading marketing for Sunriver Realty and, in essence, Sunriver Resort itself. It was full-spectrum work — brand, strategy, events, guest experience, the works — and some weeks it meant 90-hour work weeks and more stress than I knew what to do with. I wouldn't trade a minute of it. The team I worked with, and what we built together, remains one of the true highlights of my life, not just my career.
Caldera Springs went on to become one of the most successful real estate launches in the Pacific Northwest — our first sales event sold 201 of 203 homesites, over $68 million, in two days.
Some of my favorite memories from that season had nothing to do with sales numbers, though. As an employee of Sunriver Resort, I got to take part in the incredible Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday events, which helped me rediscover the joy of the season in a way I hadn't felt in years. Every day we were encouraged to make every guest feel like a VIP, and there was something genuinely empowering about that — about being trusted to make someone's vacation feel a little bit more magical.
Sunriver taught me what it feels like to work hard at something worth working hard for. That's a lesson I carry into every listing, every client, every deal.
