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Bob Rich

Bob Rich

As the son of prominent REALTOR® Jack Rich, Bob Rich was exposed to real estate at a young age. His father was a founding partner of Rich & Jackson Ltd., the largest real estate company in Calgary during the 1950s. Jack Rich became president of the Calgary Real Estate Board (CREB) in 1956, and Bob would follow in his footsteps, becoming president of CREB in 1976.

Born in Calgary in 1931, Rich spent six years of his childhood in Nelson, British Columbia, before returning to Calgary. After high school, he attended Calgary's Mount Royal College, earning a diploma in Business Administration. After graduating, Rich joined America Fore General Insurance Group when he was only 21, and soon he was transferred to Toronto.

After getting married in 1957, Rich returned to Calgary and began working for his father's company, Rich & Jackson Real Estate Ltd. Unfortunately, the Rich and Jackson partnership ended soon after he joined the firm. Soon after the breakup, Rich formed Rich Realty Ltd. and Rich Insurance Service Ltd. His greatest sale was a used car lot, which went for $100,000, at a time when the average sale price for a home was $5,000.

In the 1960s, Bob Rich devoted his energies to organized real estate at the municipal, provincial and federal level. In 1967, he became president of the Alberta Real Estate Association. Two years later, he became vice president of the Canadian Real Estate Association for the region of Alberta, and in 1976, he was president of the Calgary Real Estate Board. Throughout his work with real estate boards and his own companies, Bob found the time to upgrade his education, earning the Fellow of the Real Estate Institute (FRI) designation, and then the Accredited Appraiser of the Canadian Institute (AACI) designation, which required a five-year appraisal course. After receiving this designation, he became president of Rich Appraisal Ltd

Bob Rich retired in 2001, although he is still active in the real estate industry. He is now chairman of the Calgary Real Estate Board's Retired REALTORS'® Group which meets once a month.

For more information on Bob Rich, read the Calgary Real Estate News article "Rich history in real estate" in our feature article database.

References

Vanderleer, Kim. " 'Rich' History in Real Estate." Calgary Real Estate News, December 10, 2004. Retrieved July 17, 2008
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