Real estate broker gets wide audience

Sarasota residential real estate broker John Wilcher recently got a taste of how to sell properties TV style when he filmed a guest appearance on Million Dollar Listing New York.

The popular show, on the Bravo network, follows three agents who sell high-end homes in New York City. Wilcher, with Dwell Real Estate in Sarasota, made the cut for one episode after he took an online class set up by the show's producers. Wilcher's part in the episode was filmed Dec. 7, according to a release, at an open house of one of the show's stars, Fredrik Eklund.

Wilcher has been in the local real estate industry for 10 years, and has lived in Sarasota since 2000. What likely impressed producers was his real-life made-for-TV back-story: Wilcher is a decorated combat veteran of the Afghanistan war, the release states. He has been a U.S. Marine, Army sergeant and police officer.

“As a real estate agent during the 2008 crash, I lost everything,” Wilcher says in the statement. “I was 38 years old and had a 3-month-old baby. The only thing I knew to do was to go back into the military, and I ended up serving in Germany and Afghanistan.”

Wilcher reentered real estate when he returned home in 2011. He worked for Re/Max before he joined Dwell. He noted his brush with a real estate TV celebrity in a Dec. 10 Facebook post. “Two years ago I was getting out of Afghanistan,” wrote Wilcher, “and now I'm in NYC with the 'best of the best.' I am a blessed man and this is only the beginning!”