Paula Aragone
CEO and Founder, Aragone & Associates
Luxury homes and Orange County's most complex sales, including probate, trust, conservatorship, guardianship and divorce.
- 900+Sales Closed
- $900M+In Sales
- Top 1%Nationwide
- 23Years in Orange County
- 5.0On Google
About Paula Aragone
Paula Aragone is the CEO and founder of Aragone & Associates at First Team Real Estate and Luxury Portfolio International. For 23 years, families and their advisors have trusted her with Orange County's most consequential real estate decisions. She has closed more than 900 sales and over $900 million in volume, and her team ranks among the top 1% of agents nationwide.
Paula is known for handling the transactions where the stakes are highest. She guides luxury homeowners, high-net-worth families, estates and trusts through sales, purchases and investments, and her team has represented financial institutions in a large number of transactions. She is the advisor families turn to for every real estate need, and especially when a sale involves probate, conservatorship, guardianship or divorce. These sales often involve court oversight, fiduciary duties and competing interests, so every decision carries weight. Paula brings clarity to that process and protects the value of the asset at every step.
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Before she sold her first home, Paula completed four years of law school in Argentina. That training shapes how she reads a contract, prepares a sale for court confirmation and conducts a negotiation. It is why attorneys, professional fiduciaries, corporate trustees, CPAs and financial advisors refer their clients to her. They know she will protect the value of the asset and take the stress off the family.
Her expertise shows up in the result. For sellers, her team plans and manages the improvements, staging and design that position a property at its highest value. The finished home is then presented with editorial photography, cinematic video and the global reach of Luxury Portfolio International. For buyers, her command of valuation and negotiation protects them from overpaying. On either side of the table, that has often meant hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional value for her clients.
For homeowners ready for their next chapter, Paula created Downsizing with Distinction. The program guides clients from a large family home into a smaller residence that better fits the life they want now. It covers the sale, the move and everything in between.
Specialties
LuxuryHigh-end Orange County listings marketed through Luxury Portfolio International’s global network.
ProbateCourt-supervised probate sales for families settling an estate, handled from petition to close.
TrustTrust and successor-trustee property sales, handled with the paperwork and timeline a trust sale requires.
ConservatorshipCourt-supervised conservatorship sales for conservators and the families they represent.
GuardianshipCourt-supervised guardianship sales, handled with the care and reporting the court requires.
DivorceProperty sales handled with the discretion and timeline a divorce settlement requires.
Downsizing with DistinctionGuidance and hands-on support for seniors and families moving from a long-time home to their next one.
RelocationRelocation sales and purchases for clients moving into or out of Orange County.
Attorneys & FiduciariesA real estate resource for attorneys, fiduciaries and trustees, from valuation to court confirmation.
The $2.1 Million West Bay Sale
1436 West Bay, Newport Beach
This is the sale behind the number. The property would have traded as-is at $5 million. Instead of listing it that way, we identified where the hidden equity was, spent $100,000 on targeted preparation through our own craftsmen, and took it to market properly. It sold for $7.2 million, which put $2,100,000 more in the seller’s pocket than the as-is path would have.
- $5.0MAs-Is Value
- $100KInvested in Preparation
- $7.2MSold
Why I Built My Practice Around Protecting Family Inheritances
I got my start in Orange County luxury real estate, and early on I noticed something that didn't sit right with me. Some of the most valuable estates in the county were selling for a fraction of what they were worth. The homes weren't the problem. They were part of a trust or a probate, and most agents treated that label as a reason to discount the property instead of a reason to market it properly.
Four years of law school had taught me about fiduciary duty, contracts and negotiation, so I built my Trust and Probate Division around what trustees and executors actually need. Every estate gets the same treatment as any other high-end listing: targeted improvements, professional staging and real marketing. When an estate is asset-rich but cash-poor, my team can fund that work upfront through our internal process, so a lack of cash is never the reason a family settles for less.
That system recovered $2.1 million above as-is value on a single sale, and it regularly puts tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars back into a family's pocket. Today the same standard applies to every client, whether the sale is a beachfront estate, a trust, a conservatorship or a parent's home.
At Aragone & Associates, we maximize value and minimize stress, because strategy is what we do.
“In a strong market, almost anyone can sell a home. In a slow market, you find out who really knows how to price, prepare, and negotiate.”
Paula Aragone
