About
Chris Fontenot, and why Nexus works the way it does.
Nexus started on the repair side of this business, buying houses other people had given up on. The license came later. Both halves are still here, and keeping them in one place is deliberate.
How this started
One tool became two
The repair side came first. The license came later. Keeping both in one business is the whole point.
Most people who call Nexus are not shopping. They are solving something. A roof that failed an inspection. A parent who died and left a house nobody lives in. A rental that has taken more than it has given for three years running. An insurance claim that came back for a third of the estimate.
For years the only tool available for those calls was a direct purchase. It is a good tool and it solves a real problem, but it is one tool, and plenty of the people calling would have done better listing the house. Saying so meant sending the call away.
That is what the license changed. Chris is now a Louisiana licensed REALTOR® sponsored by Real Broker, LLC, which means the conversation can end with a listing agreement, with a direct offer, or with neither, and the recommendation is not constrained by which one is the only thing on offer.
The conflict, said out loud
Being the agent who will list your house and the investor who will buy it is a genuine conflict of interest. Most people doing both keep the two sides on separate websites and hope nobody connects them.
The way it works here instead: you get told which path nets you more, including when that path is listing with somebody else. When Nexus buys directly, Chris is a principal in that transaction and not your agent, and that disclosure is printed in full at the foot of every page on this site, at the same size as the rest of the compliance text.
What he actually does all day
Walks properties. Pulls comparable sales out of the MLS and reads them against what he knows about that street. Talks to people mid-succession about what has to happen at the courthouse before anything can be sold. Prices repairs, because he has paid for enough of them to know what a contractor is going to say before the contractor says it.
There is no team behind this. One person answers the phone and it is the same person every time.
On the record
License, brokerage, and where to check it
- Agent
- Chris Fontenot
- Title
- Louisiana Licensed REALTOR®
- License number
- 995720550
- Sponsoring broker
- Real Broker, LLC, Lafayette, Louisiana
- Broker phone
- 855-450-0442
- Primary market
- Lafayette Parish and greater Acadiana
Louisiana licenses are public. The Louisiana Real Estate Commission publishes a licensee lookup, and the number above is what you search.
How this works
Four things that do not change
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The worse answer first
If listing beats a direct offer on your house, you hear that before you hear a number. It is the only version of this that survives anybody checking the arithmetic.
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No expiring offer
Nothing here counts down. An offer is good while the condition and the market behind it hold, and if you need three weeks to talk to your family, take three weeks.
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Nothing invented
No sold counts, no star ratings, no years-in-business figure on this site that has not been supplied and checked. If a number is not here, it is because it has not been verified yet.
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Your information stays
Your address and your situation are not sold to a lead network and not forwarded to three investors out of state. See the privacy policy for exactly what is kept.
Next step
Start with the situation
Call, text, or write, and say what is actually happening with the property. The answer usually takes one conversation.
On the record
Verify all of it independently
Every claim on this page can be checked against a public source. These are the ones it rests on.
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Verify a license
Louisiana licenses are public record. Search a license number before you sign anything with any agent, including this one.
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REALTOR® standards
The code of ethics a REALTOR® is bound by, and what the 2024 changes to buyer representation require.
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HUD fair housing
What the Fair Housing Act protects, and how to file a complaint if you believe you were treated differently in a housing transaction.
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Louisiana law, in full
Successions, usufruct, indivision, partition and mineral servitudes are all in the Civil Code, published by the state.
How the work is actually done
What happens between the call and the closing
The first conversation is diagnostic rather than promotional. What is the property, who is on the deed, what condition is it in, and what is setting your timeline. Those four answers decide everything downstream, and three of them have nothing to do with price.
Then the records. Before any number is discussed, the conveyance records for the parish get pulled: who actually owns it, whether a succession is open, whether there are liens, privileges or judgments recorded against the property or a former owner, and whether there is a tax sale in the chain. In Acadiana that step decides the calendar far more often than the condition of the house does.
Then two numbers rather than one. What a listing would likely net after commission, concessions, repairs and the months of holding costs, and what a direct as-is purchase pays. You get both, with the comparable sales behind the first and the repair assumptions behind the second, and you are told plainly which one is larger.
What is deliberately not offered
- No fee to talk, no fee for a market analysis, and nothing to sign before a decision is made.
- No offer that expires at midnight. An offer holds while the condition and the market behind it hold.
- No sale-leaseback, no deed transfer with a promise to sell the house back later, and no arrangement that asks a distressed owner to sign the title over early.
- No referral of your details to a lead network, another investor, or a national buying platform.
The reason to list all of that is that every item on it is standard practice somewhere in this industry, and a homeowner in a difficult spot has no reliable way to tell the difference in advance.
Related
Where to go next
The pages most people read after this one.
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Listing versus cash
The full arithmetic on one house, three ways, with the assumptions written down.
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Listing with a REALTOR®
Pricing, prep, marketing and what a traditional sale nets.
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Buying in Acadiana
Representation, flood zones, insurance, and the process through to the act of sale.
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Areas served
Lafayette Parish and the parishes around it, town by town.
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Terms of use
What the information here is, and what it is not.
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For agents
Another agent with a listing that will not survive a traditional sale, and what happens to their client.