RE/Max is back.

A new RE/MAX agency has opened in Austin.

Duane Sauke is the owner/broken of RE/MAX Realty Plus.

The business is located at 1702 17th Street Northwest Suite No. 2 near the Staples Store in the Target Plaza shopping center. Sauke has assembled a talent crew of Realtors: Scott Ulland, Julie McHugh, Lindy Rider and David Hinman to serve as the core of his realty firm. He expects to recruit as many as six to 10 agents when fully staffed.

Sauke, who owns a RE/MAX agency in Rochester, has more than 20 years in the realty business, including the last 13 with RE/MAX.

Sauke was invited by agents who had a relationship with RE/MAX in Austin, to rekindle that relationship and open an Austin office.

“I think they had a desire, because the focus of the RE/MAX system is experienced agents who have a good-sized book of business,” Sauke said. “They thought there was opportunity again for starting up an office.”

The woeful home mortgage financial crisis wasn’t a deterrent to plans to open the new Austin business.

“Austin has a very stable real estate market,” Sauke said. “Even though it has the same small change that is being experienced in the market, we feel it is a good opportunity.”

Advancements in the ability to do things electronically will allow Sauke to provide the Austin agents with technical and other support from his Rochester office.

“I think everybody is finding as they are adjusting to a new housing market, the definition of the new market is: ‘What is the right price today?’ ”

“They are finding there still are buyers and there still is financing,” he said. “There’s still the ability to borrow money, but people will have to get used to new definitions of price and value.”

“As long as there is a healthy job market and a healthy economy in a local area, there’s still plenty of opportunity to have a successful real estate office,” he concluded.

As an owner/broker of a real estate company, Sauke said his biggest rewards are assisting agents.

“As a broken/owner I’m providing that place, that platform for agents to do great work,” he said.

Sauke is the president-elect of the Rochester Area Chamber of Commerce. He is the former president of the Minnesota Association of Realtors in 2007 and has been president of the Rochester Association of Realtors for one year and also president of the Southeast Minnesota Association of Realtors for a year. RE/MAX started in the Denver, CO area in 1972 and has grown every year since. It has had a presence in Minnesota since 1981. For more information about RE/Max Realty Plus in Austin, call (507) 433-0013.