Meet Our Team

Jason Chu is broker of record for Ambiance Real Estate, and continues a multi-generational tradition in real estate sales, portfolio management, and development.  Working in his father's real estate and mortgage lending firms since 1983, Mr. Chu earned his own real estate license in 1991, and became a broker in 2012.  For over 3 decades, Mr. Chu has worked in probate and trust sale purchasing, multi-family property sales and portfolio management, business opportunity and land sales transactions, and single family and condomium residential sales.  Investors from Asia, Europe, and N. America have sought his advice on the California Real Estate market.  Mr. Chu is focused on the SF Peninsula and Bay Area, but at his clients' request, and as part of expanding Ambiance Real Estate operations througout the Golden State, he and/or his agents have advised or participated in sales in San Diego, Greater Los Angeles, and Orange Counties, as well as the Roseville and Lincoln sub-markets.

While maintaining his position in the family real estate businesses, Mr. Chu also has held senior strategy, senior product and service development, and consultative roles for a Fortune 50 company and its clients, a pioneering HMO healthcare company headquartered in Oakland, CA, and the world's second biotech company headquartered in S. San Francisco.  In those roles, Mr. Chu's work yielded innovative, paradigm-disrupting services, technologies and business modalities.  Mr. Chu assumed full-time leadership of Chu Real Estate & Investments (portfolio management) and Rainbow Realty & Consulting (sales/leasing) in 2012, and since 2018, has been Ambiance Real Estate's leader.  

With Ambiance Real Estate, Mr. Chu hopes to restore lost traditions and practices in the real estate industry with the goals of unsurpassed client value, unwavering ethical conduct, and fiduciary responsibility aligned with our clients' goals.  It is his assertion and firm belief, that solid ethical business conduct and truly acting as a fiductiary will differentiate Ambiance Real Estate in an industry wrought with players that have "lost their way" with "slick marketing, deceptive practices, technology for technology sake, and focus on stock issuance and IPO's".

Ambiance Real Estate has no sales quotas for its agents.  Instead, Mr. Chu insists that agents spend more time listening to and working toward clients' goals as Ambiance's priority -- with client satisfaction being Ambiance's key success metric. Moreover,  as a graduate of the world's first and arguably, foremost, non-profit management schools, Mr. Chu firmly believes that community service and development is an important component to Ambiance's success -- forming C.A.R.E. as Ambiance's charitable giving and service organization.

Mr. Chu had the good fortune of being raised in California (born in S. California, but raised in San Francisco), with close ties to extended family in San Diego, Honolulu, Shanghai, and Hong Kong that have and continue to influence his development. For the Fortune 50 company, he led teams in every major geography of the USA, in Europe, in India, and in China, and a global division with $1.2 Billion USD in sales during his tenure. Mr. Chu has worked as a strategic business consultant for Booz and Co. in Shanghai and Hong Kong, China.  This international living and business experience helps him relate to clients from diverse cultures and backgrounds and to lead the Ambiance Team with proven experience and distinction.

As a "local" San Franciscan, Mr. Chu is proud to be a graduate of W. Portal Lutheran, Lowell High School, and UC Berkeley (with Bachelors' Degrees in Molecular and Cellular Biophysics and Economics).   He received his certificate in California Real Estate (the highest credential in real estate offered by California's community colleges) from the City College of San Francisco.

He also holds dual Master's degrees in Business Administration and in Public Health from Yale University's School of Management and the Public Health division of the Yale School of Medicine).  He served as a teaching fellow in three courses: Negotiations, in Leadership and Teams, and in Marketing at the Yale School of Management; and as a graduate-level teaching assistant in Human Physiology and in Disease Etiology at San Francisco State University -- co-authoring a textbook in Disease Etiology used at SFSU.  Mr. Chu has also guest lectured at Shanghai Jiao Tong University's Antai School of Managment to MBA students in Entrepreneurship.

Mr. Chu has served on the Board of Directors (as Community Development Director, and as Treasurer) for TennisforKids.org, a exercise-oriented and academic preparatory non-profit organization that served San Francisco's at-risk youth.  He currently serves on the Advisory Board of Innometive, a pioneer in self-expanding titanium fasteners with medical, dental, automotive, and aerospace vehicle applications.  (https://www.innometive.com/about.html)

Mr. Chu speaks English, German, Mandarin, and Cantonese. Pre-COVID pandemic, Mr. Chu split his time between Shanghai, the San Francisco Peninsula, and The Home Depot.

The affluent homebuyer is a discerning one. James Pierce has served as a matchmaker for real estate buyers and sellers since 2010 in the Northern California market.

After all, when clients are well-acquainted with the best of everything, it’s no surprise that their standards are high when it comes to service. James is an agent who builds relationships with clients and specializes in the luxury market. With a history of real estate practice in San Francisco and its Peninsula, James is currently residing in Portland, Oregon, where he is developing his Oregon real estate pracitce.   James is uniquely positioned to understand the needs of his sophisticated affluent, and often multi-state client base. 

Chances are, you’re just as discerning as his clients are. James is available seven days a week to meet your needs, with an additional specialization: Corporate Relocation services. 

James listens, understands, is honest with you as your advisor, and acts to close your transactions in a timely professional manner. He is a native of San Francisco who has also lived in Japan, Texas, Southern California and the Pacific Northwest.