Sereno has opened a temporary office in Los Altos with close to 20 agents, most of them Coldwell Banker refugees. Trapani was president of Coldwell Banker Silicon Valley before he started Sereno Group a little more than two years ago.

The company plans to open a permanent office in Los Altos next year at 369 S. San Antonio Road and to add another 30 agents at that time.

“Our plan when we started was to be in Los Gatos, Saratoga and Los Altos in five years. We are doing that, but we will be making ourselves rock solid before we expand again,” Trapani said.

Sereno targets Silicon Valley’s higher-end homes, which have held their values better than the housing market overall during the last two years. But Trapani said he is seeing weakness even there, which he links in part to the recent decline in the stock market.

“In the last two weeks in the upper-end market ... we have seen a psychological pullback, and I think next year will be a lot like this,” Trapani said.”

He predicts a “softening in values” as people who have to sell cut their prices.

Right now in Los Gatos, Saratoga and other markets to the north on the peninsula, only 15 percent of for-sale homes are in escrow. That’s well below the 25 percent to 30 percent in escrow in a balanced buyer and seller market, he said. When the same low sales volume hit the Santa Teresa-Blossom Valley markets in South San Jose about 18 months ago, values fell by as much as 40 percent. Now the homes are selling again.

Katherine Conrad can be reached at 408.299.1820 or kconrad@bizjournals.com. Sharon Simonson can be reached at 408.299.1853 or ssimonson@bizjournals.com.