Vita

Michael Schneider-Christians was born in Wuppertal, Germany and has a 1974 Master’s degree in Business. Michael and Verena are married since 1974. Verena was born in Cape Town, South Africa. They have two daughters, Vanessa and Valerie who are both university graduates. Michael and his family moved to the United States in 1985 and commenced working as a Realtor for Barbara Watt, owner of CENTURY 21 Sunbelt Realty, Inc. in February of 1986.

Throughout his 29 years with Barbara Watt and CENTURY 21 Sunbelt Realty, Inc. Michael has epitomized what a true professional stands for: honesty, integrity and dedication. With over $260 Million sold to the end of 2006, Michael and his team have achieved the honor of being awarded “Centurion” status 11 times as well as achieving “Grand Centurion” status for 2000 through 2005. Michael’s Team was #10 in the nation in 2001, and #1 in the South Florida Region for 2000 and 2001. Michael is one of the only 20 US Realtors interviewed for the REALOGY training book.

Michael specialized in the Cape Coral real estate market and is very involved in the community. He is a graduate of Leadership Cape Coral, Class of 1999, was the first 4 year Chairman of the “Cape Coral Chamber Foundation”, was a Director of the “Cape Coral Council for Progress”, was the 2002 Chairman of the Realtor Association of Greater Fort Myers and the Beach International Committee, was a board member of the “Cape Coral Community Foundation” and, is the past President of the “European Chamber of Commerce of SW Florida” for 2002 and 2003, and a director of the “Realtor Association of Greater Fort Myers and the Beach” for a two year term (2003 - 2004). Michael is a proud member of the first, only 15 head selected community leaders group, to become a Cape Coral Community Trustee. For 3 years Michael was appointed to be a Member of the Board of Trustees of the Southwest Florida Symphony. Michael is since early 2008 the chairman of the SWFL Symphony Endowment Foundation. In the spring of 2005 he attended Advanced Leadership Cape Coral with the 9g training firm.

On July 1st, 2006 Michael’s Team joined the team of Koffman & Associates in the Sunbelt Office. Reason: "to enable me to spread SW Florida real estate to foreign countries, like the Caribbean, the Middle East, Central America, Germany, South Africa and Australia."

Michael also teaches business for Junior Achievement (JA) for many years. For the last few years he teaches at Coronado High School, an alternative high school in Fort Myers.  Michael has been honored several times by JA for his dedicated involvement.  Now Michael teaches for JA at Coronado High School in Fort Myers.  Students may be up to 21 years old to get their diploma. Michael loves to teach at this school as he meets an amazing variety of young people.  In 2014 Michael started to invite students of his classes to lunch to build a more personal relationship and let the students tell their life stories.  Michael received the JA Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014 for all his work with the Coronado students.

Michael and Verena love to travel. One of their favorite places is Eastern and Southern Africa and its wildlife. They have climbed mount Kilimanjaro, traveled by 4x4 through Botswana to Victoria Falls in 2002 and by 4x4 for more than 10,000 miles along the coastal areas of Australia in two different trips. In 1997 they did the “Silk Road” from Beijing to Rawalpindi in Pakistan in 21 days by bus, train and plane. In April 2007 Michael and his 2 team members finished the “Heroes Legend” rally from Paris to Dakar in first position in a 15 day adventure. Michael climbed Kilimanjaro again in July 2013 with both daughters.  Verena and Michael then went on on a truck/tent safari from Nairobi to Rwanda to see the gorillas in the mist.  In 2014 Verena and Michael went to Nepal and India for 8 weeks, getting real close to the cultures.  Michael did the ABC trail with guide and porter Hari, a special Nepalese human being.

Michael loves to listen to music as well. Michael and Verena also are very fond of art. You have to see there home, then you know. Over the years they have supported Arts for Act many times, even purchasing an original Darryl Pottorf. Their latest acquisitions are two Darryl Pottorf’s out of the special artwork series, made by Darryl Pottorf and Robert Rauschenberg in support of the local trauma center in Jan. 2003 and additional works in 2004.

On July 1st, 2009 Verena and Michael opened a new Allstate insurance office in downtown Cape Coral with their daughter Vanessa and her husband Craig.  Craig Arndt runs a very successful Allstate office in Tampa. The office offers all kinds of insurance and financial services for individuals as well as employers and employees.

October 2009:  The Cape Coral WCR chapter names Michael "Humanitarian of the Year".