Professional Profile: Rene Poyant - 1983

Name: Rene Poyant - 1983

Title: President

Company: Rene L. Poyant, Realtor

Location: Barnstable Rd., Hyannis, Mass.

Birthplace: Acushnet, Mass.

Rene Poyant, 73 of Hyannis didn’t enter the real estate field until the late 1940s, and although he could play the role of Santa claus all year long (literally he has, says his son) or you might think he was the model for the little old winemaker on the Italian Swiss Colony label, he was in the family bakery business for the first 38 years of his life. Born in Acushnet, Rene attended the Fleischmann Baking School in New York City and the Wilton School of Cake Decorating, The Poyant Cider Mill, the barn where his family’s bakery was located, was followed by work at the Johnson Bakery Supply Co. in Brighton. When the business moved to Cape Cod in 1939, he supplied the Camp Edwards air base with baked good during WWII. Rene purchased his first property in 1947. Twelve years later he and Kenneth Ram, trust officer for Chase Manhattan in New York, opened their first office, which moved to its present site two years later on Barnstable Rd. The firm has since constructed three additions. Rene L. Poyant, Realtor handles commercial sales and rentals, residential sales, property management, mortgage brokerage, appraisals and maintenance of properties. It has brokered several hotel, motel and commercial sites over the years and son Marcel says “In all modesty, we are the largest commercial brokerage firm on Cape Cod.” Transactions have included the Provinctown Inn, Dunfey’s in Hyannis, Howard Johnson Motor Lodge, Picture Pond Plaza, Blue Water Motel and Ocean Mist Motel. On the Cape, longtime residents have been heard to say that Rene has changed the atmosphere of the Cape, particularly in Hyannis, from a sleepy village to a business community. His firm will “continue its services to the growing Cape with sufficient safeguards, to maintain a reasonable degree of charm and continually of the good way of life,” says Marcel. “Rene’s whole life has been built around meeting all kinds of people and accomplishing various endeavors, watching them grow. I guess that might be what you call his hobbies.” There was a lot of poverty and discrimination when Rene relocated to the Cape int eh late ‘30s, among the different nationalities and ethnic groups as well as outsiders. He won their respect through his kindness and overwhelming generosity, helping feed the poor through his bakery and lending them money from his real estate commissions to purchase homes. The relatives and friends of those who benefited returned his kindness over the years that followed. Rene is a member of the Elks Club, Knights of Columbus, Hyannis Board of Trade, Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce and the Rotary Club, where he has 37 years of perfect attendance . A longtime Realtor, he founded the Cape Cod Multiple Listing Service. When Paul Dever was governor, he served on the Mass. Maritime Commission in the late 1940s. While he has never held public office because of his educational background, Marcel says “he has been the guiding force behind a lot of the organizations of which he is a member” and has been involved in a variety of civic enterprises. “If you think of real estate on the Cape, you think of my father,” his son adds. “He has done it all and seen it all from one end of the sand dunes to the marches on the other. He still sits in his office every day cracking the whip on us and I’m sure he’s going to be around for a while yet.”