Houston Agent Shannon Sullivan Helps Find Forever Homes for Humans and Canines Alike
by David Hay | Photos by Sonya Bertolino
September 2025
When Shannon Sullivan was preparing to list the 9,200-square-foot, six-bedroom home at 625 Piney Point Road, the Houston-based agent for Douglas Elliman hit upon a novel approach to helping homebuyers picture themselves living there—by adding a rescue dog to that picture.
In a campaign she’s dubbed “Adopt a Dog and Buy a Home,” Sullivan and her fellow listing agent, Jeanine Kaminski-Ditzel, partnered with Animal Justice League (AJL) to feature four of the Houston nonprofit’s rescue dogs in the marketing photos and videos for 625 Piney Point Road.
“These dogs need all the help they can get,” said Sullivan, an avowed dog lover and AJL volunteer who learned about the organization three years ago, when her husband encountered a wayward German shepherd on his way home from work. Since its founding in 2015, the volunteer organization has rescued over 3,000 animals and, among its other free services, has provided microchips to another 1,300 brought in by their owners. Having since fostered many wonderful rescue dogs, Sullivan and her husband now have four of their own.
The agent, who works mainly around the the Inner Loop and Memorial areas of the city, had been kicking around the idea of a real estate-AJL collab for some time. The Piney Point Road listing presented the perfect opportunity to bring a fresh breeze to the typically sluggish late summer housing market.
“It’s too hot to go out for most people, and way too hot to be wandering around a yard and sizing up a home,” she explained.
With the permission of the property’s owners (also dog lovers), Sullivan arranged for AJL to bring four rescues—Duke, Miel (“sweet as honey”), Naala, and Canon—to serve as models for the listing photos. The resulting shots of the airy contemporary interiors and alluring outdoor spaces feature the canines in various poses: splayed out across a small sofa in the living room, perched atop an ottoman in another room, chasing a ball down the staircase, cavorting with Sullivan in her Elliman t-shirt, and luxuriating, ball-in-mouth, on the expansive lawn.
The photos and staging are both artful and smart. The dogs look like they belong there and truly bring the listing to life. Sullivan’s captions for the portraits include some notes on the dogs’ personalities. "Every queen deserves to be spoiled! Naala has officially declared the vanity chair her royal seat—where every day is a pampered adventure in this luxurious bathroom kingdom!" reads one.
“They really had a good time—and so did we!” Sullivan said.
The companion video of the “canine intervention” leaves no doubt about that, while hitting all the genuine emotional notes that are part of the homebuying journey.
“Within these walls a new family will soon create memories to last a lifetime,” says the voiceover. “As this home awaits its next chapter, a few foster dogs are here, too—each quietly hoping for a home filled with love, safety, and someone to call their own. Because home isn’t just a place: it’s a feeling every heart deserves.”
“It certainly made the listing stand out,” Sullivan said. “And hopefully it raises the profile of the Animal Justice League.”
She would be thrilled if other agents were inspired to feature rescue dogs in their listings, offering some advice on handling the “talent”: keep them separated. Each of the dogs was brought inside the house one-by-one.
“I wasn’t sure how they would react with each other, and we were taking no chances with the beautiful, newly renovated interior of this house,” said Sullivan.
At press time, Duke, Miel, Naala, and Canon are back with their foster parents. But if all goes according to Sullivan’s plan, they’ll soon be settling into their new forever homes. After all, a dog’s dreams do come true sometimes—just ask Chief, the German shepherd Sullivan's husband found years earlier. Since being adopted by a man in Houston, Chief and his rescue siblings spend their summers padding along the hiking paths of Oregon.
“He has quite the life,” she says.
Learn more about Houston’s Animal Justice League.
David Hay is a well-known architectural writer and playwright. His stories have been featured in The New York Times, Dwell and New York.
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