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Matchmaker unites homeowners, media execs: businesswoman books mansions for reality TV shows, feature films.

Article Excerpt
One day a stranger showed up on Sherri Milligan's doorstep and offered the mortgage broker $60,000 to let his film crew use her Beverly Hills house for a one-week shoot. Flattered, she said yes.

When the crew members packed up their bags with a goodbye and thank you, she said: "Anytime"--and meant it. "I realized there was a lot of money to be made just in my own personal residence," she said.

Milligan immediately took photos of her 12,000-square-foot house from numerous angles and contacted other production companies about using her property for filming. Then she called friends and neighbors and took pictures of their houses for her book. "Pretty soon, I was getting them business," she said.

So was born Sunset Locations Inc.

Milligan quit her mortgage broker job in 1999 to work on the project, which she took full time in 2001. She was then competing against a half-dozen other scouting companies specializing in residential properties.

Now, the business has more than 4,500 residential properties from Pasadena to Malibu--all cataloged in...

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