Are You Hungry?

by Russell Shaw

Mega-Producing Realtor

Author website

Lisa Nolan writes:

I have acquired a RE license, and am contemplating entering the industry as an agent, and wondering if there is published data
anywhere on what production levels/market shares each Real Estate company holds…. I know there are many, many other factors more
important than this to take into consideration, but am curious.Thanks for any help,Lisa

There are many local companies around the country (you don’t indicate what part of the country you live in) that enjoy a huge market share – but just in that area their office is located. There are also some regional companies that are quite dominant in their part of the United States. For example, Weichert and Crye-Leike are not well known across the country, but are very well known in the areas they
do business.

A relatively small company in Ft. Collins, Colorado, The Group, has the highest average sales per agent, year after year, of any company in the industry. Last I knew, their average number of sales PER AGENT was about 55 deals per year. They have a waiting list to get in and charge a $10,000 (non-refundable) deposit just to join. Their 55 sales per year, per agent, is very high. Coldwell Banker, for example has about 11.5 average sales per year, per agent.

Some companies, Help-U-Sell, for example, don’t promote their individual agent’s stats, working to create a uniform experience for the consumer, regardless of which agent or which office they select.

The number one national company for sales per agent is Re/Max. I remember when they were proud of that number being 23 transactions per year. It got as high as 32 sales per year per agent. I don’t know what it is just now – but would guess it is in the high 20’s. Re/Max has the very best agent to agent referral network in the industry. At one time agents were joining Re/Max by the tens of thousands thinking that being with that company would guarantee them success. When Keller-Williams really started to take off in the agent growth department – they managed to recruit thousands and thousands of agents away from Re/Max – just by offering a better dream. KW got several thousand agents that way just in Atlanta.

So …. which company should you join? I’ve been with the same company for almost 29 years. When I joined them, my “selection process” was to ask the two people I knew best – who were in real estate – which company to join. They were both with John Hall & Associates – so I joined too. Never left, so I am still here. If you are looking for a company to “make you successful”, don’t. You can find failures in almost every real estate company in America. You can find remarkable successes in companies you have probably never heard of. One of the most consistently successful Realtors in the world, Alan Domb, only does business in a few high-rise condos in Philadelphia.

If you truly want success and have that “fire in the belly” that is required to keep going when it is not even a little bit pleasant – it probably won’t matter which company you choose. If you don’t have that “hungry quality”, which company you choose still won’t matter, because no manager in the world can give that to you.