The playbook for launching a national virtual brokerage has worked two times back-to-back. The first was eXp and the second was Real Brokerage. They are both public companies today, but eXP is twice the market cap of REAL who is sitting at just over $1.1 billion. The market cap of eXp is a little over $2 Billion, more than 3x the value of the traditional broker-franchise firm, Anywhere! Their cap is 5x more than the franchise-only RE/MAX. Compass leads them all with more than $3B market capitalization operating a traditional national brokerage.  

 

Real has 21,000 agents, and completed $21.2 billion in transaction volume last year. REALTY OF  AMERICA (ROA) reports launching with “2000+ agents who represent over $5 billion in sales volume.” They have been engaged in a very targeted, pre-launch recruiting campaign. If ROA was to benchmark their value on day-one against Real, it may be valued intellectually at a quarter to that of Real on dollar volume. That is a pretty impressive valuation for a start up in a very old industry. The brokerage business model is a commission split with the ability to earn revenue share and equity, based on performance. Our understanding is that they have some unique aspects that are not being shared yet, so we will keep our ears to the ground.

Leadership at REALTY OF AMERICA include Peter and Erinn Nobel, bringing their knowledge of scaling operations and implementing the technology to support agents, previously playing key roles in the scaling of eXp Realty and Real Brokerage. They are joined by Eddie Garcia (Realty of Chicago) and Mark Dimas (Mark Dimas Properties); who have built their respective brokerages from the ground up into multi-billion-dollar enterprises across the lucrative Chicago and Houston markets. The idea of ROA is pretty simple: build fast and strong with a talented pool of agents, and go public. 

WAV Group does not provide services to ROA, but we know a few people there. The task ahead of them to serve 2,000 people across 23 markets is rough. The launch markets are San Diego, LA, Sacramento, San Francisco, Dallas, Austin’s, SA, Houston, Fort Worth, El Paso, Chicago, Milwaukee, Indianapolis, Kansas City, New Jersey, Newark, DC, Maryland, Virginia, Phoenix, Denver, Portland, and Salt Lake City. They have license applications submitted and LLCs formed in all 50 states.

I reached out to find out what they are doing to create the the basic infrastructure:

  • Accounting – Brokerage Engine
  • Commission Product – Brokerage Engine
  • Broker Website – Proprietary
  • Team/Agent websites – Proprietary
  • CRM – (not disclosed)
  • Listing Presentation / CMA – (not disclosed)
  • Marketing (Flyers, Postcards, Business Cards, virtual tours, etc) – In house graphic designers
  • And most importantly – the yard sign.