Gary Keller and John Davis
UPDATED: Jan. 31, 2:00 p.m.: In 2010, Keller Williams Realty launched an aggressive campaign to boost its ranks. As of today, the Texas-based brokerage says it’s the largest franchise firm in the world with 177,000 agents, up nearly 13 percent from last year.
Those agents sold $314.6 billion worth of real estate in the U.S. and Canada in 2017, up 15 percent year over year, Keller Williams said in a news release.
CEO John Davis said the results are a direct result of KW’s drive for market share starting seven years ago, when he said the company’s growth “went vertical.” According to Davis, a key driver to KW’s recruitment has been a narrow focus on boosting agent productivity. “Everything we do is focused on them, to build their business and help them with clients,” he said.
According to Davis, KW agents outperformed the market during 2017’s fourth quarter — typically a slow time of year — by anticipating the dip and going after new business ahead of time. For the full year, KW agents closed 1.07 million deals, up 9.7 percent from 2016.
Despite the strong numbers, the company’s sales growth (15 percent) fell short of a 19.6 percent uptick in 2016. Davis attributed the deceleration to low inventory. “When we look at existing home sales in the U.S., they were up 1.1 percent in 2017,” he said. “That’s the inventory impacting that.”
Keller Williams — which shares profits with agents and owners of regional offices — said agents turned $174.7 million in profits in 2017, up 13.1 percent from 2016. Regional owners received a total of $200.8 million, a year-over-year increase of 11.6 percent. (In 2017, Keller Williams International received $196 million in royalties.)
Although Keller Williams is a dominant player nationally, it’s a relatively new player in New York. Keller Williams NYC, owned by Ilan Bracha and Haim Binstock, opened in 2011.
Keller Williams Tribeca, led by CEO Mark Chin, opened last year.
The NYC operation was No. 6 on The Real Deal’s most recent ranking of residential firms, based on its agent count. As of that ranking, in May 2016 Keller Williams had nearly 600 agents in Manhattan. It had another 661 in Queens as of June 2017, as well as 131 agents in the Bronx. “We’re fairly new to the New York area,” Davis said. “We’re really excited to grow and have roots there.”
Nationally, Keller Williams competes with the likes of RE/MAX, Century 21, Coldwell Banker and HomeServices of America, a subsidiary of Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway.
Steve Murray, founder of data firm Real Trends, said RE/MAX still does more business globally than Keller Williams. “RE/MAX in Canada alone is many multiples of Keller in Canada,” he said. Based on agent count, however, Keller Williams has grown at a “much faster rate” than any of its competitors.
“What’s really interesting,” he added, “is that Keller Williams has achieved this growth without spending any money on national, regional or local advertising of the Keller Williams brand.”
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