Just thought some of you might want to check out this new post over on 7DS Associates blog:
The annual Brokerage Performance Report put together by REALTrends is one of the most useful and important studies for the real estate brokerage industry. Unfortunately, the last report was released in 2007, and nothing has been released since then.
The trouble with the 2007 Report, as valuable as it is, is that it uses 2006 data from respondents who submit the information voluntarily. And housing market started to decline sharply really starting in 2007, and 2008 may have been the annus horribilis of the real estate industry. It may be that the respondents of the REALTrends study simply didn’t want to tell anyone how horrible a year 2007, and then 2008 was even worse.
Either way, lacking 2007 and 2008 performance data means that it is nearly impossible to guess what constitutes “average” performance. And lacking information means decisionmaking is at best made in a vaccuum with no baseline, and at worst is haphazard.
I’ve always been keenly interested in tracking as much performance data as possible. And I’m into speculating on stuff I can’t measure. So I figured I’ll take a foolish crack at some numbers.
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Fact is, we as an industry really need some better data on company performance. It’s hard to know how well or badly you’re doing if you have nothing to measure against. Here’s to appreciating REALTrends, and hoping they get back to doing the awesomely useful Brokerage Performance Study series again.
-rsh
