The company added almost 3,000 agents in the second quarter of 2024.
This article originally appeared in HousingWire on August 7th, 2024
The Real Brokerage isn’t tapping the brakes on its rapid expansion.
During its second-quarter 2024 earnings call on Wednesday, the company said it added almost 3,000 agents from April through June, a 70% year-over-year rise and a 250% increase compared to Q2 2022.
The ballooning agent count pushed brokerage revenue to $340 million, an 84% year-over-year improvement. Gross profit came in at $31.9 million, up 79.4% from one year ago. Real tallied a net loss of $1.2 million in Q2 2024, although that is an improvement from a net loss of $4.1 million in Q2 2023.
The company believes that adding agents will help it weather a frozen housing market and elevated mortgage rates that have stymied the industry.
“We are pretty agnostic to macroeconomics because we demonstrated that we can grow despite the market conditions,” Real founder and CEO Tamir Poleg said on the earnings call. “Our model relies heavily on our agents attracting their friends. Because we rely on our agents for agent attraction, it also means that every new agent joining the company has a potential to attract one to five to 10 other agents. So, the more agents we have, the bigger the opportunity becomes.”
The company’s ancillary services revenue continues to increase. Its title revenue more than doubled year over year to $1.3 million, while its mortgage revenue almost tripled to $949,000.
“We are investing [in title and mortgage] to drive revenue growth and to enhance the experience for clients,” chief financial officer Michelle Ressler said. “So, we know that these are high-margin businesses and expect both to be profit contributors in the not-too-distant future.”
The call included updates on the company’s new divisions and technology offerings.
Its private-label division, which launched in January, allows independent brokerages to maintain their brands while also allowing them to leverage Real’s technology platform. The company said the program has attracted 20 independent brokerages and 700 agents so far this year.
In August 2023, Real introduced its AI chatbot Leo, which provides 24-hour assistance to brokerages and agents, along with contextualized communication and personalized marketing. The company expects the model to improve over time and plans to offer more information about it at a conference in October.
Written by: Jeff Andrews
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