RE/MAX Agents Know the New 2009-2010 Tax Credit

Hitwise recently ranked REMAX.COM No. 2 on its Quarterly Top 10 List, based on share of visits among all U.S. web sites in the “Business and Finance – Real Estate” category, for the quarter ending March 2008.  The Hitwise Top 10 Award recognizes web sites from over 160 industries that are leaders in their field.

In March alone, REMAX.COM received nearly 6 million hits.  Approximately half of them were direct, which means 3 million hits came from top-of-mind brand recall and consumers tying “remax.com” into the search engines access the web site.

Another website that ranks website hits is www.alexa.com.  Go to their “movers and shakers traffic graph” to type in different real estate websites (ie: Coldwell Banker, Baird & Warner, Koenig & Strey, etc) and compare them to REMAX.COM.  I promise you that they don’t compare!!

• Apartment building sales continue to be very strong.
• Rental demand for properties is stronger than last 5 years.
• Selection of residential properties are the best since 2001.
• Sellers are more motivated and very willing to “make a deal”.
• As prices moderate, affordability increases.
• Decent financing is still available at reasonable rates.
• The cut back in new home construction thins out inventory.
• Vacation home sales still very strong.
• RE/MAX continues to lead in listings sold, sales made, and total units closed.
• We are number one in 216 areas in 2007.
• Immigration accounts for 11% of sales.
• Must lower prices to clear inventories.

Regardless of an operation’s size, most real estate offices used the commission-split system, requiring sales professionals to forfeit half of their commissions to their brokers in exchange for an office environment and company services.The top producers contributed the most to the operation’s overhead, thus supporting the amateur, part-time and low-producing agents. Most salespeople left the business within two years, making residential real estate a high-turnover industry comprising in large part inexperienced and unprofessional staffs.

The Linigers wanted to change all that.

They believed that to attract and retain the best agents in the business, brokers must offer them maximum compensation, advanced support services and the freedom they need to succeed. Agents would share office overhead and pay management fees, and in return would receive a wide variety of traditional real estate franchise services and high commissions.

The strategy worked.

Recognized by the homebuying and selling public for its red, white and blue hot air balloon logo, RE/MAX has been the No. 1 residential real estate network in Canada since 1987 and is a leading industry force in the United States and many other regions.

The most significant growth for RE/MAX in recent years has come outside the United States, with expansion into Africa, Asia, Australia, the Caribbean, Central America, Europe, Mexico, New Zealand and South America. RE/MAX takes proven techniques and adapts them to local markets, thereby developing a series of tools that real estate professionals find invaluable.

Some of the innovative services created by RE/MAX International to help its members become ever more professional and successful include commercial investment, an international referral network, advanced training courses, state-of-the-art technological tools, Internet and extranet Web sites, and national television advertising campaigns. It was the first – and remains the only – real estate network to invent and maintain a satellite television network (RE/MAX Satellite Network) dedicated to real estate professionals.

In an industry rife with mergers and acquisitions, RE/MAX is the only major real estate network still owned and directed by its original founders.