Brokers
Long & Foster Leads in Sales
P. Wesley Foster Jr., founder of Long & Foster Cos., said he is always looking to buy successful agencies or lure good agents. The strategy has helped put his company at the top of Washington area real estate brokerages.
(By Katherine Frey -- The Washington Post)
TOOLBOX
   Resize
COMMENT
 Discussion Policy
 CLOSE
Comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.
Who's Blogging  |
It's no mystery who ranks first among real estate brokerage companies in the Washington market.
Long & Foster Cos., founded in 1968 and known for aggressively buying smaller companies and recruiting disenchanted top agents from the competition, tops the chart, according to Steve Murray, president of consulting firm Real Trends Inc.
For 2004, the most recent data available, Long & Foster Real Estate Inc., the brokerage part of the business, had 61,048 closed "sides," meaning it represented a seller or a buyer in a sale, and those sales involved properties worth about $18.5 billion, Murray said.
Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage was next, with 40,059 closed sides involving properties worth about $13.4 billion.
Murray's rankings do not mention Weichert Realtors, the New Jersey-based firm that is a major force here.
Weichert, which is privately held, as is Long & Foster, does not provide regional statistics to Murray and would not share them with The Washington Post. "If I were a betting person, I'd say they were at least third or fourth" in the Washington market, Murray said in a recent interview. "But I can't say for sure."
Wayne Wyvill, president and broker for Re/Max 100 Real Estate Inc., which sits in fourth place in Real Trend's official rankings, said he thinks Murray is wrong not only in guesstimating Weichert's proper placement, but also in giving second place to Coldwell Banker.
Wyvill said he has "always been frustrated that a lot of the reporting agencies haven't compared [offices] by brand."
He said that if all of the Re/Max offices in the Washington area were combined they would beat out not only Weichert, but also Coldwell Banker.
However, Re/Max brokerages aren't all part of the same company; they are franchises owned by different people. Murray said that is why he does not combine them in his rankings, even though they carry the same brand name.
Re/Max 100 has eight offices in the Washington area and will soon open its ninth in Lorton Town Center.
Ranking third in the Real Trends list is Re/Max Allegiance, an Alexandria-based brokerage with about 40 local offices, according to chairman Charlie Bengel. The brokerage has been in operation since July 2003, when Bengel combined three offices he had acquired in the previous 16 years with a couple of other brokerages.
Long & Foster also leads in the number of sales associates here, with about 8,000 local people. Coldwell Banker has more than 4,600 sales associates in the Washington area and Delaware; Re/Max Allegiance has about 1,200; and Re/Max 100 about 450. Weichert would not provide numbers.
P. Wesley Foster Jr., founder of Long & Foster, said he is always looking for more opportunities to buy productive agencies or to add good agents. The firm bought seven brokerages in Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and the District in 2004 and moved into southwestern Virginia for the first time. In 2003, it expanded into New Jersey and now has about 19 offices in the Philadelphia-New Jersey area, Weichert's back yard.
