Next weekend Pat Vredevoogd-Combs will take over as the President of the National Association of Realtors^®.  Surprisingly, The Detroit Free Press had an excellent article about her today.  It includes her three goals for her term.

1. Increasing the nation's stock of affordable housing.
2. Making health insurance accessible for all Realtors -- 30% of whom are uninsured.
3. To promote and encourage minority agents and minority home ownership.

It's an interesting article that every Realtor^® should read.

The press release sounds impressive:
Coldwell Banker Schmidt Realtors Inc., headquartered in Traverse City, Michigan, and headed by CEO Ken Schmidt, merged with Woodland Realty, based in Holland, Michigan, and AJS Realty in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The newly formed company will have the largest real estate presence in northern and western Michigan. The company does business as Coldwell Banker Schmidt Realtors in Northern Michigan and the Upper Peninsula, Coldwell Banker Woodland Schmidt in Western Michigan and Coldwell Banker AJS Schmidt in Grand Rapids. All told, the company now has more than 600 sales associates and nearly 40 offices.

The largest real estate presence in Northern Michigan.  But does it really make a difference?  No disrespect to my friends at Coldwell Banker Schmidt Realtors^® but sellers don't really care how many agents you have, especially if they are spread throughout half the state.  Sellers want results.  They don't care, for the most part, about how big your company, or office is.  They want to know about you, the individual agent.

This chart shows the top 10 offices in my local area, based on the sales volume of their agents.  Rather than name names, I've just listed whether they are a national franchise, or a  non-affiliated office.

Top Ten Offices Based on Agent Dollar Volume

			Units	Volume
Rank	Office	Agents	Per	Per
			Agent	Agent
1	Franchise	3	18.667	$2,013,021.67
2	Franchise	12	19.083	$1,908,965.42
3	Franchise	22	12.909	$1,258,258.09
4	Independent	6	9.333	$1,222,500.00
5	Franchise	8	9.25	$966,943.00
6	Independent	5	7.6	$795,682.40
7	Independent	2	7.5	$738,750.00
8	Franchise	1	6	$705,900.00
9	Franchise	18	6.4444	$622,623.67
10	Independent	3	5	$563,300.00

As the chart shows, more agents isn't necessarily the best thing for home sellers.  More important is the reputation, and professionalism of the individual agents.  In the chart above, if you combined numbers 1 and 2, with 15 agents they would exceed the sales volume of #3 with 22 agents.

Congratulations to Ken and the Schmidt family but locally, it doesn't mean a thing.