Each year, the Bravo Awards Panel recognizes companies for the highest revenue growth year-over year with the Bravo Growth Award. This year, two domestic companies were recognized: one in the products category and one in services.
For the second year in a row, eXp Realty was a recipient in the services category. Their growth in recent years has been staggering. In fact, they are one of the fastest growing global cloud-based companies in the world.
Built to Thrive
In many ways, eXp was uniquely positioned to grow during the pandemic and subsequent global shutdown. The company was born during a similar environment of global uncertainty: the housing crash of 2008.
As a serial entrepreneur with a background in real estate, Founder and CEO Glenn Sanford developed a simple but revolutionary concept: a virtual world with a robust digital infrastructure that allowed real estate agents to operate leaner; with more flexibility; and without the budget-draining overhead costs of a brick-and-mortar headquarters or chain of satellite offices. Working remotely was slowly becoming a trend when the company launched in 2009. And eXp went all in, choosing to operate on an entirely virtual platform.
So, while other companies were scrambling to teach their workforce how to log on and work remotely in 2020, it was simply business as usual at eXp—a rhythm honed through more than a decade of practice.
They’ve excelled at creating a virtual community that works collaboratively. And that community keeps growing! In the years between 2015 and 2018, the company grew over 100 percent, year-over-year. In 2019, eXp agents totaled 25,423. In 2020, that number grew 63 percent, reaching 41,313. And in the first quarter of 2022, they reached 80,000 agents worldwide.
The revenue story is equally impressive. In the fourth quarter of 2020, eXp Realty experienced record revenue of $609 million, a 122 percent increase over the previous year, and record-setting annual volume, with an 89 percent increase in residential transaction volume, totaling $72.2 billion, compared to $38.2 billion in 2019. And in 2021, their revenue more than doubled, growing $2 billion to $3.8 billion—that’s an unbelievable increase of 111.11 percent!
Reinventing Real Estate Compensation
Sanford’s approach to real estate comes from his firsthand experience of the needs and challenges that real estate agents face. Before launching eXp Realty, he spent the early 2000s working for a traditional real estate agency, where he closed more than $60 million in deals. In spite of his success, his income level was nowhere near what he had envisioned. Each year he watched as a large portion of the revenue he brought in had to be handed over in desk and franchise fees.
In his estimation, agents and brokers were doing the heavy lifting, but it was the trappings of the franchise itself that reaped the rewards. With this inherent inequity in mind, Sanford designed eXp Realty to treat its agents and brokers more like shareholders, providing equity in the company as well as an 80/20 commission split.
In the eXp business model, compensation is akin to direct selling while at the same time offering agents a lower cost to operate than a traditional brokerage and giving them equity. It gives them more time to be successful and creates a safety net for real estate professionals.
One of the strongest momentum leaders within the direct selling industry, eXp Realty has removed the friction of a location-dependent headquarters and erased the sluggish administrative processes that come with building fresh infrastructure with every new market launch, proving that the future of real estate may have already arrived.
Exceeding Expectations
The kind of massive, sustained growth eXp is enjoying can be credited to the company’s visionary leadership, disruptive business model and progressive compensation structure. They are truly game changers—and are poised to continue shattering records and breaking new ground. It should come as no surprise that they are repeat winners of the Bravo Growth Award. Sanford accepted the award on behalf of the company via video during the DSN Global Celebration.
“Thank you again for selecting eXp to receive the Bravo Growth Award,” Sanford said. “We grew $2 billion in revenue because of incredible hard work behind the scenes by so many of our staff, agents and brokers. We’ve basically doubled or more than doubled in size each year since we introduced our Agent Equity Program in 2014. It’s proof that always focusing on those in the field works.”
From the June 2022 issue of Direct Selling News magazine.
