What are you looking for?
Message from NAR Leadership
We are an industry that values our entrepreneurialism. Being a REALTOR® is not a 9-to-5 job. It’s not even a “job”. It’s a calling. The challenges we face every day are a mix of age-old questions of survival and trailblazing into the unknown. We need to account for both.
This Danger Report is a mix of yesterday, today and tomorrow. The truth is, there are a lot of challenges facing the industry. It’s important to understand where we’ve been and where we are, but equally important to anticipate the forces taking shape that we can’t yet see.
In an attempt to give ‘voice’ to these forces, we conducted confidential interviews with many of the top industry minds, from within organized real estate and from without. The result is this Report, which attempts to catalogue everyone’s greatest challenges and concerns in one place as a starting point for industry-wide dialogue.
Of course, we will be stronger if we meet these challenges together. But the pace is quickening. We must be agile and nimble if we hope to be successful. Our deliberations won’t come just from the boardroom. They will come in the hallways, the lobbies, and the walks between meetings.
We hope, in reading this Report, you are filled with both passion and resolve to engage in the debate about the future of our industry. By focusing on these challenges, we will make more opportunities than we ever imagined.
- Chris Polychron, 2015 President
- Steve Brown, 2014 President
- Dale Stinton, Chief Executive Officer
Foreword
Looking ahead to the future, whether as part of our own business strategy or as members of the REALTOR® organization, requires that we assess the environment that is taking shape and evolving each day. New threats emerge and unexpected opportunities arise, even as we anticipate other developments in the businesses or the organizations with which we are aff iliated.
But, effectively planning for the future requires a thorough understanding of the threats and challenges that the real estate industry faces today and during the next few years. As real estate professionals, one of our strengths is an ability to solve problems for our clients, so it is natural that we also want to find solutions for the threats that we see in our business and in our industry. Too often, however, we want to move quickly toward a solution, before we have a thorough understanding of the dangers we are confronting.
To help move the discussion forward in a meaningful and worthwhile manner, the National Association of REALTORS® Strategic Thinking Advisory Committee, along with Stefan Swanepoel, has created a report that seeks to describe as many of the threats and dangers as possible that may affect the real estate industry. At one time or another, each of us has probably had a conversation with a colleague in our office or at a meeting about many of the threats described in this report. Unlike these irregular, ad hoc discussions, this report brings together the collective wisdom and insights of professionals from all segments of the real estate industry allowing us to gain a more comprehensive view of the industry environment. Each day, we see evidence of changes in the industry and our business that can be both exciting and unsettling.
This report is a forward looking assessment of threats that could emerge from the perspective of agents, brokers, the National Association of REALTORS®, state and local associations and multiple listing services. The time frame during which any of these potential dangers could emerge ranges from months to years suggesting some threats have a higher level of urgency than others. If any of these threats do come to pass, either sooner or later, they could affect the industry with varied intensity. Some could even be “game changers,” shifting the flows of information, capital, and profits in ways that we don’t necessarily While the publication of the DANGER Report is one step toward inspiring thought and conversation, we hope that it will go further by allowing your organization, brokerage, or association to begin a dialogue about the dangers you see.
After reading this report, you may find areas where you agree and areas where you disagree with the assessment put forward. In either case, we hope this report will be a discussion starter that will help prepare you and your organization for the future.
- Colleen Badagliacco, 2015 Chair Strategic Thinking Advisory Committee
- Michael Oppler, 2015 Vice Chair Strategic Thinking Advisory Committee
- Todd Shipman, 2014 Chair Strategic Thinking Advisory Committee
Preface
The D.A.N.G.E.R. Report addresses one step in a strategic planning exercise by asking an important question: What are the threats that could impact the residential real estate industry?
We sometimes view the industry through a distorted lens based on limited facts and a lot of conjecture. We decided it was time to change that.
This Report is a bold attempt to help the industry wrap its arms around the future. The future is not doom and gloom but at the same time we should not underestimate it. Change will absolutely happen and you can bet the farm on that. The unexpected often occurs with a single event or a single company. Some risks or threats identified in this report may build slowly through incremental changes while others might be overnight surprises.
- Doubt everything, be profoundly skeptical.
- Be zealous in your pursuit of knowledge.
- Shatter conventional wisdom.
- Laugh at your disbelief.
The National Association of REALTORS® commissioned the Swanepoel | T3 Group (now T3 Sixty) to uncover, research, and index the potential threats facing the industry. And we did so by reaching out to more than 70 of the industry’s leading CEOs and thought leaders and to over 7,500 brokers and agents across the country.
The opinions of those interviewed were categorized into five key sections and the threats, risks, and dangers resulting from the interviews were analyzed and rated as to their probability, timing, and impact. Remember, this is an art and not a science; you are welcome to have a different opinion on our scoring of each danger. We tried very hard to keep the information objective and apolitical, and remained one step away from providing solutions. That is the part we kept for you as the captain of your ship. None of the dangers contained in this Report are predictions, trends, or allegations. Don’t read too much emotion or negativity into any statement. See each danger for what it is—a potential threat that could impact you or some part of our industry. Although we cannot predict the future, there is also nothing unusual about the future. Use this Report as a checklist and starting point to prepare. Information creates knowledge and knowledge produces confidence. It is incumbent upon each of us to ensure that we are leaving a healthy and thriving industry to the next generation. To that end, I urge you to read this Report with the intent of not only becoming informed, but with a commitment to actively contribute to the future success of our industry.
- Stefan Swanepoel, CEO and President, T3 Sixty
Explore the Dangers
