Real estate guru and consultant Stefan Swanepoel announced his Power 200 List today, a roundup that includes franchise, technology, brokerage, media and other industry executives who influence and shape the real estate business.
Top executives with Realogy and major franchisors including Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices, Keller Williams Realty, Re/Max and Coldwell Banker accounted for nearly 20 percent of “the most powerful and most influential leaders in the residential real estate brokerage industry.”
Richard A. Smith, the chairman, CEO and president of real estate brokerage and franchise giant Realogy, is Swanepoel’s selection as the Most Powerful Person in residential real estate brokerage.
“While there are others who have higher personal profiles, within the industry there is no doubt that none have more power and influence in almost every aspect of the residential real estate brokerage industry than Smith,” Swanepoel said.
Spencer Rascoff, CEO of Zillow, ranks second followed by Gary Keller, founder and chairman of Keller Williams Realty International; Dave Liniger, founder and chairman of Re/Max; Wesley Foster, founder and chairman of Long & Foster; Jim Weichert, founder and president of Weichert Realtors; and Dale Stinton, CEO of the National Association of Realtors.
Newcomers to this list include Ryan O’Hara, the newly appointed CEO of realtor.com operator Move Inc.; former PayPal, LinkedIn, Yelp, YouTube and Airbnb entrepreneur and now founder of Opendoor, Keith Rabois; and Kevin J. Kelleher, CEO and president of Cartus Corp., Realogy’s global relocation subsidiary.
Thirty-eight of those listed are women — some are shown with their male business partners — mirroring industry leadership demographics dominated by older white males.
The executive editor of the Power 200 is blogger and consultant Rob Hahn, who said, “We acknowledge their enormous influence and contribution to our industry by detailing their role in improving the overall homebuying transaction and the real estate business in particular.”
Some of those listed are clients of Swanepoel. But according to the introduction to the report, Swanepoel “reviewed nearly 1,000 contenders. We scoured the Web, read hundreds of bios, read hundreds of LinkedIn pages, sent hundreds of requests for additional information, made endless telephone calls to verify or confirm stats, and cross-referenced data with surveys, reports and company announcements.”
Inman Publisher Brad Inman was No. 40 on the list.
“Who doesn’t want to be on such a list?” Inman said.
