- 2 days ago
On today’s episode, Editor in Chief Sarah Wheeler talks with Robert Palmer, founder of LPT Realty, about industry M&A, private listings, giving agents a choice in the brokerage model and what’s driving his company’s growth. Palmer will be a featured speaker at The Gathering April 27-30 in Austin.
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https://events.housingwire.com/the-gathering-2026
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To learn more about Total Expert visit totalexpert.com
The HousingWire Daily podcast brings the full picture of the most compelling stories in the housing market reported across HousingWire. Each morning, listen to editor in chief Sarah Wheeler talk to leading industry voices and get a deeper look behind the scenes of the top mortgage and real est
Related to this episode:
Join us for The Gathering!
https://events.housingwire.com/the-gathering-2026
HousingWire | YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXDD_3y3LvU60vac7eki-6Q
More info about HousingWire
https://lnk.bio/housingwire
To learn more about Total Expert visit totalexpert.com
The HousingWire Daily podcast brings the full picture of the most compelling stories in the housing market reported across HousingWire. Each morning, listen to editor in chief Sarah Wheeler talk to leading industry voices and get a deeper look behind the scenes of the top mortgage and real est
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NewsTranscript
00:09Welcome, everyone. My guest today is Robert Palmer, founder of LPT Realty, to talk about
00:14industry M&A, private listings, giving agents a choice in the brokerage model, and the phenomenal
00:20growth his company has seen. Before we dive in, I want to thank our sponsor, Total Expert,
00:25for making this episode possible. Robert, welcome to the podcast. Yeah, thanks for having me, Sarah.
00:30Excited to be here. Excited to have you on. Of course, you're going to be one of our speakers
00:35at The Gathering. Super excited about that session, but kind of wanted to give our listeners a sneak
00:40peek because the reason we asked you to be at The Gathering, the reason you're here on this podcast
00:44is you guys are doing some really interesting things, and you're consciously building something
00:49different with LPT, and I really would love to dig into that. What makes LPT different?
00:54Yeah, yeah. I think we had the benefit of seeing the landscape, the kind of the original or the
01:00first what I would call class of national single-instancy brokerages are mostly over a decade
01:05old now. We were kind of the new kid on the block, but we had the benefit of time, of
01:09seeing some of
01:10the mistakes they made, seeing the landscape changed. By the time we were designing LPT, things like the
01:16commission lawsuit were already underway. Hadn't been settled yet, but it was out there. We knew these
01:21things were happening. AI was starting to kind of come on the scene, and so I think for us, the
01:26ability
01:26to really build things from the ground up was beneficial with all that in mind. And then, too,
01:32I think we have a little bit of a different take on what it takes to be successful in this
01:36industry.
01:37We have a concept called individual definition of success, which I think is really important. When
01:42you look at an industry like real estate, where you have 1.5-ish million entrepreneurs out there
01:47running their own business, building their own brand, it's a different kind of industry. It's
01:51a different kind of enterprise. And so it's really important to me that no matter what an agent's
01:55individual definition of success is, whether that's a couple of closings a year or we have teams doing
02:00over 2,000 closings a year, we really built the company to be able to meet them where they are
02:05and honor that individual definition of success.
02:08You know, along with that, one of the things that differentiates you guys is that you
02:12offer agents, they can choose what kind of brokerage model they want to work under, right?
02:16So there's a flat fee model or a more traditional commission split. So we'd love to talk to you about
02:21that a little bit. How did that come up and how does that practically work? Because I would think
02:25that that makes things more complicated on your end.
02:28We definitely had to build some custom technology, you know, to be able to track it. We had to have
02:32our own internal system for all the accounting and commissions and, you know, DAs and everything
02:36because there was no out of the, off the shelf, out of the box solution that would allow us to
02:40offer
02:41that kind of flexibility. But I think as we were designing LPT, what we really saw is that there's
02:46a large, a large swath of agents that the cap model has largely left behind. You know, the cap
02:52model is fantastic if you're doing enough closings to cap. But I think we see a lot of people now
02:56where
02:56maybe they have, you know, multiple income streams, they're managing rental properties, you know,
03:01maybe they have another career that they're working in as well. Maybe they're, you know, in the
03:05insurance business or something adjacent to real estate. And so while they're fantastic agents and they do a
03:10great job for their clients, they're not going to do enough transactions to cap. And so the cap model
03:15largely left them behind. And I think that's where you saw the rise of the transaction fee or the
03:21quote unquote 100% brokerage, you know, in the last decade for that very type of agent. And so as
03:27we
03:27looked at the landscape and said, well, how do we want to build a brokerage that can, you know, that
03:31can
03:31help as many agents as possible, support as many agents as possible while reinforcing that individual
03:36definition of success. Because I think for a lot of the cloud brokerages, the agent doing two, three,
03:41four transactions a year doesn't really fit because of that cap situation. And so you're seeing
03:46them leave, you know, if you look at the attrition at most of the large national brokerages that are on
03:51a cap model, they're losing those agents doing two, three, four transactions a year. And we think
03:56they're an important part of the industry. I know there's folks that disagree with me on that. But I think
04:00they're an important part of the industry. And we wanted to be there to support them. And so building the
04:04hybrid model, and it really boils down to Sarah, if you want to make money off of other agents,
04:09right, if you want to build a business where you're leading a team, or you're earning revenue share,
04:14recruiting income, if you are interested in earning dollars off of other agents, then you need to be on our
04:19split plan with the cap. If you're only interested in earning dollars and earning money from your personal
04:24real estate production, that's really where that 100% model comes into play. And so it's very self selective, you
04:30know, it's not just like, Oh, why would one person pay more one person, you know, pay less, it really
04:34comes down to what is your definition of success, if it includes helping others mentoring, having a
04:39branch office, being a team leader, earning revenue share, all of those things require the split plan
04:44with the cap, where if it's just, you know what, I want to be a fantastic agent, I want to
04:48help, you
04:49know, three, four, five buyers and sellers a year, then I'm going to go on that 100% plan. And
04:54then the other
04:54really interesting piece is the team members. And so our team members are able to go on to that 100
05:00%
05:00plan, which has really helped our team leaders grow, you know, the ability to recruit into a model
05:05where the the agent isn't losing 20% or 15% on top of what the team leaders making, and
05:10maybe on top of
05:11what a referral source is making, has really helped our team leaders grow, because their team members
05:16have better economics in those early deals each year. And then on top of that, we're more aligned as a
05:21brokerage, because we have the same economics, whether they're a solo agent or a team member.
05:25And so what we see in a lot of models is the the recruiters don't want their solo agents joining
05:31teams, because they'll make less money. You know, the local franchise owner doesn't want solo agents
05:36joining teams, because they'll make less money, because those caps go down and a lot of models.
05:40And so the brokerage actually fights the team leader on growth, because their interests aren't aligned.
05:45Well, in our model, because anyone can pick between the two plans, we encourage a solo agent who maybe
05:50would do better on a team or could benefit from the leadership of a team to make that
05:54transition. And I think that alignment is why you're seeing the largest teams in the country
05:58come to LPT, why you're seeing the amount of growth inside of the teams at LPT is just absolutely
06:04astronomical. And it's because of that alignment, we want our teams to grow, we support our teams in
06:09that growth, because of economic alignment.
06:11So how how does that work for the team leaders, if the people on their team are those solo people,
06:17they're not, you know, they're not making money off of their and what's their incentive to be a
06:21team leader?
06:22Yeah, so it actually it allows the team leader to make more money, because their their team split
06:26is still their team split, right? So if we think about team economics, the team leader and the team
06:30member are going to have a team split. And then the question becomes, well, how much is the brokerage
06:35taking? And so most of the large brokerages will take less on a team member, and we're right in line
06:40with them on our economics. But the problem becomes the brokerage makes less when a solo
06:44agent joins a team, the team leader is still in the same spot. It's the alignment that's the
06:49difference. It's the fact that because we have the same economics as the brokerage, we're not
06:53limiting those team leaders. And by having no monthly fee, you know, by taking the money slower
06:57because of that 100% comp plan versus taking 20% on those early deals, there's a lot more
07:03alignment. You know, it's always been interesting to me, if you're a team leader, and you're recruiting
07:07an agent, you sit down and you say, you know what, I think you'd be a great fit for my
07:10team. I think
07:11we should work together. And we're going to make a lot of money together. But first, I need your
07:14credit card, because I have to charge you a joining fee. And I have to charge you a monthly fee.
07:18And
07:19you know, you're going to pay me this monthly fee three or four times before you see your first check.
07:23And it just it almost seems silly. And it can destroy that alignment early on. And so part of our
07:28decision to not have a joining fee to not have a monthly fee is so that team leaders can recruit
07:33those agents in a more aligned way. So it's interesting, you know, you brought up that like
07:37some some people in the industry would push back on those, they don't they don't want those people
07:41who do three, four or five loans a year. Tell me from your perspective, why you value them, why you
07:47think they're good for consumers or for the industry or for your business?
07:50Yeah, look, I think there's a lot of consumers who value comfort and familiarity in this process.
07:56You know, I think if you look at, quote unquote, disruptors who have tried to come into our
08:00industry and commoditize it, they failed, you know, what, why does the consumer, why would a
08:05consumer, you know, rather do a transaction with someone they've known for 20 years, who maybe only
08:10does three or four or five transactions a year, versus maybe someone doing 20 transactions a year
08:14that's a stranger to them. And I think we see a lot of consumers make that choice. It's a big
08:19decision.
08:20I think trust is a massive layer. And two, I think the idea that just because someone's only closing a
08:25few deals a year means they're less qualified. Like, I don't see that at all. You know, we're,
08:28we're going to probably process 100,000 transactions this year. We ended last year at 61,000. And I can
08:34tell you, there are absolutely amazing entrepreneurs who execute at the highest level. They negotiate
08:40amazingly for their clients, they, they are there, they're handholding, and they're only doing three
08:44or four or five transactions a year. And so I don't think volume is the right metric for quality of
08:49service. And I think ultimately, the consumer choice is what's most important. And a lot of consumers
08:54really value that familiarity. And they value that long standing trusted relationship
08:58outside of real estate, which is why we see those agents continue to succeed at those levels.
09:03Really interesting. That is definitely a different, you know, take than some people
09:07do. But I like the focus on the consumers. And it's about, you know, what, what do they want? And
09:12and I feel like, the more we do that, right? The more we serve them, it seems like that's where
09:17you're going to be winning. Absolutely.
09:18So we had the two biggest real estate companies in America merged last year. So did that offer a
09:26stress test of your model? And you're, you've had very rapid growth? Like what, how did you,
09:30how did you look at that? Yeah, I mean, the growth has continued. You know, we, we, we continue to
09:35work
09:35our game plan. Yeah, I think, I think it's an interesting merger. You know, and really, when I
09:41think about it, you know, you have, you have a very large single entity brokerage in Compass that's,
09:46you know, licensed in all 50 states and, and operates directly with their agents. And then
09:50you had Anywhere, which is a massive franchise operation and organization. And while they do
09:54have the corporate owned stores, which still rank very highly for production, you've got this massive
09:59franchise layer. And so I think it's interesting. I think it's an interesting dynamic to now think
10:03that, you know, you have, you know, Compass Corporate competing with Sotheby's franchise owners.
10:08And, you know, the Sotheby's franchise owner pays a franchise fee up to Sotheby's owned by Compass
10:13Corporate, and then they're competing on the streets. Like,
10:16I think, I think there's a lot to try to integrate those very complex models as far as, as our
10:21game
10:22plan and our growth, you know, really didn't see much of an impact. You know, I think we,
10:25we continue to compete with the local franchises in the same way we did before. We continue to
10:29compete with Compass in the same way we did before. And, and I'm, I'm a little skeptical of if that
10:34type of scale spread across that many different organizations really brings much benefit in the
10:40long run. You know, does it bring benefit to consumers? Does it bring benefit to the, to the
10:44brokerage? Because I can tell you that the local franchise owner, you know, who owns a Century 21
10:49or an ERA, you know, they're not necessarily motivated by the same things that are motivating
10:53Compass Corporate up in Manhattan. And so I think you just, you have a lot of different businesses,
10:59a lot of individual entrepreneurs. And so where maybe in other industries, that type of consolidation
11:03would have a bigger impact. Here, we're still a lot of independent contractors. We're still a lot of
11:08folks and agents who run their own business and have their own vision of what marketing and success
11:12look like. And so the fact that, that their franchise payments now go to the same person
11:17that owns this other large entity, we didn't really see that be much of an impact.
11:22Interesting. Yeah. I mean, we're definitely, when it happened, it was kind of like, okay,
11:25let's look at what this looks like a year later, two years later, right? Because I think it's going
11:30to take a while to, to see what that impact is. And we know that some people have been really
11:34happy
11:34about it and there are probably some people who haven't. So we're still looking, you know,
11:38speaking of M&A deals, of course, we had a huge deal with Rocket, Redfin, Mr. Cooper, and now
11:45the Compass Alliance. So, you know, they're calling it Alliance. I'm not sure what that means,
11:50but not that they own them. But what do you think about that whole, like, potentially end-to-end
11:57transaction, you know, model? Yeah. You know, I think it's fascinating. You know, we obviously follow
12:02the transactions very closely. I come from the mortgage space. You know, I still have a very large
12:06mortgage company that's involved in refinance and mortgage servicing. And so I've competed with,
12:10you know, Rocket and Quicken for many years. I think it's fascinating. I think everyone's
12:15trying to figure out what does this next level of scale look like? You know, I think one of the
12:19really interesting things is when the Compass Anywhere merger first happened, you know, Robert
12:24Refkin talked a lot about the benefits of having both companies have a joint venture with guaranteed
12:28rate and how that was going to create synergies with the G-rate venture, you know, joint ventures. And
12:33they were going to be able to use those funds to help pay down the debt. And then just
12:36a few months later, complete pivot. And now Rocket is the preferred, you know, digital
12:40mortgage lender of the Compass Anywhere group. And so I think it just shows that there's a lot
12:45of unknowns. Everyone's trying to figure it out. I think on the mortgage side, the Mr. Cooper
12:51Rocket acquisition made a lot of sense to me. You know, to have that massive servicing portfolio,
12:55we know that Rocket is a fantastic executor when it comes to mortgage refinance and those
13:00originations out of the portfolio. So that one to me, I think, made a lot of sense. I think
13:04Redfin made a lot of sense. I mean, when you look at the Redfin model, you know, the agents
13:08there are mostly on salaries and a lot of them are W-2. They don't necessarily have that same
13:12entrepreneurial spirit. And so it is much easier to capture their mortgage business.
13:16And so I think from Rocket's perspective, you see Redfin, who had struggled to turn a profit,
13:22struggled to really, you know, actuate their original mission of disintermediating the agent.
13:27But it's an absolutely fantastic lead source for a mortgage company because you have all of that,
13:32you know, Redfin portal traffic. You have the agents who are on salaries and bonuses,
13:36which is then easier to capture the mortgage business. So I think all of that really lined
13:41up pretty well. Again, it doesn't align with my view of the industry. It doesn't align with my
13:45view of putting the agent first and letting them have that individual definition of success. But
13:49from a financial sense, it makes a lot of sense for Rocket in those companies.
13:53The Compass Rocket Alliance, I think, makes a little less sense. You know, when you look at
13:57the markets that Rocket traditionally, you know, dominates in the price points versus
14:01a Compass price point in those larger markets, it really is going to rely on getting attached down
14:08into the franchises. And most of those franchise owners have their own mortgage relationships.
14:13And so whether, you know, Robert Refkin decided to put Quicken into the Compass app or not,
14:17you know, the local ERA owner or Century 21 owner, or even Sotheby's owner of those franchises who has a
14:22local mortgage company or a local bank who's supporting them, you know, you're now competing
14:26for that. You're now stepping on each other's toes and stepping on each other's alliances.
14:30And I think, I think we're going to see struggles across that organization to figure out integration,
14:36alignment, and attach.
14:37Love that you said Quicken. I also, you know,
14:40that harkens back to, to pre-rocket days, right?
14:45So one of the reasons that we've been watching LP, LPT Realty is because of your fast growth,
14:50but also because you do come from the mortgage space. So you'd built this, you had this whole
14:54career on mortgage and tech and all that. So it's always interesting to me to see someone coming
14:59from one side, going to the other. We see it both ways. We'd love to know, like, how does that
15:04influence how you're building this realty company coming from the mortgage space?
15:08Yes. Look, I think as a 20 year mortgage guy who had to come on the scene and say,
15:12Hey, I'm going to build one of the largest real estate brokerages in the country. And I'm not
15:15going to offer my mortgage company at all. You know, there's, there's no cross-selling. You won't find
15:20an LPT agent who's done a mortgage with RP funding. We don't, we don't cross those streams.
15:24And I think it's because of the real deep understanding I have of the consumer experience,
15:30the agent experience. And I, we really want our local entrepreneurs to find that best local
15:35loan officer. You know, I joke, the loan officer I was, you know, 18 years ago, I remember I once
15:39drove, you know, an hour to get a water sample so we could get a well test, you know, on
15:43time for an
15:44FHA closing. And you're not going to get that from a call center. You're not going to get that
15:48from a mortgage joint venture with the brokerage. And so we, we encourage our team leaders. We
15:53encourage our agents go find that great local loan officer, go find that great local mortgage
15:58partner. And that means we stay out of it. And I'm the only CEO talking that way. If you listen
16:02to
16:02any other earnings calls, the, you know, the whole model is we're going to lose money on the brokerage
16:06side and we're going to make it up on the ancillaries. And I just, I think it's a fool's
16:10errand. I think we've seen so many folks fail at that in the past. I do think the rocket Redfin
16:14has
16:15the absolute best chance to succeed there. I think Zillow and ZHL has a chance to succeed
16:19because there's a different level of relationship with the lead, but for entrepreneurs who are out
16:24there generating their own business and driving their own results, I don't think the brokerage
16:28has any business trying to get, get in the way of their local mortgage relationships. And so we're
16:32staying out of it. And I know it's again, another contrarian position, not something we're focused
16:37on. And I think it's been part of our growth. I think the industry is refreshed by the idea
16:41that we're not here trying to disrupt those longstanding beneficial mortgage relationships.
16:46And we're letting our local entrepreneurs control those decisions and, and ultimately help their
16:50consumers find the right great local mortgage partner. Well, and you know, some of that growth
16:54has been through your own acquisitions, right? And we're talking about all these other, but, but you've
16:59been acquiring some of that is tech companies recently. Yeah. So interesting. We haven't actually,
17:04we've never actually acquired for growth. So all of our growth has been a hundred percent organic,
17:07but we have acquired adjacent businesses that we then help think support our agents and help drive
17:13additional, you know, revenue streams for the business. You know, so we, we acquired the reside
17:17platform earlier this year, which has through the last couple of years under the amazing leadership
17:22of John Cheplak and Sunit Argawal, Preston Guyton, they've helped over a hundred teams scale and grow,
17:29you know, through coaching and, and mentorship and recruiting assistants and new agent training,
17:34you know, systems set up really fantastic platform. We think there's a lot of potential there
17:38in the future. And then humanize, you know, led by Chris Giannis, recently a housing wire,
17:44a rising star, which we were very proud of him for that. Probably the absolute best recruiting
17:49platform for teams in this industry. And so as we look at this belief that teams are going to grow,
17:55teams are going to continue to, to be play a bigger and bigger role in our industry. I think that
18:00you're going to see most of the franchise layer, those small local franchises will be displaced by
18:06teams over the next 10 to 15 years. And it will be teams supporting agents in the way that local
18:11franchises support agents today. I think we're going to see more and more of that. And so we want to
18:16be
18:16in the way of progress. We're all in on investing in technology that we think, we think helps our
18:21teams fulfill their vision because then that vision ultimately helps our, our independent agents
18:25survive, you know, and thrive and grow and, and reach their definition of success.
18:29I think there is a hybrid coming where teams start to look a little less like teams and look even
18:34more
18:34like those legacy brokerages. And, you know, there are quote unquote, independent agents who are parts
18:39of teams. And again, all the vernacular and language isn't, isn't kind of vetted out yet, but that's where
18:44we see things going. Because when you have entrepreneurs like these amazing team leaders who are not bound
18:50by franchise geography, they're not bound by franchise restrictions. It is a merit-based system. They earn it
18:56every day. We believe they can bring a better value prop to any agent, whether that agent, you know,
19:02views themselves as a solo agent or a team member than a local franchise office can. The teams can
19:07provide that brick and mortar layer in this new cloud infrastructure era. And, and we're all in on
19:12helping them fulfill that, that vision and that mission.
19:14Okay. Well, big, big talk, uh, lots of headlines lately around the whole, um, listings, uh, private
19:21listings, um, some things we call portal wars, right? Like, uh, who, you know, and, and the alliances
19:27that we see around private listings or non-private listings or Zillow doing, where do you guys come
19:32down on that?
19:33Yeah. You know, I think it's fascinating. I mean, I, I shared this with our agents. I do a Monday
19:36morning
19:37zoom with the entire brokerage. We actually just celebrated our 181st consecutive zoom. I have not missed
19:42one in 181 weeks since we started doing that. Um, and so we, we talked a lot about this and
19:47I think
19:48it's interesting, you know, compass came out first and said, Hey, Mr. And Mrs. Seller, when you list
19:52with us, you know, we're going to get your home in front of, I think it's 40 million, you know,
19:56viewers on, on Redfin before anyone else can. And, and that sounded good for a minute until the,
20:02the bigger portals came in. And, and now you have, you know, Zillow saying, well,
20:06well, through Zillow preview, you can get in front of almost 300 million users. And then you have
20:09realtor.com and homes.com and their audiences. And I think ultimately we want to do what's best for
20:15our consumers. And so is it better to put them on the number four portal or the number two portal
20:20or the number one portal? Those are the decisions we're looking to make right now. A big proponent
20:24of agent choice. We would never force our agents to, you know, pre-market homes early. We would
20:29never force our consumers to be a part of something they don't want to be a part of, but we
20:32also want
20:33to make, you know, the best opportunities available. And so, you know, you have compass now aligned
20:37with the number four portal. I thought it was interesting that EXP made the decision to align
20:42with the number two and three portals, depending on, on how you look at the rank instead of with
20:47Zillow as the number one portal. You know, there's a lot of, a lot of teams at, at EXP who
20:52rely on
20:52Zillow leads from flex and flex seller leads. And it'd be interesting to me to see, like, is that
20:57going to continue when those listings are going to land on a competing portal? You know, at what point
21:01does this consolidation and these alliances really start to take hold? So you've got, you know,
21:06you can, you can list with Keller Williams and be on the number one portal. You can list with EXP
21:10and
21:10be on the two and three portal. You can list with compass and be on the number four portal.
21:13We're still trying to decide where we want to come in on this. We're having lots of conversations with
21:17all of those folks want to be a little more thoughtful about the decision we make and make
21:21sure we are putting our agents and consumers in the best position, but it's a whole new landscape.
21:26It's something that didn't really exist. And it's something consumers have to now weigh because
21:30when you are deciding what agent you want to list your home with, which portal they've decided
21:35to align with, if you're going to go down that, that preview or that pre-marketing journey is going
21:40to make a difference. I think there's a lot of potential for confusion from, from a consumer
21:45point of view, just us trying to keep up with like, what does this mean for this company and,
21:50and this portal and this. So if you're a consumer, I think there's a lot, maybe more explaining you
21:55have to do from the agent side, whatever you're choosing to do here on how that landscape has changed
22:00and how people are going to find your listing. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's really what
22:04it comes down to, right, Sarah? Like it's, it's about exposure, you know, the seller needs exposure
22:08and, and I understand the argument for private listing coming out of Manhattan. You know, I joke
22:13about this a lot. Like when you look at the world through that lens and you're selling one of a
22:17kind,
22:18you know, 10, 20, $30 million, you know, penthouses in Manhattan, I can understand where, you know,
22:24private listing and discretion and everything come into play. But, you know, if you're selling a half a
22:28million dollar, you know, new construction home, this is its first resale in Orlando, Florida,
22:32I don't see a lot of need for, you know, for price discovery and private listings. And, and so I
22:38almost think our industry is battling from two different points of view. And I think each one
22:43is probably right, but they're right in their own way. And now they're trying to be forced across the
22:47entire, you know, the entire nation. And look, real estate's a local business, you know, local
22:52decisions, local, local expertise. I think it's why we still have as many MLSs as we do.
22:58It's why you still do see a lot of local independence. It's why the franchise model
23:01was so powerful for so long. Local decision-making is important. We believe the agent can do that
23:07in a lot of ways on their own, but, but some of this policy, when it comes to, you know,
23:11private
23:11listings and preview listings and all these things is really coming down with a different worldview,
23:16I think, than exists in most of the markets that we serve. And that's something we really try to
23:21balance. We don't want to make a decision, like even this choice ultimately of, you know,
23:27preview or pre-market listing. We don't want to make a choice that doesn't serve our agents at
23:31the absolute local granular level. We don't want to make a decision that looks great in Manhattan
23:36and looks terrible in Dallas, you know, or looks great in LA and looks horrible in Tampa. And it's
23:41really something that we have a responsibility to weigh and be judicious about as a national
23:46brokerage. And I think that's one of the things we're all still figuring out. And this is probably
23:49the best example of it is this diversity of opinion around private listings and private
23:55networks. And to me, it's, it's very much a geographic question above all else.
23:59I also think it takes into, you know, you mentioned entrepreneurial, uh, the entrepreneurs
24:04that are real estate agents. And I think you, you come back, you have to come back always to like
24:09real estate agents are very independent people. They do not like to be told what to do or forced
24:15into a program. I mean, like, so, so in some ways you just go, um, you know, it'll be interesting
24:19to see how some of these things work themselves out with a group of such independent people.
24:25Yeah. I think the interesting thing with this is like, you know, so the, the kind of, uh, I guess,
24:29independent approach right now is like, Hey, we're going to align with the number two and number three
24:32portal. And then agents can have a choice between those two, which to me is more only the illusion of
24:37choice because what you don't have a choice of anymore is the number one portal, you know, and this is
24:41where I'm torn because, you know, if we go to entrepreneurs and say, Hey, you can choose between
24:45two and three, but you cannot choose number one, or you can choose number one, or you can choose
24:50nothing at all. Uh, there's still choice in there, but it's, which is the better choice, which is the
24:54truly freeing choice. And again, that's where we're being very judicious about how we look at this, but
24:59it is, it is probably the most complex dynamic that we faced, uh, in our, our short four year
25:04history as a company. And it's one that we don't want to get wrong for our agents.
25:07I appreciate that thoughtful approach. Well, last question is, uh, where are you in the process of
25:11your IPO? Yeah. So, uh, as I've said before, I fully committed to the idea that a cloud brokerage
25:18where agents are earning stock and earning RSUs has to be committed to that process. Um, you know,
25:23as far as where we are in it, uh, we continue to, to believe that that is the outcome. And
25:27as we can
25:28say more, we will. Understood. Um, Robert, thank you so much for being on. Um, everybody who's listening,
25:34he's going to be talking about the growth playbook, how to scale from the fastest growing
25:38independent brokerage with LPT realty. That's, that's why we're having you on. And that's why
25:42we continue to watch you and your business and what you're doing. So thank you for sharing this
25:47with our, uh, with our listeners. Thanks, Sarah.
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