- 3 days ago
LIVE from HousingWire’s Gathering, Tracey Velt sits down with Jim D’Amico, CEO of Brands by Integra, to talk about brokerage growth, industry consolidation and why he’s optimistic about the Compass acquisition of Anywhere.
D’Amico built his company from two agents in Massachusetts into a multi-brand operation with roughly 2,000 agents across 18 states. Today, Brands by Integra includes multiple real estate franchises, mortgage, insurance, asset management and property management companies — all operating under one umbrella.
The conversation centers on the industry’s accelerating consolidation, particularly Compass’ acquisition of Anywhere. D’Amico says the deal injected new energy into a brokerage landscape he felt had grown stagnant, and he believes Compass CEO Robert Reffkin brings a growth-focused mindset that could unlock the scale and lead-generation potential many franchise brands have never fully leveraged.
He also addresses one of the industry’s most debated topics: Compass’ private listing network. In D’Amico’s view, the strategy has been widely misunderstood. Rather than limiting access, he believes the approach is meant to give agents and sellers more control over marketing timelines while restoring some of the value agents once held when listing information wasn’t instantly public.
Beyond mergers, D’Amico sees the future of brokerage tied to scale, technology and ecosystem expansion. While he believes mortgage and brokerage can work together, he notes the operational complexity of running both businesses. What excites him most is how real estate companies are increasingly acquiring technology — a move he believes will define the next phase of industry competition.
Despite rapid consolidation across the sector, D’Amico says the brokerage landscape will always support multiple models — from national platforms to local boutique firms. For his company, the focus now is simple: build density in existing markets, keep expanding through strategic acquisitions and continue growing nationally while maintaining a family-run culture.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
Brands by Integra has about 2,000 agents in 18 states.
The company plans continued expansion and acquisitions.
The Compass–Anywhere deal brings new energy to brokerage.
Robert Reffkin’s private listing strategy is widely misunderstood.
Private listings may give sellers more marketing flexibility.
Industry consolidation is accelerating.
Brokerage scale is increasingly important.
Technology is becoming a major competitive advantage.
Mortgage and brokerage can work together with separate operations.
Multiple brokerage models will continue to coexist.
Related to this episode:
Jim D'Amico's LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-d-amico-72594247/
Brands by Integra
https://brandsbyintegra.com/
The RealTrending podcast features conversations with the brightest minds in real estate. Every Monday, brokerage leaders, top agents, team leaders,
D’Amico built his company from two agents in Massachusetts into a multi-brand operation with roughly 2,000 agents across 18 states. Today, Brands by Integra includes multiple real estate franchises, mortgage, insurance, asset management and property management companies — all operating under one umbrella.
The conversation centers on the industry’s accelerating consolidation, particularly Compass’ acquisition of Anywhere. D’Amico says the deal injected new energy into a brokerage landscape he felt had grown stagnant, and he believes Compass CEO Robert Reffkin brings a growth-focused mindset that could unlock the scale and lead-generation potential many franchise brands have never fully leveraged.
He also addresses one of the industry’s most debated topics: Compass’ private listing network. In D’Amico’s view, the strategy has been widely misunderstood. Rather than limiting access, he believes the approach is meant to give agents and sellers more control over marketing timelines while restoring some of the value agents once held when listing information wasn’t instantly public.
Beyond mergers, D’Amico sees the future of brokerage tied to scale, technology and ecosystem expansion. While he believes mortgage and brokerage can work together, he notes the operational complexity of running both businesses. What excites him most is how real estate companies are increasingly acquiring technology — a move he believes will define the next phase of industry competition.
Despite rapid consolidation across the sector, D’Amico says the brokerage landscape will always support multiple models — from national platforms to local boutique firms. For his company, the focus now is simple: build density in existing markets, keep expanding through strategic acquisitions and continue growing nationally while maintaining a family-run culture.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
Brands by Integra has about 2,000 agents in 18 states.
The company plans continued expansion and acquisitions.
The Compass–Anywhere deal brings new energy to brokerage.
Robert Reffkin’s private listing strategy is widely misunderstood.
Private listings may give sellers more marketing flexibility.
Industry consolidation is accelerating.
Brokerage scale is increasingly important.
Technology is becoming a major competitive advantage.
Mortgage and brokerage can work together with separate operations.
Multiple brokerage models will continue to coexist.
Related to this episode:
Jim D'Amico's LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-d-amico-72594247/
Brands by Integra
https://brandsbyintegra.com/
The RealTrending podcast features conversations with the brightest minds in real estate. Every Monday, brokerage leaders, top agents, team leaders,
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NewsTranscript
00:08um today on the real trending podcast we are live from the gathering housing wires the gathering
00:14and i have jim domico he is the ceo of brands by integra so thanks for joining me thanks for
00:20having me yeah so this is exciting um we're at the gathering so we're doing this live that's fun
00:26so why don't you tell the audience um our listeners a little bit about what brands by integra actually
00:32is okay so brands by integra is an uh umbrella of companies uh i started century 21 domico and
00:41associates back in 1994 it was myself and two agents and we began growing the company we had
00:48multiple century 21s throughout massachusetts multiple names and dbas because of the territories
00:55and the in the cities and towns that we were in we finally got it to one name century 21
01:00northeast
01:01and then we decided to grow into florida and that name didn't work so we bought a company named
01:06century 21 integra and um that was back in 2021 and we bought some companies in new york and some
01:15companies in texas and then we bought a carl banker franchise in pennsylvania so at that point we said
01:20okay we have multiple brands this will be the brands by integra and we will encompass also our
01:26mortgage company which is new fed mortgage corporation uh we own new fed insurance james rose
01:31asset management is our property management division and and our 501c3 and our sober living facility and
01:38and so forth so we have multiple companies under this brands by integra umbrella great and so um
01:45what is your ultimate growth strategy now moving forward um are you looking like how many agents
01:52do you have right now and are you looking to um you know how big are you looking to grow
01:57so we have right now roughly 2 000 agents which i feel is a little small for the footprint to
02:04be honest
02:05we have multiple states we're in 18 states our next focus is to create density in those states okay i
02:13think
02:13that we are not opposed to being a 50 state company uh right now we're like again we're in 18
02:20states
02:20we're in 28 states in mortgage so uh we're growing through our network so our network being uh this
02:28loan officer knows this loan officer in this state and so like recently our most recent hire was in ohio
02:35okay we don't have brokerage in ohio but now we have mortgage in ohio so maybe we'll look at brokerage
02:40there so we just i kind of just take each day as it comes okay i do the next thing
02:46okay and then
02:47wherever that leads us a year from now we'll look back and say okay here we are are you looking
02:52at
02:52other any other um century 21 or cold oil banker roll-ins or acquisitions um if they offer if there's
02:59an opportunity out there absolutely yeah we are actually um going to acquire two more century 21s in
03:07the coming weeks and we're continuously looking for not only just century 21s and cold bankers but
03:13also independent companies independent companies um give us a different like kind of outlook on the
03:19market you know we feel like we learn a lot from companies that are not in the system yeah and
03:24so yeah
03:25we're open i know you just had a couple of announcements i know one was texas and then the
03:30other one i can't remember i just wrote it so arizona oh arizona okay arizona yes teamed up with
03:36greg haig and teresa haig yeah over at cydia great company and it's been such a great process
03:42uh onboarding and getting our teams together and so we're right in the middle of that right now and
03:46it's a lot of fun yeah great um so the big news obviously is that you recommitted to compass um
03:53after
03:54the compass international now um international holdings i better do the whole thing compass
04:00international holdings um and you you recommitted to them you're excited about the the acquisition
04:06so talk to me a little bit about that like how you found out what your immediate thoughts were
04:13what you've um i assume you've probably either met with robert already um what that was like
04:20and tell me a little bit about it sure so back when they announced the compass acquisition uh i think
04:28it was like september october of 25 i had an opportunity to extend my franchise agreement i felt
04:35that i wanted to be committed at that point because i've been with anywhere for their whole existence and
04:44prior to that realogy and i've been with the brand since 1992 as an agent in 1994 of 95 as
04:53an owner
04:53and so i've seen every different team come through and when i heard it was compass i didn't know much
05:00about robert refkin i knew a little bit about the private network um private listing network i i was
05:06confused like everybody else is at that point i i thought it was about something different than what
05:10it really is about um and so i just felt that compass had that mentality that matched with my mentality
05:19and i felt that anywhere had the leadership in place that i believe compass needed like the liz
05:26gerringers and mike meelers and jason was and and our teams that we have over at anywhere i thought
05:31it was just going to be a great match and i wanted to have i wanted to have the most
05:36time left
05:36when he came in because yeah he's a growth guy and i'm a growth guy and if i have like
05:41one year two
05:42years left of my franchise agreement how valuable am i to this new entity coming in so i i took
05:51a gamble
05:51and and and i believe just with the arizona acquisition uh merger that we just did and it was a
05:57merger true merger um that um you know i i believe i was in the right position to do that
06:04deal based on
06:05my position with the company so i got to meet robert refkin and i'm a big fan i think he's
06:14the hardest
06:14working man in real estate he is extremely intelligent he thinks like i think when it comes
06:20to he's a broker and so it's it's refreshing to have a broker in that seat yeah that runs you
06:27know
06:27all these uh brands and he is growth oriented and he is a he's a roadblock clearer when it comes
06:38to
06:38um growth strategies for independent you know franchisees yeah i mean he came into this industry
06:45and did things a completely different innovative way um people didn't like it always but you know
06:53they didn't like it because it affected them so so yeah um and one of the things you talked about
06:59is that he's misunderstood on the whole three-phased marketing and the private listing so talk to me a
07:05little bit about that and what you learned about it and your view of of the marketing technique sure
07:12and and you know i'm non-confrontational like i don't have i'm not i'm not uh i think it affects
07:19more the luxury space then it affects a lot of my space yeah um but you know i do know
07:26the luxury
07:26space we have some luxury offices and and teams and brokers and agents um when it comes to luxury
07:35when when you're sitting down at the kitchen table and you're putting together a listing opportunity as
07:40an agent yeah um you don't want to leave that listing table without the listing and i believe that
07:46the restrictions that were placed on by the mls is about how much time you had to actually start the
07:52clock ticking yeah was the concern and we've always had ways around it um you know the non-mls listing
07:59for however how many days or what have you he just he just moved that needle and a lot of
08:07people are
08:07saying that he wants to double end the listings and sell both sides but that's really not it like
08:12he's sharing it now with the mls in in chicago right he's sharing them with redfin the private
08:19listing network is basically my view and this is my view of it based on what i've heard him say
08:26i feel like he's bringing back the mls book where realtors have value and buyers don't have the
08:36information when i started in this business we had a book oh yeah and and if you wanted to know
08:41what
08:41was for sale yeah and and did it matter that it took a week for the book to come out
08:45back then
08:46you know yes yeah technology things are faster and that's great and i love the technology i love
08:52everything about uh being in this age yeah but there's some value to the old way of the of the
09:00mls book
09:01where the realtor has value yeah and i think he really wants a realtor to have value yeah and so
09:06i
09:06believe in that too yeah and you know it's interesting because i actually was at florida
09:11realtors at the time that listings started going online tells you how old i am but um you know and
09:17people were just aghast by the idea that like or in zillow um that listings would a go online that
09:24the consumers could potentially see them and wouldn't need the agent to come to them for information
09:30um right so it's interesting that he's kind of going back to what a lot of agents wanted
09:37in the beginning right um at that point at least and i think and i think he does i i
09:44think the
09:44perspective for the sellers is valid the days on market is a concern i have a house on the market
09:50right now days on market kills yeah um sellers don't have uh necessarily all of the right information
09:57when they start the process to sell their house sometimes they start high now we all know you can
10:03price reduce and i'm not sure that that i'm all that you know we've had price reduction issues in
10:11the past historically as as real estate agents the days on market you know that are public um those
10:17challenging because people think something's wrong with the house yeah and so if you have to spend a
10:23week staging a house or taking professional photographs or you want to kind of get you know
10:28your caravan back in the day it was a caravan right you get the agents out there you do a
10:32caravan
10:33usually before the house hit the market when i bought an office my first acquisition as a as a
10:39young agent a young broker um we had caravan and and this company that i acquired they would play
10:46this game called guess the price yeah and they would guess the price and it would help
10:51the listing agent go back to the seller and say you know we have your house on back then for
10:55like
10:5699 000 right and the agents think it's worth 75 000 and then it gave them an opportunity to put
11:02it on
11:02for the right price so i mean i i don't think it's as you know last year we all we
11:09talked about was
11:09class action lawsuits this year it's private listing networks and next year it'll be something else but
11:13i really do believe that he has um a valid argument i and and i also think that everyone has
11:22a valid
11:23argument you know it's just i i just choose not to be in the argument i want to do business
11:27and i want
11:28to bring in talent and i want to create opportunities for agents to grow their business and that's that's
11:35what i'm about yeah i mean businesses should be able to run within obviously certain parameters um the way
11:43they want to do business um you know it's kind of like i feel like it's the atmosphere of the
11:50whole
11:51country now that we have to find something to divide us absolutely so what could that next thing be
11:57absolutely um because i do think that conversation around it is always good and people can have their
12:03opinions about it um you don't want to do that for your company don't do it for your company right
12:09i mean um the potential impact i think though on the industry is that someone as large as compass
12:18international holdings now um has a lot of influence on how that gets done so other companies are now
12:26wondering if they should put together their own private listing network in that um i mean there's a ton
12:33of consolidation and we just heard by the real remax um deal that that went down um how do how
12:40do you
12:40see the consolidation um impacting the industry do you feel like it's an inflection point right now
12:49i i like the movement i like the movement i think that the compass acquiring anywhere is is super
12:56exciting to me like i just think it adds so much value the technology that they have and all the
13:01things
13:01that we're going to have is added yeah value prop is great i think the real to remax is great
13:07as well
13:08because i think real brings a value to remax and remax brings a value to real i don't believe in
13:17acquisition for the sake of acquisition yeah i i think that um at the end of the day there's there's
13:23always going to be just so many agents right and then where those agents work it's everything changes
13:29it's just the names that change yeah you know the um i would say like the overall
13:37perspective of the company or the the um the personality of each company uh it takes takes the
13:44place of the last company that had that personality it's just a different name yeah so i feel like
13:50there's agents who like this model and there's agents who like that model and there's agents who like
13:55my model and what the key is is to just get your message out right so but the acquisitions are
14:01kind
14:01of fun i like i like living under them and not yeah i don't want to be the one creating
14:06the private
14:06listing network i could tell you that yeah yeah i want to stay out of those i want to stay
14:10off of
14:11that radar yeah uh but i do love learning about all of these different things that keep happening and
14:16reading about them and following you and housing wire and everything so it's yeah it's been fun yeah i mean
14:21it's fun for us obviously we get a lot of a lot of good things to report on right there's
14:26a lot of
14:27good content i will say i read my email newsletters a lot more now than i did three years three
14:33or four
14:33years absolutely absolutely um so let's talk about because i do see um the industry is moving toward a
14:42more you know complete ecosystem where you know a lot of companies they're looking beyond ancillary
14:50services and actually looking into acquisitions of those um companies and even you know there's
14:57always rumblings too that uh mortgage will buy brokerage um it's not always going to be another
15:05broker buying another broker there are other industries looking to buy brokerages as well um so
15:12you know at housing where our event obviously encompasses both real estate and mortgage so talk to me
15:19about this is your first time here so talk to me a little bit about what you see as kind
15:24of the future
15:25of real estate and how this plays into it sure um yeah this is my first time at uh at
15:32the gathering
15:32and i will definitely be back this was by far my favorite conference that i've been to in the past
15:41probably of any conference that i've been to this was this has been a lot of fun yeah and you
15:45guys
15:45know how to do it and do it right i've had some great opportunities to network with great people
15:50got to play some golf uh had this is a great hotel great venue great speakers uh just a lot
15:58of who's
15:58who in the industry which is great i own a mortgage company new fed mortgage um i think that mortgage
16:05and
16:05real estate go very well together but i also think that mortgage is a very challenging industry so
16:11i think that mortgage and real estate together mortgage acquiring real estate i i don't see the
16:18interesting thing that i do see is real estate acquiring tech yeah which i which you know i learned
16:24yesterday with robert palm yeah robert palmer yeah lpt and he's not acquiring brokerages he's acquiring
16:31tech right and that's interesting too compass acquires tech yeah a lot of these companies now acquiring
16:36tech it's not something that i've ever you know had any experience with so i i love that part of
16:41it
16:41i'll follow that more uh mortgage um acquiring brokerage i see this i see the synergy um but i do
16:52think
16:53that being in both businesses yeah you really do need separation and separation of teams you know we
17:00have a cfo in each business we have a ceo in each business yeah and it's not something that like
17:05with
17:05property management and real estate you could do right right so like i think that there's some
17:09there's some definite synergy this event having both mortgage and real estate being strongly
17:16represented is is really excellent it's been an excellent uh the subject matter has just been
17:23you know it bounces and it and it really flows and it's it's been really helpful great yeah i i
17:28think
17:28i mean obviously with respa you can't the synergies have to be a certain way darn respa yeah i mean
17:37i've
17:37heard rumblings about companies you know outside of respa that would are looking at real estate it's
17:48really interesting i don't know them personally like i don't know what they are these are all
17:53conversations that i've had there's a lot of private equity yeah and and you know there's there's a lot
17:58of outside interest in yeah you know real estate brokerage is a machine right and so why is there so
18:05much consolidation because it's not a very profitable machine yeah and so if you're only doing
18:10two million dollars in uh let's say annual commission revenue yeah i mean realistically your profit margin
18:18is not six figures yeah so if your profit margin is not six figures and you own in a business
18:23i mean
18:23yeah it's there's a lot of other things you could be doing yeah to make that amount of profit so
18:29i think
18:30that scale and volume is is definitely um necessary in the in the brokerage industry like you either have
18:38to be big or you have to commit to being an agent that owns a brokerage yeah and you know
18:45that's the
18:45commitment that that each person has to decide there's some awesome boutique brokerages that make
18:50a lot of money yeah but you know you have to be in one place and you have to be
18:54that person and when
18:55you go to dinner you're going to know everyone at the restaurant you have to be that always working
18:59in your community and i think that there's i think that some of those people can make a lot more
19:04money
19:05than a person like myself that's in 18 states so i think there's that there's there's a lot of interest
19:10in our industry because it's a machine there's a lot of data there's a lot of people getting
19:14in touch there's a lot of you know you have a lot of you have houses you have yeah individuals
19:19that
19:19want to buy sell uh refinance get mortgages title property management it just goes all the way down
19:28the line home improvement yeah absolutely so with the consolidation or with the um with the acquisition
19:34of anywhere what did you feel compass or robert really did right that made you um you know feel
19:44good about i think when the when it's first announced because it's public a public company
19:48they can't really give you notice um but they can give you a little bit of notice but not you
19:55know
19:55it's kind of sprung on you a little bit um so everybody's usually it's a lot of chaos in the
20:02beginning like oh my gosh what does that mean what's going to happen to us what do you feel like
20:06they did right um when this happened that immediately made you you know feel comfortable
20:13with with everything going on well he i think if anyone came in and bought anywhere at that point
20:21i'd have been happy because not not to yeah you know but just to be completely honest i felt like
20:26it
20:26was a little bit stagnant i don't feel that there was a lot of excitement around brokerage i felt like
20:32we were more like a publicly traded company who was very cautious and careful and didn't really
20:36want to take any action and so with robert coming in and really saying hey now we have nine brands
20:45and we're going to market to the public and we're actually going to bring leads into the company
20:49yeah how can you complain anywhere had that ability for so many years and just didn't act on it
20:57yeah really gee six brands we can literally go on tv with a with an excellent website and say
21:04come and find your listings here yeah just yeah you know even if we got a little bit of business
21:09it
21:10would have been better than zero and really i think that that's where they dropped the ball and so we
21:15were we were all happy i mean when i say we like the franchisees that i know that i talk
21:20to on a regular
21:21basis we were excited right right yeah right out of the gate but robert what did he do right
21:25he made it a point to come and see all of us and he's still doing it if you follow
21:30him yeah he's
21:31the hardest working man and he'll give you his cell phone and he'll answer your texts and he'll
21:35call you back i mean he answered he answered a phone call for me it was at an airport in
21:40europe and he
21:41said let me just get through customs and i'll call you right back yeah so i mean he's that he's
21:45that guy
21:45that's that's how that's what i that's what i like to think i am and so i like having that
21:51in the big
21:51seat yeah i think he's very misunderstood in the industry um and i'm not sure you know how
22:01i i don't think people really give him the benefit or benefit of doubt over the some of the things
22:09that
22:09he does they automatically make up their assumption um it could be just because their competition i don't
22:14know um but he also isn't afraid to tell you he doesn't agree with you right it's very decisive
22:20yes and he makes moves and he makes them fast and because people don't understand it doesn't mean that
22:28it isn't right yeah right and so i think that there's a lot of that like you started with in
22:32this country yeah um just because they don't understand it it doesn't mean it's wrong and you
22:36know i've had a couple of conversations here where i've been like i don't know if you really
22:39understand what he's you know what he's about because i believe that he is he operates with
22:46more integrity than anyone i've met in that seat okay and so that to me is very important yeah
22:53absolutely um any last thoughts about you know your future um with the brands by integra or um just
23:01the future of the industry in general i mean our future we're going to continue to be the engine that
23:06could you know we we just take on each challenge we're a family-run company and you know our
23:14employees our agents our loan officers our staff are all family uh are all like family and so we
23:22really do and people say this all the time you know like oh we're a family this really is a
23:27family
23:27i mean my cousin runs the brokerage operation his wife pays the agent so i mean we we we are
23:32family
23:33owned and operated agents can call me i answer my phone yeah we want to be able to continue to
23:39do
23:39that we love being on a larger scale we love the difference in markets when it's slow in boston it's
23:45busy in florida when it's slow in new york it's busy in texas and all the migration that's happening so
23:51we'll continue to look at that like i said we want to try to build some density we just hired
23:56a couple of
23:56new leadership positions in texas so we really want to lean into our texas operation illinois we just did a
24:02major acquisition up in schaumburg so we also want to lean into that and so okay we're we're having fun
24:08and when it's not fun anymore then we'll then we'll talk robert but no we we uh we're having a
24:15lot of fun
24:15i i love what i do i don't see myself as retiring i feel like i'm just hitting my stride
24:20so um hopefully
24:22god willing we get the ability to do this for a long time yeah well jim thanks so much for
24:27joining
24:27real trending on site here at the gathering thank you for having me thanks
24:38you
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