Guzzetta-Mercado Family Team Joins Baird & Warner Ranks

The Baird & Warner family is growing.

Chicagoland’s second-largest brokerage is continuing to build its team in an ongoing turf war with heavyweight Compass, including the addition of the Guzzetta-Mercado Group in the northwest suburbs. Last year, the family-owned company declared a “new era of independent brokerage” following the acquisition of Dream Town Real Estate and has since been building its agent network despite some losses to Compass.

The most recent additions include the husband-and-wife team of Joe and Madeline Guzzetta, along with Joe’s father, Kenneth, and Joe’s brothers Bryan Mercado and Tim Guzzetta. The group made the move from RE/MAX Properties Northwest earlier in March, according to a recent press release.

Madeline and Joe Guzzetta told The Real Deal that Baird & Warner’s investments in technology and its support for the growing Guzzetta-Mercado Group tipped the scales for them.

“Obviously, we’ve seen a lot of the conglomerates around here … we were considering going to some of these companies, but it almost felt like we were getting lost,” Joe Guzzetta said.

Swaps and mergers have rocked the Chicago-area brokerage market for some time now. Compass’ acquisition spree hit a high-water mark after it announced its acquisition of Anywhere Real Estate for $1.6 billion in September. This brought Corcoran, Sotheby’s International Realty, Coldwell Banker, Century 21, @properties and Christie’s International Real Estate under its brand.

Meanwhile, Baird & Warner, whose transaction volume is higher in the suburban region, acquired Dream Town Real Estate in June 2025 to solidify its market strength. The group has since announced initiatives like custom AI assistants and a “City Collective” initiative to compete with Compass’s growing presence.

The Guzzetta-Mercado Group told TRD that it aims to expand its Park Ridge and Edgebrook posts in the next two years with more members as they continue specializing in the Northwest and North Shore suburbs.

The move is also a return to the Baird & Warner fold for Kenneth Guzzetta, whose father also worked out of the company’s Edgebrook office, making it a multigenerational association.

“At other brokerages, we felt like we were being interviewed, not the other way around,” Madeline Guzzetta stated in the release. “As a family of realtors, we were looking for a family business, and that’s exactly what we found.”

The company also noted that in three months, the association with Baird & Warner has yielded results in deal volume for Guzzetta-Mercado.