David Roberts

Roberts’ ascension is a reminder that success in real estate has little to do with brokerage or brand. It is, as they say, location, location, location.

His boutique brokerage exclusively caters to the gated Royal Palm Yacht & Country Club community in Boca Raton. It is Boca Raton’s most expensive neighborhood and he is its No. 1 broker. He closed $636.1 million in on-market sales in TRD’s 2025 Palm Beach County broker ranking — his second chart-topping year — beating agents at some of the most prestigious brokerages. 

His success is closely tied to the rising profile of Royal Palm. Roberts’ career in the neighborhood spans more than four decades. He began selling real estate in the community in 1984, when he joined Arthur Vining Davis’ Arvida as an in-house agent during the early development of the neighborhood. There is hardly a lot in Royal Palm he has not sold. As the original homes sold and were redeveloped into larger, modern mansions, the community’s clientele got richer. The pandemic-inspired luxury boom brought a wave of buyers, fueling unprecedented price growth and record sales for Roberts.

Over the years, he has built a close working relationship with spec developers Steve and Scott Dingle, the brothers who founded and run SRD Building, Royal Palm’s most active development firm. He represented the Dingle brothers in their 2024 purchase of a 1.7-acre waterfront teardown estate for a record-setting $36 million, the largest land deal in the community’s history.

Roberts practices what he preaches: he is himself a resident of Royal Palm, along with his wife Marcella Roberts.

–– Kate Hinsche