How to Be Independent Without Operating a Brokerage (It’s Finally Possible)
Top agents are on the move; you read about it all the time. But these days, they’re not all leaving one legacy brokerage just to join a rival office across the street.
They’re moving to start their very own companies.
Take Meital Taub, Doug Echelberger, or David Cohen. More top agents are choosing to develop their own brand by starting their own company.
What’s behind this recent trend? After all, the very best agents have always aspired to start something of their own — and always had the skills and reputation to do it.
But a few things stood in their way, obstacles that a new brokerage model has made possible to overcome.
Operating an independent brokerage is hard
Historically, the only way to go out on your own in real estate has been to get your broker’s license and open an independent brokerage.
But operating an independent brokerage is incredibly difficult. Agents who choose that path take on administrative headaches and massive liability in exchange for razor-thin margins — and, because many have to drop out of production to actually run the business, a massive income cut.
Operating an independent brokerage is isolating
Starting your own independent brokerage means finding yourself on an island. You no longer have access to the systems, resources, or network of a larger brokerage or office — it’s just you.
On the other hand, if you’re leading a team within a bigger brokerage, you have a much wider group of agents to collaborate with. However, the vast majority of agents are not at your caliber and only do a small handful of transactions a year.
Too often, top producers end up as the biggest fish in a giant pond with few actual peers to learn from. But given how isolating going independent can be, they’ve had no other choice.
Until now.
The brokerage-as-a-service model takes the difficulty and isolation out of embracing independence
In the past few years, a brand-new brokerage-as-a-service model has popped up and flipped the traditional brokerage on its head.
The inventor of this model is Side, which was founded in 2017 specifically to serve top-producing agents and teams. Much like software-as-a-service solution Shopify provides a platform on which to build ecommerce companies, brokerage-as-a-service solution Side provides a platform on which to build real estate companies.
Agents who meet Side’s high qualification thresholds can launch their own company with a bespoke brand that is all their own. Instead of serving as their own broker-of-record, they partner with Side to fill that role and act as their technology partner, business manager, and support system.
As David Cohen — who runs the second largest independent residential real estate company in San Francisco, City Real Estate — said: “I knew I wanted to start my own company, but until I found Side, the barriers to entry felt too high. Working with Side made it so much easier to build my company than it would have been if I had tried to do it alone.”
Not only does Side make independence easier, it allows top agents to join a thriving, one-of-a-kind community — which saw 62% of its agents and teams named America’s Best Real Estate Professionals in 2023.
It’s the first time top agents have been able to go independent together — and the results have been extraordinary. Side has quickly grown to a top-ten national brokerage by volume supporting 600+ boutique companies, each averaging roughly $45 million in transaction volume per team.
“The response to this model has been incredible,” said CEO Guy Gal. “When an agent partners with Side, they get all of the upside of starting their own company, without the downsides associated with actually operating a brokerage. We’ve made ownership so much easier — and it’s amazing to see the incredible boutique companies that our agent partners have established.”