Rankings FAQ’s

The RealTrends Verified City Rankings are the latest iteration of the RealTrends rankings. RealTrends recognizes that real estate is local, and these city-specific rankings allow top-performing agents and teams to showcase their success within a local context. By offering national, state, and now city rankings data, RealTrends aims to provide agents and teams with multiple ways to promote their achievements.

The RealTrends Verified City Rankings are based on the agent’s and team’s physical location, as submitted to RealTrends in the submission application. Production data represents residential transactions ONLY. RealTrends excludes transactions such as commercial, rentals, lease, land, empty lots, and outside referred business from published totals. RealTrends is a VERIFIED program and obtains documentation on all stated production totals before publishing. Verifications are completed by working directly with our brand partners, or by obtaining verification documentation directly from submitting agents and teams.

RealTrends offers various packages to help you promote your ranking as a top agent in your city. You can explore our promotional packages here.

This year’s rankings are based on the agent’s physical location as reported on their application or bulk submission. RealTrends does not consider the locations of the properties transacted when determining these rankings.

If you believe there is an error in your application, you can submit a ticket for our team to review. RealTrends will make changes to the following fields:

• Name
• Brokerage
• Website
• Headshot
• Social media information
• Removal from rankings

However, RealTrends will not make changes to:

• Team or agent classification
• Team size
• City
• State
• Transaction sides
• Transaction volume

Submit a ticket here for our team to review your change request.

To locate your RealTrends Verified City Ranking, try searching for your name on the RealTrends homepage. Your national, state, and city rankings will appear in your profile.

If your name still does not appear, please let us know here.

Please note that RealTrends requires sales production verification to be included on the list. If you haven’t submitted verification information, you will not appear on the list.

RealTrends accepts applications to appear on our Verified Rankings lists, and participation is voluntary. RealTrends makes no guarantees that the published list includes all real estate professionals. Each year, agents and teams choose whether to participate based on various factors. The Verified lists only include agents and teams who have submitted an application and completed the verification process.

RealTrends partners with the largest real estate brands to accept bulk submitted data on agent and team performance. If you work with a national real estate brokerage and appear on this list your data was most likely provided as part of our partnership with your brand. Your inclusion on this list is a benefit of being associated with your brand. If you were featured on the RealTrends Verified National and State Rankings (released in June), then you are automatically included in this program.

If you submitted data to participate in affiliated rankings programs (such as AREAA A-List or LGBTQ+ Real Estate Top Performers), you are also included in this program.

The easiest way to check your RealTrends Verified City Ranking is by searching for your name on the RealTrends homepage. Your national, state, and city rankings will be displayed in your profile.

Please remember that your city rank is based on your physical location as submitted to RealTrends.

For the inaugural City Rankings list, RealTrends has prioritized building “rankings pages” for the top 50 cities in our database. If you are in one of these cities, you can click the relevant link below to view the rankings for your city. RealTrends will expand the list of “rankings pages” in next year’s program, along with some exciting additions to this unique program. 

Please remember that your city rank is based on your physical location as submitted to RealTrends.

RealTrends has no specific qualification requirements, such as the number of sides or sale volume, to be a Verified City Agent or Team.

The RealTrends Verified + Tom Ferry rankings program is submissions based, and requires that you provide your production information to RealTrends for verification and ranking.

RealTrends has partnerships with many of the industry’s largest brands to receive data on your behalf, but we also allow for manual submissions via our portal. If your brokerage is affiliated with a national brand then we recommend you contact your broker or manager to understand this process for your brokerage to submit your data for our rankings. If you are an independent agent or team, then you must submit your data directly to RealTrends via our submission portal.

Here’s a video going over the process.

There is an annual submission fee of $175 for The RealTrends Verified agent and team rankings. One submission fee will provide consideration for all agent and team ranking awards.

• To qualify for the RealTrends Verified awards (Tom Ferry The Thousand and America’s Best Real Estate Professionals) you must meet our minimum production thresholds:
  • An Individual Agent must close 40 residential transaction sides OR $16 million in closed sales volume
  • A Team must close 60 residential transaction sides OR $24 million in closed sales volume

If you do not meet the qualifications, you can still submit. We will rank you within your city and create/update your RealTrends profile.

We only count residential real estate transactions (single-family homes and condos). We do not count commercial, referrals, land, lots, leases, multi-family, or rentals towards our thresholds. If you represent the buyer and seller on a transaction, you are able to double-count both the transaction and volume (sales price) towards your totals.

If a property is co-listed we will accept the transaction towards your total, but require you to document the split transaction.

For transaction sides, this means you will divide the side by the number of agents that had co-listed the property. For transaction volume, you will divide the volume by thenumber of agents that co-listed the property.

Splitting of sides and volume should match the commission split on the transaction. For example, if the commission is split 70/30 between two agents who co-listed a property, then one agent would get 0.7 side and 70% of the volume allocated towards their total. The other agent would get 0.3 side and 30% of the volume.

The RealTrends Verified submission portal is open every year from January through March.

The RealTrends Agent Rankings reflect the previous calendar year. For example, the 2024 rankings show data from calendar year 2023. We release new rankings in June of each year. This June we will be publishing the 2024 rankings using 2023 sales data.

RealTrends accepts various forms of verification. Our preferred method of verification is via our automated electronic verification system which requires you to list the name, title, and email of your managing broker who will verify your stated production.

Alternatively, you can provide documentation including MLS data, production reports from reputable CRM software, or a signed letter from your managing broker.

If you can answer ‘yes’ to EITHER of the questions below, you are considered a TEAM for the purposes of our Rankings.

• Do you have more than 1 licensed assistant?
• Do you list multiple team members on your website, or have a ‘Meet the Team’ section?

• Small: 2-5 licensed agents
• Medium: 6-10 licensed agents
• Large: 11-20 licensed agents
• Mega: 21+ licensed agents

Yes, RealTrends partners with The Wall Street Journal to publish the results of The Thousand. Please note, the Wall Street Journal is not responsible for the production of these rankings, and as such this program should be referred to as “RealTrends + Tom Ferry The Thousand as featured in The Wall Street Journal”. Please refrain from stating you are ranked by The Wall Street Journal.

Yes. In this instance we suggest submitting your data to us directly through our portal. you must provide verification for both brokerages/brands for the numbers to be combined and accepted.

Participation in the RealTrends The Thousand and America’s Best Real Estate Professionals ranking is optional and requires your data to be provided to our team for review and verification. If you fail to submit your data to RealTrends you will not be included. Additionally, if you fail to submit verification information you will not be included.

We require that all submissions have accompanying verification documentation. In most cases, agents/teams are omitted for not submitting this information. In other cases, verification documentation is found to include prohibited transaction types, which result in the submission not meeting our minimum requirements.

If you feel there was an error, please visit our Help Desk for assistance.

Unfortunately, once the submission period ends there is no way to be included. We encourage you to subscribe to our daily newsletter, RealTrends Daily, to be reminded next year.

This could be caused by a number of issues including not meeting the residential transaction threshold or switching brand affiliation mid-year (see above). Please contact your broker or manager for resolution with your affiliated brand.

Please submit a ticket through our Help Desk to request changes to how your information is presented.

Electronic verification our newest method of verification!

During submission in the portal, you will need to supply us with the name, title, and email of your managing broker. We will automatically populate a verification letter with the transaction sides, sales volume, and other information submitted.

Your managing broker will receive an email with a link to electronically sign this verification letter. RealTrends, your managing broker, and you will receive a copy of the signed verification letter within 1 hour of it being signed.

The RealTrends 500 and Nation’s Best brokerage rankings programs are submissions based, and require that you provide your production information to RealTrends for verification and ranking.

RealTrends has partnerships with many of the industry’s largest brands to receive data on your behalf, but we also allow for manual submissions via our portal. If your brokerage is affiliated with us, then we recommend you contact your corporate representative to understand this process for your brokerage. If you are in independent brokerage, you must submit your data directly to RealTrends via our submission portal.

The RealTrends 500 represents the top 500 brokerages in the country based on transaction sides. As such, the threshold to qualify for this designation changes each year, but the program always showcases the top 500 brokerages in the country. The Nation’s Best is a list of all brokerages that met our minimum threshold to qualify of 500 transaction sides in the previous calendar year.

There is no cost to submit your data for consideration in the RealTrends 500 and Nation’s Best Brokerage Rankings.

For the RealTrends 500 and Nation’s Best Brokerage Rankings, your firm must have closed 500 transaction sides in the previous calendar year OR $350 million in residential sales volume.

We only count residential real estate transactions (single-family homes and condos). We do not count commercial, referrals, land, lots, leases, multi-family, or rentals towards our thresholds. If you represent the buyer and seller on a transaction, you are able to double-count both the transaction and volume (sales price) towards your totals.

The RealTrends 500 and Nation’s Best Brokerage Rankings submission portal is open mid-January through February. You can submit your data directly to RealTrends via our submission portal.

The RealTrends Brokerage Rankings reflect the previous calendar year. For example, the 2023 rankings will show data from calendar year 2022.

RealTrends accepts various forms of verification. Our preferred method of verification is via our automated electronic verification system which requires you to list the name, title and email of your third-party CPA, Accountant, or Auditor.

RealTrends also accepts documentation confirming your volume via a MLS report, tax returns, or a letter from a third-party CPA, Accountant, or Auditor. RealTrends may request GCI information to determine if profit margins are within industry norms as part of our verification process.

Yes. If your brokerage was acquired or changed brands in the calendar year being reported, you are able to combine your production into a single submission. In order to submit via this method, you must submit directly through our portal. You must provide verification for both brokerages/brands for the numbers to be combined.

Participation in the RealTrends Brokerage Rankings is optional and requires your data to be provided to our team for review and verification. If you fail to submit your data to RealTrends you will not be included. Additionally, if you fail to submit verification information you will not be included.

We require that all submissions have accompanying verification documentation. In most cases, brokerages are omitted for not submitting this information. In other cases, verification documentation is found to include prohibited transaction types, which result in the submission not meeting our 500 transaction sides threshold.

If you feel there was an error, please visit our Help Desk for assistance.

Unfortunately, once the submission period ends there is no way to be included. We encourage you to subscribe to our daily newsletter,  RealTrends Daily, to be reminded next year.

This could be caused by a number of issues including not meeting the residential transaction threshold or switching brand affiliation mid-year (see above). Please contact your representative at your corporate office for resolution.

Please submit a ticket through our Help Desk to request changes to how your brokerage is presented.

Electronic verification is new this year!

During submission in the portal, you will need to supply us with the name, title, and email of your third-party CPA, Accountant, or Auditor. We will automatically populate a verification letter with the transaction sides, sales volume, and other information submitted.

Your chosen verifier will receive an email with a link to electronically sign this verification letter. RealTrends, your verifier, and you will receive a copy of the signed verification letter within 1 hour of it being signed.