Compass-Anywhere merger forces brokers to adjust competitive playbooks

New York City

Bess Freedman and her firm Brown Harris Stevens are no strangers to competing with both Compass, which is headquartered in New York City, and top Anywhere firms, including Corcoran and Sotheby’s International Realty. While Freedman acknowledges all the noise surrounding the merger, she feels the transaction is primarily a challenge for the companies being acquired. It is against this backdrop, which will be focused on integrating the Anywhere brands and agents into the Compass organization, that she feels established and privately held firms like her will be able to shine.

“Instead of offering more of the same, BHS can give agents, buyers, sellers and renters something unique: We are singularly focused on customer service and our only stakeholders are our agents. In NYC,  we are the only company that manages nearly 400 buildings and offers a broker specialist program. Real estate is an information and service business, and the synergy between our brokerage and managed buildings is an incredible resource and opportunity for BHS agents and our clients,” Freedman wrote in an email. 

Freedman’s confidence in her firm comes despite estimates that post-merger, Compass’s market share in Brooklyn could come in at over 60% and at over 80% in Manhattan. But after a strong 2025, in which Freedman said her firm recruited agents with nearly $20 billion in career sales, she believes 2026 has the potential to be just as strong, regardless of what her competitors are doing. 

“We continue to speak with agents from competing firms in many markets who want to differentiate their business with the support of Brown Harris Stevens,” she wrote.

And Brown Harris Stevens is not the only firm in New York City to feel strongly about its growth and recruiting efforts this year. 

“With this mass merger, we are experiencing unprecedented inbound interest from agents seeking stability and independence,” a Douglas Elliman spokesperson wrote in an email. “More than ever, Douglas Elliman is the world’s premier agent-focused luxury brokerage, truly independent, financially strong and dedicated to empowering agents and their success.”

Boston

Further North on the East Coast in the Greater Boston area, Chip Stella, one of the broker-owners of Wellesley, Massachusetts-based Rutledge Properties, a roughly 20-agent, single office, luxury focused firm, also feels confident despite now facing the impressive might of a combined Anywhere and Compass. 

Stella and his team are leaning heavily into the small, boutique nature of their firm, running an advertising campaign that says Rutledge Properties answers to Main Street, not Wall Street.

“The campaign has been super popular,” Stella said. “I think our consumer base in Greater Boston understands that they are better served by companies that serve Main Street and don’t have to answer to shareholders. Our tagline is ‘Boutique is Better’ and that doesn’t just mean a small firm, it is the type of service we provide consumers.” 

Noting that his firm did roughly $300 million in sales volume last year, he feels this message is resonating with consumers, and he believes it will continue fueling his firm’s success in the year ahead. 

“As a boutique company we are very agile, we’re on our toes,” he said. “We can serve clients the best way that we see fit and they see fit because we work with them as a team, and that garners better results.” 

Stella’s confidence remains strong despite estimates that Compass will have over 60% market share in Boston after the merger. 

Looking at the bigger picture, Stella also wonders how the consolidation of so many of his competitors in the Greater Boston area will impact innovation.

“Competition is what spurs innovation. So, with having such a huge market share here, will that really drive innovation for them? And I think the answer is probably no.” 

Nashville 

The Music City is one metro Capitol Forum’s analysis estimates a combined Compass and Anywhere will have a nearly overwhelming market share at close to 70%.

Phillip Cantrell, the founder of Tennessee-based Benchmark Realty, is well aware of the scale this merger will provide Compass in Nashville, telling HousingWire that he sees the deal in a similar light to the endeavors of historical business magnates like Rockefeller, Carnegie and Gould, as an attempt at market share growth “to capture an old school monopoly in its purest form.”

However, unlike some of the business magnates of the past, Cantrell said he feels that Robert Reffkin is embarking on this endeavor very adroitly, “unlike the bludgeoning methods that predecessors employed in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s.”

“I’m convinced [Robert] is well aware of the minefields, yet like me, refuses to cower in fear of challenging existing traditions,” Cantrell wrote in an email. “Some may not like him (and I’m not saying I do or don’t – I definitely have tremendous respect) but even a blind man can recognize and appreciate his intestinal fortitude. It’s taken him a while to find his footing, but I believe he now knows exactly what he’s doing.”

When it comes to competing with a merged Compass-Anywhere, Cantrell doesn’t actually see much of a competition given that, in his view, the two firms run “completely different business models.” 

He also noted that Benchmark Realty is no stranger to competing with all of the Anywhere brands, as they have well-established operations in many of the markets his firm serves. 

“We grow stronger because we have worthy competitors. That is the singular reason this industry suffers so much — the lack of worthy competitors. If everyone is doing business the same way, no one improves the transaction for the consumer,” he wrote.

“Fundamentally, we are not much into glittery objects here.