The real estate industry just went through one of the most consequential quarters in recent memory, and the earnings reports to prove it are in.
Real Brokerage, Compass, and Zillow all posted strong Q1 2026 results, with each company reporting meaningful year-over-year growth in revenue and profitability.
For Compass, the quarter itself included closing the acquisition of Anywhere, along with a “three-year strategic alliance” with Rocket/Redfin. And in the weeks following the close of Q1, Real Brokerage announced it would acquire RE/MAX to form Real REMAX Group, while Zillow announced a collaboration with Realtor.com.
The industry has seen consolidation before, but rarely at this pace or scale. Agents have a lot to sort through right now, and this particular stretch of weeks is going to be one people look back on.
Here’s what each company reported, and what the dealmaking around it might mean for agents on the ground.
Real Brokerage Keeps Growing, Then Swings for the Fences
Real Brokerage had a strong Q1, and the context makes the results even more noteworthy. Q1 is historically the company’s slowest quarter of the year.
The core numbers reflected broad-based growth across the business:
- Revenue: $465.6 million, up 32% year over year
- Agent count: 33,510, up 25% year over year
- Transactions closed: 41,882, up 25% year over year
- Total transaction value: $16.8 billion, up 24% year over year
- Adjusted EBITDA: $14.9 million, up 80% year over year
- Cash on hand: $62.9 million, with no debt
CEO Tamir Poleg gave the following statement in the Company’s earnings report:
“Real delivered another quarter of significant growth, with revenue increasing 32% year-over-year, demonstrating the continued strength of our platform and agent value proposition. The agreement to acquire RE/MAX Holdings Inc. (‘REMAX’) represents a defining moment in our history and in our industry – by combining Real’s technology-driven brokerage with one of the industry’s most iconic and trusted brands we will create the preeminent real estate platform of the future.”
Beyond the core brokerage, Real’s ancillary businesses have been building into a meaningful part of the overall story.
- One Real Mortgage and One Real Title each posted double-digit revenue growth in Q1.
- Real Wallet, the company’s financial technology platform for agents, grew revenue 246% year over year.
By May 2026, more than 8,000 agents were using Real Wallet Business Checking Accounts, with total deposits at approximately $25.3 million and total credit outstanding at $9.3 million.
Chief Operating Officer Jenna Rozenblat saw the ancillary performance as proof that the platform is working as designed:
“Q1 tells a compelling story about the breadth of what we are building – both agent count and transaction count increased 25%, while all three ancillary businesses each posted strong revenue growth, validating that agents and their clients are adopting the full Real ecosystem. The platform is working, and the combination with REMAX provides a step-change in the scale through which we can deliver it.”
A few weeks after the quarter closed (April 26), Real announced it entered a definitive agreement to acquire RE/MAX Holdings, Inc., with the two companies forming a new holding company called Real REMAX Group.
That same morning, Tamir joined Byron Lazine on the Hot Sheet to talk about the acquisition and what it means for both Real and REMAX agents moving forward.
For a company that’s grown largely by winning agents over one conversation at a time, acquiring one of the most recognized brand names in the industry is a different kind of move altogether.
Compass Completes Its Biggest Bet and Starts Counting the Savings
Compass entered 2026 as a fundamentally different company than it was a year ago.
The acquisition of Anywhere closed on January 9, and Q1 was the first quarter that reflected the full weight of that combination. The headline numbers are big, but they need some context to be meaningful.
The reported year-over-year jumps are largely a product of Anywhere’s operations being added to the books. The more telling figures are the pro forma numbers, which treat the two companies as if they had been combined for the full prior year period:
- Total reported revenue: $2.70 billion, up 99% year over year
- Pro forma revenue: $2.76 billion, up 7% year over year
- Pro forma Brokerage GTV: $98.7 billion, up 7.3% year over year (vs. 1.5% market growth)
- Pro forma Brokerage transactions: 101,147, up 2.6% year over year (vs. 0.2% market growth)
- Total Brokerage agents at end of Q1: 84,187
- GAAP Net Income: $22 million, compared to a net loss of $51 million in Q1 2025
- Adjusted EBITDA: $61 million
- Cash on hand: $484 million
On a pro forma basis, Compass outpaced the broader market on both transactions and GTV by a significant margin. That kind of outperformance in a sluggish market is what CEO Robert Reffkin pointed to when framing the quarter:
“We achieved strong financial and operational results in our first quarter as a newly combined company. Revenue came in above the mid-point of our guide and Adjusted EBITDA came in above the high-end of our guidance range driven by continued OPEX discipline and healthy revenue growth. In Q1, we continued to outperform the industry, with pro forma Brokerage transactions up 2.6% year-over-year compared to market transactions up 0.2% year-over-year, reflecting 240 basis points of outperformance, while pro forma Brokerage GTV was up 7.3% year-over-year, which compared favorably to market volumes that were up 1.5% year-over-year.”
The other big story out of Compass in Q1 was the speed at which the company moved on cost synergies. By April 1, just 82 days after the Anywhere deal closed, Compass had actioned over $250 million in net cost synergies. The company has since raised its targets significantly:
- 2026 realized cost synergy target: raised from $100 million to $200 million
- Year 1 actioned cost synergy target: raised from $250 million to $300 million
- Total actioned cost synergy target over three years: raised from $400 million to $500 million
Reffkin was direct about what full realization of those synergies would mean for the business:
“By fully realizing these cost synergies, we believe Compass will be able to achieve durable profitability and lower our financial leverage in a flat housing market, with significant upside in a housing market recovery.”
CFO Scott Wahlers echoed that focus heading into the rest of the year:
“I’m very pleased with our Q1 2026 results, which reflect our first quarter as a combined company following the close of the Anywhere transaction on January 9, 2026. We delivered $2.70 billion in Revenue, Adjusted EBITDA of $61 million and ended the quarter with $484 million in cash. “Looking ahead, we remain acutely focused on OPEX control, executing against our cost synergy targets, and generating cash flow to de-lever our balance sheet.”
On the technology side, Compass continued to see growing adoption of its platform tools.
Compass One, the company’s all-in-one client dashboard, was used in 31.5% of all closed home sale transactions in Q1, up from 17.4% a year ago. The platform is set to be rebranded as the Home Platform and made available to Anywhere’s brokerage agents in Q3 2026, with a rollout to Anywhere’s franchise network planned for Q1 2027.
Then there’s the Redfin deal, which Compass announced in March before the quarter closed.
The three-year partnership puts Compass’ ‘Coming Soon’ listings and ‘Private Exclusive’ properties on Redfin. The companies say the move has the potential to bring more than 500,000 additional listings to Redfin.
Zillow Posts Strong Numbers and Doubles Down on Its Platform Vision
Zillow has been making the case for a while now that it’s building something bigger than a home search site. He made the same point during a recent CNBC interview. The Q1 2026 numbers did a lot to support that argument.
The headline results came in strong:
- Total revenue: $708 million, up 18% year over year
- For Sale revenue: $514 million, up 12% year over year
- Residential revenue: $450 million, up 8% year over year
- Mortgages revenue: $64 million, up 56% year over year
- Rentals revenue: $183 million, up 42% year over year
- Net income: $46 million, up from $8 million in Q1 2025
- Net income margin: 6%, a 520-basis-point increase year over year
- Adjusted EBITDA: $182 million, at a 26% margin
- Adjusted free cash flow: $127 million, up from $88 million in Q1 2025
The Mortgages segment stood out. Purchase loan origination volume nearly doubled year over year, growing 96% to $1.5 billion, at a time when the broader industry saw purchase mortgage origination volume decline about 1%. Rentals had a strong quarter too, with multifamily revenue up 57% year over year. Both segments are becoming a real part of how Zillow makes money.
The company also bought back 13.5 million shares for $626 million during the quarter, a pretty clear vote of confidence from leadership in where things are heading.
There was one nuance worth noting on the traffic side: By Zillow’s own measurement, average monthly unique users were down 3% year over year to 220 million, with total visits also down 3% to 2.3 billion.
But Comscore showed average monthly unique visitors up 12% year over year to 127 million. By that measure, Zillow is the only large company in its category to have grown its share of the real estate audience for six consecutive quarters.
CEO Jeremy Wacksman stated:
“Zillow’s integrated platform is delivering meaningful value for buyers, sellers, renters and real estate professionals alike. We’re embedding AI throughout the real estate experience in ways that make Zillow increasingly indispensable, and we’re innovating with speed and intention. Zillow’s strong Q1 results reflect the consistency of our execution, the strength of our brand, our audience engagement, and the durability of our multi-year strategy.”
Shortly after the quarter closed, Zillow announced a partnership with Realtor.com to share Preview listings starting this summer.
With Compass partnering with Rocket/Redfin and Real Brokerage folding in RE/MAX, it’s a smart time for Zillow to be deepening its grip on the top of the funnel, where buyers and sellers go first when they start thinking about a move.
What It All Means for the Industry
These three companies are chasing very different visions of what real estate looks like in the future. But all three are betting that bigger, more integrated platforms are where the industry is headed
So far, the numbers are backing that up:
- Real Brokerage grew revenue 32% in its slowest quarter of the year, then turned around and agreed to acquire one of the most recognized brand names in the business.
- Compass spent Q1 showing that its Anywhere deal is already paying off, raised its cost synergy targets, and had already signed a deal for Redfin before the quarter closed.
- Zillow nearly doubled its mortgage origination volume, grew rentals revenue 42%, and partnered with Realtor.com shortly after the quarter ended.
None of this is happening in a booming market. These companies are posting well above market growth rates with very little wind at their backs.
For agents trying to get a read on where things are headed, here’s the stick-figure drawing coming out of Q1:
- Platforms are getting bigger,
- Services are getting more bundled
- Technology is getting harder to opt out of
The more interesting question at this point is how fast all of that reshapes what it actually looks like to build a real estate business in 2026 and beyond.
