The following Q&A comes from the HW+ exclusive Slack channel, where Steve Murray, senior advisor to RealTrends, and Tracey Velt, RealTrends editorial, as they give an exclusive first look at the 2021 RealTrends Brokerage Compensation Report. During the Q&A, Murray shared some of his biggest takeaways from the data, the trends he is watching and how executive compensation has changed over the years.

The full 2021 RealTrends Brokerage Compensation Report will be available next week, with this Q&A giving a first look at the data. For the study, RealTrends surveyed all the firms on the 2021 RealTrends 500 and Nation’s Best rankings, asking for annual compensation data for the 2020 calendar year.

The following Q&A has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Tracey Velt: Hi everyone! I want to start out by having Steve talk a little about the report. We looked at 12 different executive positions at a brokerage to determine compensation based on region and size of brokerage. Why don’t you talk a little about the types of brokerages that participated?

Steve Murray: We surveyed all 1760 brokerage firms in the REAL Trends 500 and Nations Best brokerage firms and received 140 replies. These firms were both franchised and independent and ranged in size from $1 million in gross revenues to over $400 million. They were also generally spread regionally so it was a good cross-section.