He said this has resulted in the company’s marketing department honing in on content creation, since they know it’s the best way to get in front of the AI models.
“There has been this whole shift in how people find agents,” Raveis said. “I got a call from my sales manager in my Danbury, Connecticut, office and they said someone had just walked in because they asked ChatGPT for the best real estate office in Danbury — and we were it. That really put this in perspective to be the No. 1 top search in every town we’re in.”
Flourishing up and down the East Coast
In addition to looking at ways to make AI models work for them, Raveis and his team are also looking at leveraging AI to help agents with their own marketing and transaction management tasks.
“We have meetings every week about what we can do with AI and how to integrate that into our company,” Raveis said. “The technology isn’t going to replace or change the agent — they are still going to be the ones making the deal — but it is going to change how all the data and information an agent deals with is handled. We as a company want to deliver those solutions to agents before our competitors.”
As Raveis looks ahead to 2026, he said his team is also aiming for continued growth, something that has really picked up over the past few years.
“This year has been a year of growth in our luxury marketplace from Maine to Florida. It’s about mindset, even though the real estate industry is a bit off,” he said.
“We continue to acquire family companies like ours and win awards for our top luxury service. We recently opened an office in Charleston, South Carolina, and there are several more company acquisitions in the works for next year. 2026 is going to be an exciting year for us.”
He noted that William Raveis is currently exploring five or six potential acquisitions as the company looks to expand its East Coast footprint. Given the M&A that Raveis is exploring, it’s not surprising that he agrees with the concept of industry consolidation. But despite this trend, Raveis also feels the industry is becoming increasingly divided as companies consolidate and enter into their own lanes.
“The consolidation between Anywhere and Compass is beneficial for us as a company because it helps distinguish us from them even more. It is a true luxury brand over a transactional model — like Chanel competing with TJ Maxx,” he said.
“Everyone is sort of doing their own thing, but this means that now we have a lane that is even bigger than it was a year ago, which will allow us to grow even more.”
Potential ‘decoupling’ from NAR
In addition to leveraging both M&A and organic growth to fuel development in 2026, Raveis said his firm will also be expanding the ancillary services it offers in 2026.
Like many other full-service brokerages, William Raveis offers mortgage, title and insurance services. But in the first half of 2026, the company plans to start offering wealth management services to clients.
“We have a wealth adviser that operates in all 50 states that we will be partnering with,” Raveis said. “It will most likely be going live in February or March of next year, but that is definitely one of the ways we are looking to do things a bit differently.”
Besides Compass’s acquisition of Anywhere, Raveis said he has also been paying close attention to the developments at the National Association of Realtors (NAR), as well as the value proposition discussions occurring at MLSs and Realtor associations.
According to Raveis, NAR hurt its relationship with his firm by leaving it out of its commission lawsuit settlement agreement. Due to this, he said the company is exploring leaving the national trade association in markets where MLS access and association membership are not tied.
“Decoupling ourselves from NAR and getting involved directly with the MLS is something that we are very strongly looking at in 2026,” Raveis said. “We have always been involved in the Realtor associations and at all three levels due to the three-tiered system, but that has been blown up a bit by the lawsuit and them coming after us when we didn’t do anything to essentially pay a fine for how NAR is structured.”
Raveis said he and his team had previously been proud NAR members, but that is no longer the case and they see little to no value in belonging to NAR.
“In our view, the MLS is really where the value is. We don’t see much value from NAR at this point,” he said.
In order to mend the relationship, Raveis wants NAR to reimburse the brokerages left out of the settlement for the amounts they paid to settle. He would also like to see the association provide brokers with technology or systems they can use to reinvest in their own businesses.
“What are they doing to help us be more efficient?” Raveis posited. “They have to convince us of their value, and that wasn’t the case 10 years ago.”
