America’s Most Trusted Residential Real Estate Brokerage
Searching for a new home and making a purchase decision often includes a considerable amount of uncertainty. Where are the best neighborhoods? Is the price of the home correct? What features include a tangible price value? In short, when there is no shortage of questions being asked and having a qualified professional to assist in answering these questions is of great importance. Trusting the judgments of real estate professionals is of great value when trying to answer questions and make the right home purchase decision. This year, in the Lifestory Research 2020 America’s Most Trusted® Residential Real Estate Brokerage Study, we found that Sotheby's International Realty is once again the brand most trusted. This is the third year in a row that Sotheby’s has ranked as the most trusted brand in this category.
Sotheby's International Realty produced a Net Trust Quotient Score of 96.4 and received the 5 Star Trust Rating in the study among people actively shopping for a new home. What are the best brokerage brands? The most trusted brokerage brands, in order, included Sotheby's International Realty, Berkshire Hathaway Home Services, Keller Williams Realty, and Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate. Other brands in the study, with lower trust ratings, were Coldwell Banker Real Estate, Century 21 Real Estate, Prudential Realty, ReMax Real Estate, and ERA Real Estate. Sotheby's International Realty received the best reviews and trust ratings among the most popular residential real estate brokerage brands as judged by consumers. See the table for trust scores and the most trusted ratings of the most popular home real estate brokerage brands.
The annual study examines trust among customers actively shopping for a new home. The 2020 ranking is based on 13,770 opinions of people surveyed between January and December in the United States. Brands included in the final ranking were nationally recognized among people who reported that they were actively shopping for a new home, as measured by brand awareness. To be considered, brands needed to receive enough survey responses to achieve a 95% confidence level with no more than a 3% margin of error in a national sample.
The Lifestory Research Net Trust Quotient Score measures the trust people hold of brands in multiple different product categories. This score includes three levels of consumer trust: “advocates,” a customer who feels a significant trust toward the brand, “neutrals,” those who have a moderate level of trust in the brand, and “antagonists,” those who do not trust a brand. The rankings are based on the Net Trust Index Quotient Score. Scores are standardized across more than 300 brands and product segments included in the study, and then rank-ordered within each segment. Details of the approach used in the research program can be found on the survey methodology page.
The Lifestory Research America’s Most Trusted® Study explores shopper perceptions and examines how each shopping event and brand encounter impacts customers’ overall value. The study investigates the questions asked by shoppers – Who is the best? Which is recommend the most? The study also identifies critical service standards that drive higher customer experiences and the bottom line. The study addresses reviews and summarizes net promoter, quality reviews, purchase intent, as well as a variety of other metrics.
The brokerage brands that were found to be most recognized in the study were Sotheby's International Realty, Berkshire Hathaway Home Services, Keller Williams Realty, and Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate, Coldwell Banker Real Estate, Century 21 Real Estate, Prudential Realty, ReMax Real Estate, and ERA Real Estate. Brand awareness and brand familiarity were used to determine if a brokerage brand was known well enough to be included in the national trust ranking. Sotheby's International Realty received the highest Net Trust Quotient score and earned the #1 ranking of most trusted brokerage brands.
The Sotheby's International Realty network was founded in 1976, designed to connect independent real estate companies to clients and provide independent brokerage marketing and listing services. Sotheby's International Realty is a subsidiary of Realogy Holdings Corp. (NYSE: RLGY), a global leader in real estate franchising and provider of real estate services.
Lifestory Research America’s Most Trusted® Study results are based on survey participants responses and should not be considered legal or financial advice. Your experiences may vary. For details, see our Terms of Use and Legal Notices on the Lifestory Research website. No promotional use or advertising can be made of America’s Most Trusted® survey results without the express prior written consent of Lifestory Research.
About Lifestory Research®
Lifestory Research is a trusted national independent market research firm headquartered in Newport Beach, California. At Lifestory Research we are passionate about customers, employees, brands and the science of influence. Our work is backed by research intelligence that drives confident business decisions.
About America’s Most Trusted®
America’s Most Trusted® is a designation awarded to brands that garner the trust among those they serve. Awards are based upon the collection and evaluation of thousands of consumer opinions. The approach used to capture the opinions of people seeks to adhere to the highest quality standards of consumer insight.
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