Every fall the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR) hosts their annual REALTOR® Conference and Expo. Held this year in Orlando, Florida, CREA representatives were there to help educate NAR members on Canadian real estate and provide an opportunity for REALTORS® in Canada to network and build referrals with their American colleagues. We also used the event as an opportunity to highlight the international activity between Canada and the United States.
To begin, we created a heat map looking at where U.S. visitors to REALTOR.ca are coming from when searching for property in Canada. The heat map also provides insights into the number of times U.S. visitors have reached out to a Canadian REALTOR® by email or have shared property details from listings on REALTOR.ca. From this data, we discovered there were over 44,000 direct leads for REALTORS® in Canada in the 12 months ending May 31, 2016.
We also discovered the states providing the most visitors to REALTOR.ca were New York, Florida, California and Texas. In the days following the U.S. presidential election, these states remained at the top of the list.
To complement the heat map, we learned from the latest CREA Membership Survey that:
- A growing number of REALTORS® from Canada have worked with international clients – roughly 4 out of 10 – which is up from 30 percent a year ago.
- Clients from the United States and China account for 36 percent of international clients for REALTORS® in Canada.
- CREA’s efforts to promote the CIPS Designation (Certified International Property Specialist) as an opportunity for REALTORS® to generate international referrals have paid off, based on the growth in designees.
Looking at the Canada – U.S. cross-border consumer trends infographic below, there are roughly equal numbers of Americans looking for property in Canada as there are Canadians looking for property in the U.S. However, twice as many leads (44,000) were created for REALTORS® in Canada than for REALTORS® in the United States.
As Canada’s leading national real estate site, REALTOR.ca and CREA are expanding our services to better help REALTORS® tap into international opportunities. This will include a new referral network to help both your Canadian clients purchase property abroad as well as gain American clients looking for property in Canada.
For more information about REALTOR.ca insights, including access to the 2015 Insights Report and the latest top keyword searches, visit REALTORLink.ca/Insights.
