Last month, more than 350 members of the REALTOR® association community joined the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) for its annual Leadership Summit, Open Forum, and Annual General Meeting (AGM). It was a jam-packed couple of days, reflecting on the past, celebrating REALTORS®, and looking towards the future of real estate in Canada.
If you weren’t able to attend in person or online, here’s what you need to know:
Leadership Summit
Attendees at Leadership Summit had the opportunity to see and hear from industry experts such as Rob Hahn, 7DS Associates, Estelle Métayer, and Dr. Shilpa Tiwari, INICIO. They also had the chance to engage in group discussions on the future of REALTOR.ca, watch CREA’s first-ever technology pitch battle, and experience a live recording of the REAL TIME podcast with business visionary, Lital Marom and host Erin Davis.
During the discussion on the future of REALTOR.ca, attendees were assigned tables where they got to work with colleagues from across Canada to answer questions including, if they had $100 million to invest in REALTOR.ca, what would they do?
Our technology pitch battle saw six companies, Arx, Clear Estate, Manzil, Propra, Billdr, and Reimagine take the stage to share how they believe their product or service can help the real estate industry. After each company made their pitch, the judges, Hahn, Stephanie Wood, Alate Partners and Jordana Springgay of REM, declared Clear Estate the winner of the $2,500 cash prize.
Open Forum
The following day, CREA’s Open Forum kicked off at 11 a.m., providing both voting delegates and observers an opportunity to speak about issues impacting the industry as well as proposed resolutions ahead of the AGM.
We named Dale Devereaux of Red Deer, Alberta, the Canadian REALTORS Care® Award 2023 winner. A $5,000 donation from CREA was made to Devereaux’s charity of choice, the Red Deer Food Bank. Additionally, Century 21 Canada made a $5,000 donation to another charity close to his heart, the Red Deer Ronald McDonald House. We were truly inspired by all the submissions received, and nominations made – every year REALTORS® across Canada continue to amaze us.
We then turned the spotlight on the AEN Award of Excellence, recognizing an outstanding Association Executive, who demonstrates leadership, cooperation, and community involvement. This year, Katrina Steffler, Executive Director of Guelph & District Association of REALTORS®, received the award.
CREA’s Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) committee presented its finalized outline for a new ESG strategy, which focuses on issues identified as being the most meaningful to our association, membership, and industry partners. The strategy will start with the development of a new social purpose statement for CREA but also outlines three leadership themes to help us organize the advancement of our ESG priorities:
- sustainable and resilient communities;
- diversity, equity, inclusion and Indigenous reconciliation; and
- ethics and professionalism.
AGM
During AGM, delegates voted in favour of adding a new “Duty of Cooperation” to the REALTOR® Code, which includes a requirement to comply with the REALTOR® Cooperation Policy. The policy will come into force on Wednesday, January 3, 2024.
We also welcomed back several members of our Board of Directors and were happy to add a few new ones. We’d like to say a sincere “thank you” to all those who applied; we appreciate your dedication, willingness to contribute, and respective involvement in the REALTOR® association community.
Meet our 2023-2024 Board of Directors:
Jill Oudil Reflects on Year as Chair
Ahead of AGM, we sat down with Jill Oudil, CREA’s Immediate Past Chair, to reflect and offer any takeaways she learned during her time as Chair. Next month, we’ll sit down with our new Chair, Larry Cerqua, to find out what he hopes to achieve during his tenure.
If you couldn’t make it this year, but you’re interested in attending next year, please stay tuned for details on how to register in 2024. More photos and videos from these events can be found on CREA’s socials media pages.
If you have any questions and would like to contact us about any of the above changes, please reach out to our Member Experience Centre at support@crea.ca.
