Above (from left to right): National Association of REALTORSⓇ President Kevin Sears and Anthony Lamacchia at Lamacchia’s recent Crush It in Real Estate event in Boston, Massachusetts.Â
According to Anthony Lamacchia, real estate professionals will look back on 2023 and 2024 and say, “That wasn’t easy.” But those days are over, he adds.
“Folks, I’m telling you, there is a wave coming in the next five years. It will be the biggest boom you’ve ever seen.”
That is how Lamacchia kicked off his recent Crush It in Real Estate event, named after the eponymous coaching program that serves Lamacchia Realty’s own agents and those from other, sometimes competing, firms. Held at the Westin Copley Place in Boston on February 13, the event hosted more than 750 real estate professionals, about a third of whom hailed from outside of the Lamacchia Realty family.
“We opened up the door to all our competitors,” said Lamacchia. “We love to have you with us because we are in a cooperating business.”
In addition to Lamacchia, the Crush It In Real Estate conference featured several powerful speakers. Shant Banosian, leading mortgage broker with Guaranteed Rate, broke down the outlook for mortgage rates in the year ahead, anticipating a slight decline to about 6.6% or 6.5% come May.
“This market feels a lot like last year,” he said. “Hopefully, the difference this year is that the psychology of the consumer is different.”
Banosian pointed to positive indicators for the year ahead, such as gradually loosening rate-lock, slowly increasing inventory and record-high home equity. His advice for capitalizing on these positive harbingers is to move past the noise and focus on the basics.
“Know what your basics are in terms of all the things that you need to do to have success,” he said. “Number two, focus on what you can control. We spend so much time thinking about the things that we don’t control—interest rates, the economy, the NAR settlement, inventory, home sales—all these things that we can’t do anything about. What we can control are our activities and actions. So know what your activities, actions, your systems, your processes need to be in order to have success this year. Out-value your competition…make your clients think different. Or you can be commoditized and make it only about price, and that’s ultimately a race to the bottom.”
National Association of REALTORSⓇ (NAR) President Kevin Sears, whose brokerage firm was acquired by Lamacchia last year, also took the stage to discuss the association’s game plan for the year ahead, and the steps it is taking to recover from the near-fatal blows it has recently suffered. It all begins, said Sears, with NAR CEO Nykia Wright.
“Nykia is super smart, and I really appreciate working with her,” he explained. “She comes in with a history of being able to right the ship, turn things around and leave things better than you found them. Nykia has no baggage in the association, no loyalties, and is looking at our association as a business—what do we need to do to be a successful business? Last fall, we passed a budget. We did not raise dues for 2025, but we passed the first balanced budget in over 10 years. We trimmed $20 million in expenses.”
Sears reported that Wright is continuing to “look at everything with a fine-tooth comb,” while still ensuring that NAR provides the tools, resources and advocacy members have come to rely on.
NAR is also focused on overhauling its communications efforts, Sears noted, pointing to the recent additions of real estate veteran Sherry Chris, who has taken on a special advisory role aimed at strengthening relationships with the brokerage community, and Jarrod Grasso, former New Jersey REALTORS CEO, as its first-ever SVP of Industry Relations, charged with strengthening relationships with local and state associations. Sears also teased the forthcoming addition of a new executive to oversee communications and marketing, and discussed NAR’s ongoing policy work, such as advocating for higher limits on capital gains tax and continued conversations with the DOJ.Â
The Crush It In Real Estate event also featured presentations from NAR Chief Economist Dr. Lawrence Yun, who discussed both national and regional market trends in Massachusetts, Lamacchia Realty Trainer Jason Posnick, who provided hands-on tactics for success, and special guest speaker Deshauna Barber, who shared strategies for overcoming great challenge, drawn from her own journey from sexual abuse survivor to U.S. Army Reserve captain to Miss USA winner.
The overarching theme of the event, however, was Lamacchia’s forecast for a robust market ahead…and the need to prepare.
“The second part of this decade is going to be the biggest real estate boom America has ever seen,” Lamacchia stressed. “I am one hundred percent positive. There’s a tremendous amount of pent-up demand out there, and it keeps stacking and stacking, and now it’s releasing.
“You’ve got to make sure to get all your habits right and you’ve got to think about what you do every single day. Many REALTORSⓇ spend time doing things that really don’t make them money, but they make them feel busy. You have to get busy with activities that make you money—prospecting leads, dialing the phone, doing listing appointments, showing motivated buyers homes and writing offers with them.
“This year, ’25, is going to be the pivot year that you’ve got to get yourself back in action and be prepared if you want to catch the wave that we are going to see.”
