Real Estate Agent Retention: What Top Producers Want in 2026 (and How to Deliver It)

You spent months recruiting them. You sold them on your brokerage’s culture and your vision. Then they left. Let’s not do that again.

It’s tempting to treat a huge investment in recruitment as the answer to building a solid brokerage, ​but a Wall Street Journal analysis found the number of full-time agents and brokers fell to 440,000 in 2023, down 72,000 in a single year.

The real stars aren’t necessarily your new hires. They’re the agents who stay, bringing experience and trust. 

NAR’s 2025 Member Profile found 74% of REALTORS® were “very certain” they’d stay active in the business for at least two more years, and the 2026 NAR Member Profile shows repeat clients now account for 28% of the typical member’s business — roughly half the pipeline for agents with more than 16 years’ experience.

Real estate agent retention in 2026 isn’t won with a bigger commission split alone. It’s won by giving agents a reason to believe their brokerage is actively helping them close more business, every day.

Here’s how brokerage leaders can do just that.

Jump to What You Need:

• Training 
• Technology
• Marketing 
• Compensation 
• Brokerage Culture and Leadership
• How RISE Gives Brokers a Retention Edge 

Key Factors Agents Consider When Choosing and Staying With a Brokerage

If you run a brokerage, you’ve felt it. An agent gives notice. It stings, like getting the wind knocked out of you. You start asking whether it was something you did.

Often, it was. Not because you’re a bad leader, but because some common issues came into play. 

Read: Why Do Agents Leave High-Performing Brokerages (And What You Can Actually Do About It)?

To understand how to retain your real estate agents, look beyond compensation alone and examine the everyday experience your brokerage provides. 

Training 

Too many brokerages hand a new agent a few logins and tell them it’s time to swim. Meanwhile, the brokerage down the street is getting louder about exactly what it offers, from its culture to its support package, and your agents notice.

Across industries up to 25% of workers receive no training beyond initial onboarding, according to research by People Management. Real estate is not immune. Don’t let your brokerage be the reason that statistic holds for your agents.

Technology

According to the NAR Technology Survey Report over 80% of agents believe having leading-edge technology is a top priority when selecting a brokerage, yet only 46% of agents said their broker provided them with a CRM (customer relationship management software that logs every client conversation, follow-up, and deadline in one place).

A CRM is a good example. Agents are busy, so even a great CRM only works if an agent has time to log into it, comb through contacts, and remember who to follow up with and when. 

That gap between “we have a CRM” and “agents are actually using it to work their book” is where top producers quietly start looking elsewhere, often toward a brokerage that hands them a system that works for them instead of one more thing to work.

That gap is your opening. Agents depend on technology that actually delivers results — not just software that sits idle in the tech stack.

Marketing

Agents are increasingly looking for brokerages that offer robust marketing and follow-up support. A smart, AI-native real estate marketing system can make your agents look categorically more capable than a competitor.

According to the NAR Technology Survey Report, 47% of respondents spend less than $250 a month on lead generation, while 20% spend less than $50.

Agents notice when a brokerage closes that gap for them: automated marketing, lead nurturing, and communication that doesn’t rely on the agent remembering every follow-up themselves.

Compensation 

While technology and ongoing support matter, compensation remains a key factor. Agents prefer brokerages that offer competitive splits, bonuses, and incentives aligned with performance.

Structured incentive programs that reward top performers can boost morale and retention.

When it comes to monthly fees, an agent just starting their business will be reluctant to sign with a brokerage that charges a large monthly fee.

Brokerage Culture and Leadership

Systems and support matter, but relationships are what actually keep people around. In a 2025 survey of 600 agents, just 13% named pay as their main reason for staying put, while 43% pointed to culture, leadership, and personal relationships instead. 

Vision counts too, not as a slogan, but as something agents can point to. Among agents who said their brokerage had a clear vision for the future, 87% reported being happy where they are, versus less than half of those who didn’t see one

How RISE Gives Brokers a Retention Edge

RISE by MoxiWorks is a native-AI relationship engine that works quietly in the background of an agent’s day. Instead of asking agents to remember to log in, comb through contacts, and figure out who to follow up with, RISE surfaces who in their database is showing buying or selling signals, so follow-up happens because the system flagged it, not because the agent happened to remember.

For brokers focused on real estate agent retention, here are the key wins. 

1. It gives every agent a relationship engine, not just a database. RISE continuously monitors an agent’s contacts for behavioral signals, such as high-intent activity or a jump in market movement in a contact’s area so the contacts worth calling today are at the top of the list.
2. It automates busywork. From surfacing the right contact to drafting outreach and even sending a CMA directly, agents spend more time on the conversations that actually move deals forward.
3. It’s a differentiator your brokerage can use. “We give every agent AI-powered relationship intelligence” is a much stronger pitch to a prospective hire.
4. It’s integrated. RISE gives agents a relationship engine, follow-up signals and outreach automation in one native system that’s easy to manage. 

RISE is actively helping agents work smarter and close more.​ What could be more appealing than that?