Dave Liniger with Walter Schneider in 1989.
To celebrate 25 years of serving Canada’s real estate community, REM asked a small group of real estate leaders this question:
“Who had the biggest impact – good or bad – on Canadian real estate in the last 25 years?
This is not a popularity contest or a marketing exercise. We want to know who you think had the biggest impact on the industry in the last 25 years – even if it was, in your opinion, a negative impact. Your choices could include Realtors, company executives, association executive officers, regulators, service company executives….even politicians! Who has had the most impact during the last 25 years in making the industry what it is today?”
REM took those consensus picks and added our own and the results are below and on the following pages. Take a look and see if you agree with these choices, and then let us know who we missed. Add your comments to the stories on REMonline or drop an email to [email protected].
Frank Polzler and Walter Schneider
Re/Max founder and chairman Dave Liniger has often said that if it wasn’t for Re/Max Ontario-Atlantic Canada founders Frank Polzler and Walter Schneider, the entire Re/Max organization might have collapsed in its early days. After launching their company in 1980, they became critical to the future success of the organization, eventually expanding to own several U.S. master franchises and leading Re/Max expansion into Europe.
“Regardless of the brand we choose to associate with, it is hard to dispute that Re/Max led the way through several paradigm shifts seen in the industry over the last 25 years,” says Schneider. “We revolutionized commission structures, opened doors to women – who are a significant force in the sector today and were among the first to embrace the notion of teams…Our focus on the agent has led us to continually innovate, and that is something we are very proud of.”
Pamela Alexander, CEO and managing director of Re/Max Integra (the parent company that includes the Ontario, U.S., European and Middle East regions) says: “It is no secret that Frank Polzler and Walter Schneider are considered to be trailblazers within the real estate industry. They are active leaders, with open minds, who continue to embrace the unknown and drive the industry forward.”
