It is no secret that the relocation industry is undergoing dramatic changes from the broker/agent side. Large brokers are getting bigger and more agents are beginning to specialize. One relocation firm is finding a way to meld the two trends into new services that will help everyone involved in the corporate transfer - the transferee, the transferee's company, the broker/relocation company and the agent.

Petey Parker, vice president and director of relocation services for Ebby Halliday Realtors,Texas' largest volume brokerage firm and ranked #16 in the nation, has made it her personal mission to not only assist the associates within her firm but to help the industry in general by encouraging brokers and agents across the nation to expand and refine their services. Parker is a nationally known speaker and has conducted forums, meetings and seminars for the National Association of REALTORS® as well as a number of large corporations on the topic of relocation. She believes it is crucial for the brokers and owners to continue to find means to improve service - by addressing the global and national relocation.

One of the ways she and others are changing the relocation industry is in marketing "the overview," in which the transferee is shown the city, special interests, clubs, schools and recreational facilities as a preliminary step to viewing homes.

"Who knows the overview better than the real estate market?" says Parker, whose company is working to position the overview as a fee-based service. "The overview requires a great deal more work than an in-town transaction, and a much higher level of sophistication and communication. Many companies are hiring brokers and relocation firms to introduce employees and job candidates to an overview before they take a job in a new city. Our mission is to make them want to live in their new city."

To put the overview service in perspective, someone from another country, for example, has to first get acclimated to the country, then to the state, our laws, then to a city, and then to a community. To expect a sales associate to handle all that alone is too risky for the agent and for the company who is transferring the employee.

"We have trained and have on hand a whole international staff of sales associates to specialize in handling global moves. And we expect those sales associates to be paid, because these are special circumstances that take them away from their normal course of business. We bond them with the family coming in, so it is a relationship that works for the benefit of all."

According to Parker, REALTORS^® need to realize that the relocation industry is a separate business but does not have to compete with the real estate industry. "In that separation, there is a different handling of the customers. From another part of the country or another part of the world, the customer will see our area differently that someone who is moving across town, and that requires someone with special knowledge," she explains.

Agents who wish to look ahead to the future should recognize the trend and consider adding a specialty such as language to their skills. "Companies are no longer thinking if they are going global," says Parker, "they are thinking when." That fact has a huge impact on the real estate industry and agents individually.

"Our company is responding to what our agents want and that is specific solutions to assist them with international and national relocations," says Parker.

Parker heralds another trend in which companies are beginning to turn to broker/relocation divisions to not only assist transferring families from out of the country, but to assist them in convincing top level employees to relocate by showcasing the area.

These companies are no longer in a position to tell an employee that it is time to move. Executives are invested in the community in which they live, often with a high profile, and may be reluctant to uproot their families. "It represents a loss when these families are moved. They have to start over in a new community," says Parker. "The companies are taking the initiative to allow us to show the family what living in the area will be like and helping them get involved in the community. It is much more personal than it used to be."

Relocating executives and foreign transferees both require an overview of the community that can last from one and a half to as much as three days. "If you have a family that is coming into the city the next day and they don't speak English, we can use the panel to place the family with an agent that is going to be able to really help them. " The agents who participate in the International panel undergo special training, and plan to be with the transferee for long, intense periods.

"I believe that as we get this really going, we will do this same program for national moves as well," forecasts Parker. "We will start seeing this more and more with relocation - that companies and people in general will want us to sell them on the area first, a home second, and I think that is why the fees are justified. It is also a benefit to our agents who don't have the language or cultural skills to know that they can turn their customers over to the relocation division and that they won't "lose" them, but that their customers will be introduced to a whole new level of service."

The companies who use the relocation services will be able to go to their employees and say "I know you are hesitant about moving, but we can help you. It is a win-win situation for everybody."