Compass Ain't Going Out Like That

Reffkin throws down the gauntlet at the 2025 Compass RETREAT

When 2025 began, I did not have “Compass goes to war against the two most powerful institutions in residential real estate” on my dance card. I double checked my Seven Predictions from last year, and while I thought CCP would go away (more or less), I didn’t think Zillow would step into the breach the way they did.

Yet, here we are.

Inman has already reported on what he said, but I wanted to see the speech for myself. And it was just uploaded to YouTube. A news story cannot capture what I think is truly important about the speech. This post cannot either, which means you should go watch the speech for yourself. It is embedded above.

We’re going to spend a few minutes on this, because I think this speech by this man at this time could be important for how the industry goes in the future.

This doesn’t feel like past kerfuffles in the industry between big players. This doesn’t feel like the “You Have Ten Days” moment, doesn’t feel like BPP, doesn’t feel like other public spats. It feels like a potential turning point, where one side or the other has to lose and lose big.

Let’s get into it.