The results of this year's survey draw a couple of major conclusions: AI is becoming increasingly important for real estate operations, and brokerage executives foresee an increase in housing demand and business profitability in 2026, despite lower economic confidence.

Delta Media Group conducted our annual real estate leadership survey in December with over 100 participants nationwide from top brokerage firms.

This survey's findings provide valuable insights into how today's brokerage executives feel about topics such as artificial intelligence (AI), all-in-one marketing technology, business operations, the housing market, and the economy as we transition to 2026.

Here are the results of this year's real estate leadership survey:

Q1: The survey first asked participating real estate executives how important AI was to them and the agents in their brokerage today. The average response was about 7 on a scale of 0 to 10. This was a one-point increase from last year's survey, where the average response was a 6 out of 10. It was a 2-point increase from the previous year, when the average response was 4 out of 10.

Q2: Real estate leaders see AI becoming even more important for business success in 2026. The average executive predicts it will be about an 8 out of 10 on the importance scale in 2026.

Q3: We next asked how their brokerages were leveraging AI for business operations. The most popular answer by far: over 25% of respondents said they primarily use AI for content creation. The second most popular response was for writing listing descriptions, at 14%. This shows a significant shift from last year, in which writing listing descriptions was the most popular use.

Q4: When asked if they were using AI at their company today, over 97% of leaders answered "yes," displaying a 10% increase from last year's survey results, where only 87% of leaders had that response.

Q5: We then asked respondents how their agents were using AI, and, again, the top responses were for writing listing descriptions (12%) and content creation (11%). The remaining responses were scattered across various tasks, including data analysis and reporting, automating administrative tasks, social media, virtual staging, and summarizing reports.

Q6: When asked to rate the value of all-in-one marketing platforms featuring AI and automation for their business, the average response among leaders was a 7 out of 10.

Q7: Leaders were then asked in what areas they plan to expand their company's use of AI in 2026. Once again, the top response was for content creation and writing listing descriptions, with about 8.5%. This response was closely followed by using AI to streamline social media, continuing a trend there as well.

Q8: When asked how worried they were about AI lacking the appropriate gates or guardrails to limit risk and liability, the average response was a 6 out of 10. This is the same level of worry participants expressed in our last two surveys, exhibiting that leads still have the same hesitations about AI as they did two years ago.

Q9: In this year's survey, brokerage leaders were asked about the specific challenges and concerns that arise when integrating AI into their business operations. The top answers were data and security risks at over 17%, with agent adoption and concerns, including resistance to change, real estate regulation, compliance, and integrating them with existing systems, not far behind.

Q10: Moving on to business profitability, over 85% of brokerage leaders said they expect their business profitability to increase in 2026, while less than 3% said they expect their profitability to decrease in the coming year. This shows a major increase in brokerage leadership confidence since last year, when only about 63% of leaders expected to see an increase.

Q11: Most leaders (81%) also expect their total transitions to increase in 2026 compared to the last 12 months. Although not as steep, this also signals an increase in leadership confidence, as only 72% expected transaction volumes to rise in 2025.

Q12: Over 64% of leaders expect their market share to increase in 2026. This is a slight dip from last year, when about 68% of leaders expected an increase in market share.

Q13: According to the survey results, recruitment is the biggest challenge brokerage firms face today, with "recruiting top producers" as the top response from leaders, at over 8%. This is consistent with last year's results.

Q14: The majority of brokerage leaders are optimistic about the economy's future, with 54% predicting it will improve in 2026. Overall, leaders are slightly more pessimistic than last year, according to the results, which showed that 60% foresaw economic improvement.

Q15: While they may be less hopeful about the economy than in previous years, about 63% of brokerage leaders expect housing demand in their market to increase, or significantly increase, this year. Fewer than 5% expect demand to deteriorate, and the rest (33%) expect it to remain the same.

Q19: Finally, 47% of leaders are more confident in the US economy than they were one year ago. 29% said they feel less confident, and about 23% said they feel the same. 

On the other hand, the majority of leaders feel the same way about the global economy as they did at the start of 2025, with 53%. About 21% say they feel more confident than one year ago, while about 35% say they feel less confident.

44% of leaders feel the same way about the state economy as last year, with about 36% more confident and 20% less. 49% feel the same way about the local economy, with nearly 37% more confident and about 15% less.