Keller Williams Cornerstone Realty was founded in 1998 and has grown to be the #1 real estate company in Marion County Florida. As the team lead I first got my license in 2006, however Keller Williams Realty was founded in 1983 by Gary Keller and Joe Williams. It started out as a single office based in Austin, Texas, selling local residential real estate in the Austin area. After two years in business, Keller Williams became the largest single office residential real estate firm in Austin with 72 licensed agents. In the mid-1980s, the company suffered from the United States housing bubble and began to offer profit sharing to existing and potential associates in order to retain agents and help get through the recession. Within a year, the company grew to 130 agents and began to climb back as the top real estate broker in Austin.

In the early 1990s, Keller Williams expanded outside of the state of Texas, opening up its business model to franchising beginning in 1991. It opened an office in Oklahoma in 1993, marking the firm’s first office to be located outside of its home state. The Oklahoma office was later recognized as the most successful single real estate office in that state.. Keller Williams expanded at a rapid rate throughout the United States, much of which was attributed to its commission split for agents. In 1997 the company was recognized by being on the Franchise Gold 100 list by. As it moved into the next century, Keller Williams became the 6th largest real estate agency in the U.S.. An example of its rapid expansion came in the state of Florida where in 2004 it was attributed as the largest real estate office in Polk County with 114 agents. That same year, it was attributed as the fastest growing real estate office in the entire state with 45 market centers, bringing its total nationwide agent count to over 30,000. Now we are 200,000 agents strong and in 55 regions of the world.