From Solo Producer to Brokerage Owner: What Tanya Cosmini Learned Running Realty ONE Group Elevate for Four Years

When Tanya Cosmini launched Realty ONE Group Elevate in the St. Johns County corridor of Northeast Florida, she came in with a clear vision: defend her agents, build something different, and grow fast. Nearly four years later, the broker-owner and 20-year real estate veteran is candid about what she got right, what surprised her, and what no one tells you before you open the doors of your own brokerage.

The Reality of Running a Brokerage Is Nothing Like the Vision

“I went into it thinking I was gonna like, guns blazing, like defend the agents every day on all these crazy things, and it’s really not like that,” Tanya said with a laugh. “For the most part, real estate’s kind of calm and easy.”

That does not mean problems never surface. Just the week before this conversation, one of her agents called in tears because a buyer was threatening to escalate a compensation dispute to the broker level. Tanya did not flinch. She picked up the phone, heard the buyer out — including the cussing — and sent a written summary of the conversation with a full document trail afterward.

“She left it feeling empowered, which is really all I care about,” Tanya said. “That she felt supported. That she knew that in a time when a customer’s threatening to call her broker, her broker is going to answer the phone.”

That responsiveness is not accidental. It is the centerpiece of her brokerage culture and the direct result of her own experience as an agent who never had that kind of backing. Tanya built Realty ONE Group Elevate around the principle that how she was treated — and how she was not treated — would become her blueprint for doing things differently.

Retention Is Just as Hard as Recruiting

Ask most broker-owners where they focus their energy, and recruiting dominates the conversation. Tanya is equally emphatic that retention cannot be an afterthought.

“You can’t be letting them go out the back door,” she said. “Part of that is putting yourself out in front and being willing to take that phone call and get on the phone with a client at eight or nine o’clock at night if that’s what you have to do to calm them down.”

Her approach to availability is intentional, not reactive. When she is sitting with someone — whether an agent or a client — her phone goes face down. But she commits to fast follow-up, and when an agent has an urgent situation, she will excuse herself and respond. It is a small behavior with an outsized cultural signal: your broker is actually here.

“Whatever they called about to them is an emergency and is important, and I want to give them the time they deserve for that.”

Why She Still Sells Real Estate — And Will Not Apologize for It

One of the more polarizing choices Tanya has made as a broker-owner is staying in production. She acknowledges she gets criticism for it. She also does not care.

“How can I help you as an agent sell real estate, navigate the contract, with all the changes and the climate of real estate changing, if I’m not practicing it?” she said. “Real estate is a practice. You’re never going to master it. The customer changes, the agents change, and if I don’t hear it and feel it and see it, I can’t help them properly.”

Tanya cites data she looked up herself: roughly 96 percent of broker-owners sell real estate, and about 24 percent hide it. She is firmly in the transparent camp. Her production also creates direct value for her agents. When she holds a listing in a neighborhood where one of her agents lives, she puts that agent’s sign in the yard, giving them visibility and street credibility they would not otherwise have.

“I love that my business can support them. That’s my goal for my agents,” she said.

The Recruiting Cycle Is Longer Than Anyone Tells You

If there is one lesson Tanya would go back and prepare herself for, it is the timeline of agent recruiting. She went in expecting that a great conversation would lead quickly to a signed agreement. The reality has been far more drawn out.

“The majority of the agents that have joined, it’s been like a one-to-two year cycle,” she said. “That many conversations.”

Part of what makes the cycle so long is that agents rarely move for a single clear reason. Tanya, who describes herself as highly analytical and science-trained, has kept detailed notes on every recruiting conversation. The conclusion she keeps reaching is that there is no universal pattern.

“It’s a million different things. It’s quite fascinating, because I’m an animal about it,” she said. “Sometimes it’s like, I like who sits next to me.”

The number one reason agents change brokerages, she has found, is support — a broad category that includes broker availability, technology, admin backup, and the sense that someone is genuinely in their corner. The breaking point is almost always a crisis moment where no one answers the phone.

“I can list 10 agents selling 15 to 20 million that call me weekly because their broker isn’t available,” she said. “Yeah.”

Abundance Mindset Drives the Culture — And Weeds Out Those Who Don’t Fit

Building a collaborative brokerage culture is not just a talking point at Realty ONE Group Elevate. It is embedded in the actual daily behavior of the team. Agents share listings for open houses, help each other identify negotiation points with specific builders, and call out deals going sideways in group chats before they become full-blown problems.

Tanya does not force the culture. She lets it do its own filtering.

“My goal is to foster a collaborative culture with an abundance mindset. If you don’t have that, it kind of makes you ill to be around it,” she said. “They weed themselves out, which is pretty great.”

When conflict does arise, she resists the instinct to call people out directly. She prefers to address behavior through examples and hypotheticals in group settings, allowing agents to recognize themselves in the scenario without the defensiveness of a direct confrontation.

The Boring Secret Sauce Every Agent Already Knows But Almost Nobody Uses

When asked what makes an agent successful, Tanya gives an answer that she readily admits is not exciting.

“It’s not a shiny object, it’s not a system, it’s not a coach, it’s not a script,” she said. “All it is is consistency. That’s it.”

She is in her own words a recovering shiny object syndrome sufferer. The antidote, she says, is finding one or two activities — calls, open houses, sphere contact — and doing them relentlessly, without searching for the next better thing. The top-producing agents she sees are not using some remarkable new tool. They found a system that works, built the habit of consistency around it, and never let go.

“If you want to get strong and have the muscles, you have to consistently lift weights. It’s really not mind-blowing, but if you think about it, that’s all you need to be successful,” she said.

Nearly four years into building Realty ONE Group Elevate, Tanya has not traded in that principle for something flashier. She has simply built a brokerage culture around it. For agents who have spent years watching the needle barely move despite chasing every new platform and pitch, that message may be the most valuable thing a broker-owner can offer.