Local real estate brokerages join forces

One South Realty staff and agents with Rhonda Carroll, right, whose Clocktower Realty Group is folding into the company. (Jonathan Spiers photos)

Facing a changing housing market in the wake of the pandemic, a pair of homegrown Richmond real estate brokerages are pooling their resources and finding strength in numbers by joining forces.

One South Realty Group is absorbing local peer Clocktower Realty Group, a comparably-sized, 6-year-old brokerage founded and led by principal broker Rhonda Carroll.

The combination, which remains in process, will see One South continue under its name and roughly double in size to about 140 agents and staff.

It also gives One South its first Southside outpost with Clocktower’s office in the Midlothian Village Square shopping center. Clocktower’s other office, on Franklin Street in Shockoe Bottom, also comes with the deal, though its use for the combined company is being determined.

The combination caps a brief but impactful run for Clocktower, which ballooned from four to 38 agents in its first year and continued to grow annually thereafter, ultimately reaching 73 agents this year.

Rhonda Carroll

Carroll, who started in real estate in 2012 and launched Clocktower in 2017, said the brokerage’s growth meant more time handling the business and less time in the sales and leadership roles she’d previously enjoyed.

While the brokerage saw steady growth from the start, she said the changes facing the housing market and rising interest rates had her bracing for unknown territory – and reaching out to One South for advice.

“We had never been in a market where sales went down or rates had gone up so extreme, so I just wanted to make sure I was giving all my agents the opportunities they needed to stay successful,” Carroll said.

Knowing that One South had started in and survived the Great Recession, Carroll said she reached out several months ago and talks ultimately turned toward joining forces.

“I knew that they had opened in 2008, which was obviously a horrible time to open a real estate company, but made it through,” Carroll said. “They’ve always been a real estate company that I’ve held in the top of my regards. They have built a killer brand and they have a great reputation.

“The more we talked, they were like, ‘Man, you guys have all these really amazing things that we’ve been trying to build in our company,’ and they had a whole lot of stuff that I had been trying to do for Clocktower,” she said. “We have very similar philosophies and mindsets. Even our logos are kind of similar if you put them side by side.”

One South co-founder Rick Jarvis said the feeling was mutual. While the company wasn’t looking to bring another firm into the fold, he said combining with Clocktower made sense to both companies and brought benefits to both sides.

Rick Jarvis

“We weren’t actively seeking a deal like this, but we have worked hard to put One South in a position where we could take it on if the people and the numbers made sense,” Jarvis said. “Rhonda built a great company and they were doing a lot of outside-the-box things that we had never thought about.

“The more we spoke, the more we realized that both companies had implemented things that the other could benefit from, and it kind of went from there,” he said. “The financial analysis was actually the easy part; the harder part was making sure that culturally and philosophically we were aligned. The more we learned about Clocktower and the more discussions we had, the more we realized the alignment was there.”

The companies are in the process of transferring licenses for Clocktower agents coming over to One South, and getting them acclimated to One South’s systems. Of Clocktower’s 73 agents, more than 50 have made the move so far, and Jarvis and Carroll said they expect more will do the same.

“I think we’re going to end up retaining over 90 percent, which is crazy for something like this,” Carroll said. “I think it speaks a lot to how much everybody believes in it and how passionate everybody is in both companies. One South has been equally excited, and working with those guys has been really good. I’m excited about the potential, kind of creating a super company.”

With the larger roster comes an increase in potential sales volume for One South, whose agents have closed nearly 600 residential transactions so far this year. Carroll said Clocktower’s agents had closed almost 400 this year.

Jarvis said the combined volume should put One South in the top 10 producing firms in the Central Virginia Regional Multiple Listing Service. One South’s numbers do not include its commercial division, One South Commercial, led by co-founder Tom Rosman, who Carroll said she had worked with on commercial deals over the years.

Clocktower’s office in the Midlothian Village Square shopping center will become a One South outpost. (Photo courtesy of Rhonda Carroll)

Adding to One South’s reach is Clocktower’s Midlothian office, which will be rebranded and serve as the brokerage’s Southside outpost. The 2,000-square-foot office, at 13823 Village Place Drive, opened in a smaller space two doors away before moving to its current space two years ago.

The office supplements One South’s headquarters at 2314 W. Main St. in the Fan. Beyond Richmond, the brokerage also has a presence in the Northern Neck with its Bay Properties affiliate, which it acquired in 2013.

“One of the really exciting aspects of bringing on Clocktower is their office in Midlothian,” Jarvis said. “We have a growing number of agents who work more suburban Richmond markets, and offering an outpost in Midlothian will be a game changer for us. Clocktower has developed a great presence in that market as well. Many of their top agents work heavily in that area.”

As for Clocktower’s Shockoe office at 1705 E. Franklin St., Jarvis said they’re weighing options that could include planting a larger agent team there.

Clocktower’s office in Shockoe Bottom is also included in the deal.

Carroll’s role with the company will be as an additional managing broker, joining current One South managing broker Laura Waite. Carroll said she’ll also have a seat on the company’s leadership board and will help agents with branding and setting strategy for particularly challenging listings.

“Basically getting back to my highest and best use, I feel like, which is important in being able to do the things that I enjoy doing and that the agents really need too,” she said.

Having guided Clocktower to become one of Richmond’s larger brokerages, Carroll said she’s pleased with what was accomplished, and to have found a new home for her agents moving forward.

“I feel like if we hadn’t grown and created the brand and the company that we created, coming together with One South probably never would have happened,” she said. “It certainly wasn’t something that I had planned to do years ago by any means. But at this point, I think that we really are giving the most tools and the most service possible to all of our agents, and that’s a really cool place to be.”

For One South, Jarvis said Clocktower’s addition will make the brokerage stronger for all of its agents.

“One of the internal mandates we both had was to make sure the agents could maintain the same level of access to our core services,” he said. “We put a ton of time and effort into getting this right, and so far it has gone really well.

“At the end of the day, what Rhonda built will bring with it a lot of things that will make One South better, and I know she feels the exact same way about us,” Jarvis said. “What we are building is actually designed for a market that is changing, and we are excited by what the future will bring.”