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Amid a federal push to dismantle diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, Windermere Real Estate is doubling down. The Seattle-based brokerage announced on Monday that it’s appointed longtime broker Brooks Glenn as its new director of inclusion and community engagement as former director, Samantha Enos, returns to full-time sales.
Brooks Glenn
Glenn has been in the real estate industry for 25 years, with executive experience in real estate sales and property management and legal training in real estate and corporate law. Outside of the office, Glenn is deeply involved with several real estate organizations, including Western Washington Realtist, The Real Estate Alliance of Seattle and the Black Home Initiative. For his work, Glenn was named the National Association of Real Estate Brokers’ Realtist Broker of the Year in 2021.
“I took this position because I recognize the historical role that real estate professionals played in perpetuating harm and systemic inequalities, particularly toward Black communities and other minority groups,” Glenn said in a statement. “Practices like restrictive covenants, redlining and exclusionary opportunities in real estate contributed to long-lasting harm for both homebuyers and practitioners.”
“While legal changes have been made, and hearts and minds have clearly shifted, I believe the work is far from over,” he added.
Windermere began its formal DEI journey amid a summer of protests after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd while arresting him for allegedly selling loose cigarettes. Brokerage president OB Jacobi said Floyd’s death and the wider Black Lives Matter movement made him realize Windermere could do more to support DEI within the company and the communities they serve.
OB Jacobi
“For nearly 50 years Windermere has been deeply rooted in the communities where we do business. However, the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement has made us realize that our roots don’t extend as deep as we thought,” Jacobi said in an October 2020 blog post. “It also made us realize that over the decades, the real estate industry has played a significant role in exacerbating systemic racism through redlining and steering, which has prevented many members of historically marginalized communities from building wealth through homeownership.”
The next year, Windermere rolled out the program, which hinges on four pillars: Community, Homeownership, Leadership and Culture.
The Community and Homeownership pillars focus on increased involvement in racially diverse communities through homeownership education and other community-based initiatives. Through these two pillars, Windermere has spent the past four years helping homeowners remove restrictive covenants from their titles.
Meanwhile, the Leadership and Culture pillars focus on creating an inclusive environment and providing leadership training and opportunities, such as an internship program with the University of Washington for students of color interested in starting a real estate career.
Windermere’s DEI efforts earned them the 2024 Innovative Brokerage Award from Leading Real Estate Companies of the World.
Jacobi said Enos’ return to full-time real estate sales gave the company an opportunity to reevaluate the future of its DEI program, as companies like Target, Walmart, Amazon, McDonalds, Meta, Google and Disney reduce their DEI efforts or slash them altogether.
“Following Samantha [Enos]’s return to real estate sales, we had many discussions about the future of DEI at Windermere and how we could best continue our efforts and the goals we outlined for the company in 2021,” he said in a statement. “These discussions intensified in recent months as we watched companies around the country pull back from their DEI commitments.”
”Despite this trend, we feel strongly that it’s important to continue our work to support and advance diversity, equity, and inclusion within our company, within our industry, and within homeownership,” he added. “And we are confident that Brooks is the right person to lead those efforts.”
Glenn will be responsible for overseeing Windermere’s overall DEI goals and supporting individual Windermere offices with their DEI strategies and programs. He’ll also focus on DEI advancement in the real estate industry through outreach and collaboration.
“Windermere standing strong in its commitment to not simply support the movement, but become a driving force to promote Diversity, Equity and Inclusion has the potential to inspire others and change communities,” he said. “I’m honored to do this work alongside Windermere, and if I’m honest, I recognize I’m standing on the shoulders of giants.”
