Howard Hanna Real Estate Services is moving into Alabama, Inman has learned exclusively, through a partnership with ARC Realty and Capstone Realty, which will operate together as the state’s largest brokerage.
The deal adds 875 agents across roughly 12 offices in Birmingham, Montgomery and Huntsville to Howard Hanna’s network. ARC and Capstone together closed about 6,000 transactions worth $2.8 billion in sales volume in 2025, according to the companies.
Howard Hanna is calling the deal a partnership, not an acquisition. But CEO Howard “Hoby” Hanna IV told Inman the company is taking a majority stake in the combined firm. It’s the same model Howard Hanna has used in other markets: buy control, but let local operators run day-to-day decisions. Financial terms weren’t disclosed.
“It lets us keep local leadership involved and keep entrepreneurs with their hands on the steering wheel,” Hanna told Inman.
ARC Realty CEO Beau Bevis and Capstone Realty CEO Darrin Hasley will stay on. Hanna said Bevis will lead Howard Hanna’s push deeper into the Southeast.
Why Alabama, and why now
Hanna told Inman that Alabama wasn’t necessarily a target market for the brokerage. His rule of thumb for expansion is any strong company east of the Mississippi River, a footprint he says Howard Hanna can manage hands-on. Within that footprint, deals come to the company, not the other way around.
“We don’t have Wall Street money behind us telling us to grow by acquisition or hit a quarterly goal,” Hanna said. “So we can be very selective.”
In this case, Hanna said, Bevis and Hasley reached out first. Their two firms merged in 2022, creating one of Alabama’s largest independent brokerage networks and establishing a No. 1 position in the Greater Alabama MLS (GAMLS). ARC has operated in Central Alabama since 2012, and Capstone, founded in 2009, is focused on Huntsville and North Alabama.
Alabama is only the starting point, Hanna said. He hopes to use the ARC-Capstone base to move into Tennessee and parts of Florida over the next year.
The Alabama deal is Howard Hanna’s latest in a rapid expansion. Hanna said the company had made three major announcements in the past 60 days, including bringing Maine-based Portside Real Estate Group into the partnership. He said more deals could come before the end of the year and in 2027.
Howard Hanna says it’s the country’s largest family-owned brokerage, with more than 500 offices and 15,000 sales associates and staff across 19 states. The 875 Alabama agents would add meaningfully to that headcount.
What changes for ARC and Capstone agents
The Alabama firms will co-brand rather than rebrand, operating as Howard Hanna ARC and Howard Hanna Capstone. Howard Hanna uses the same model in the Carolinas, where Allen Tate has operated as Howard Hanna Allen Tate since a 2025 rebrand. Allen Tate Realtors combined with Howard Hanna in 2018, and the companies operated under their individual names for several years before the rebrand.
For ARC and Capstone agents, Hanna described a phased rollout of changes with the new partnership. The first things they’ll get are:
- Hanna Health and Wealth, a program that offers health, dental and vision insurance to independent contractors, along with investment and retirement savings products
- Income Advantage, a draw against future commissions
- Howard Hanna’s education platform
Two more integrations are scheduled for next year. HannaList, which Hanna described as a single point of entry for listing distribution that works alongside the MLS, will arrive in the first quarter of 2027. Howard Hanna’s integrated agent technology platform, H-Suite, will follow later in 2027.
The consumer pitch begins this fall, when Howard Hanna brings its 100% Money Back Guarantee to Alabama. Under the program, Howard Hanna will buy back a home purchased through one of its listings if the buyer is unhappy for any reason within the first year.
“It’s a unique, creative marketing program that we think has driven a lot of sales in all our other markets, and we believe it’ll fit really well in the growth markets of Huntsville and Birmingham,” Hanna said.
Hanna on OpenRE, Compass and the MLS
The Alabama deal comes as large brokerages and MLSs fight over who controls listing data. Hanna offered a few hot takes about the escalating situation during the interview with Inman.
He took a shot at Open Real Estate, the listing initiative a group of large brokerages announced this week.
Keller Williams, AGNT (the parent of eXp and NextHome), HomeServices of America and Real REMAX Group are founding Open Real Estate, an industry-led effort to build shared infrastructure for distributing listing information across MLSs, real estate search sites and other platforms.
The group positions itself as a counterweight to listing fragmentation that supporters say began with Compass and Redfin’s February deal to share Compass agents’ exclusive listings, a fracturing that could force buyers to go to great lengths to find homes.
“It’s a great headline, but there’s nothing there,” Hanna said of Open Real Estate. He argued that Howard Hanna has already built its own listing input, editing, distribution and analytics with Find It First through a partnership with Ocusell.
“So we’re innovating, we’re building, we’re disrupting the market,” Hanna told Inman.
Hanna also rejected Anthony Lamacchia, CEO of the Lamacchia Companies, calling Compass’s MLS lawsuits “mutually assured destruction” in a recent Inman op-ed.
Hanna agrees with Compass that the MLS needs reform. In his view, the MLS has drifted from its B2B roots, and IDX rules written around 2000 now let listing portals pull data out of the system without putting any in.
But he said lawsuits are the wrong tool.
“I hate lawsuits. I hate seeing people get backed into corners in a fight,” Hanna said. “We should all be sitting at a table finding a way to assure not destruction, but growth for the industry and for consumers in the future.”
Hanna described the Alabama partnership deal as part of a broader industry shift, with large independent firms choosing to join larger independent networks instead of franchise systems.
“That’s part of the changing face of the industry,” he said. “Great independent brokerage firms that are focused on running real estate businesses are coming together and being a force for the industry.”
