Century 21 Real Estate

The franchise fee ranges from $0 to $25,000, with the actual amount determined by your market and agreement structure — zero-fee entry points are sometimes available for established brokerages converting their existing office.

The 6% royalty applies to gross revenue on each closed transaction. There's a separate 1.5% royalty on gross revenue from property management services. Century 21 doesn't disclose a fixed advertising fund rate in the summary — your franchise agreement will specify contributions to the national advertising fund (NAF).

Total investment spans $34,670 to $466,300. The low end reflects a small-market conversion (existing brokerage switching brands); the high end is a new, full-size office buildout with staff in a major metro. Real estate brokerage franchises are one of the few categories where your ongoing labor costs (agent splits, administrative staff) can dwarf the franchise fees.

Century 21 does not disclose Item 19 financial performance data in its FDD. There are no averages, medians, or ranges for franchisee revenue, office income, or broker profitability. This is a legal non-disclosure — the FDD requirements allow franchisors to omit Item 19 entirely.

What this means practically: you cannot use the FDD to estimate income potential. You'll need to speak with a statistically significant sample of existing Century 21 franchisees in comparable markets, ask specifically about gross revenue per agent, office overhead as a percentage of GCI (gross commission income), and net income after agent splits and royalties.

Real estate brokerage profitability varies enormously by market cycle, agent count, and split structure. A 10-agent office in a hot market can generate strong income; the same office in a slow market with 6 agents may barely cover overhead.

Century 21 operates 1,734 franchised offices in the US — a significant national footprint. The brand is owned by Anywhere Real Estate (formerly Realogy), which also owns Coldwell Banker, ERA, Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate, and Corcoran. The parent company's scale provides corporate infrastructure and national advertising reach.

The real estate brokerage sector is heavily tied to interest rate cycles. The 2022–2024 rate environment significantly suppressed transaction volume across all brokerage brands. Franchisees who signed during the 2020–2021 boom may be experiencing considerably different unit economics than those who survived the 2023–2024 correction. Review the franchisor's own financial statements (Anywhere Real Estate is publicly traded) to understand current system health.

The absence of Item 19 financial performance disclosure is a significant red flag for evaluation purposes — not because it implies fraud, but because it leaves you flying blind. Every real estate brokerage franchise in this category (Century 21, Coldwell Banker, RE/MAX, Keller Williams) has structural reasons for not disclosing: individual office economics vary too much by market and agent count to produce meaningful averages. But that's exactly why you must do deep franchisee interviews before signing.

Agent recruiting is the actual business. A Century 21 franchise is fundamentally an agent recruitment and retention operation — the brand provides leads and credibility, but your profitability depends on how many producing agents you can hire, split, and keep. If you don't have existing relationships in local real estate, the ramp to profitability is long.

The wide investment range ($35K–$466K) also reflects how unpredictable build costs and working capital needs are. The low-end figure assumes an existing brokerage conversion with minimal overhead — a realistic first-year operating budget for a new office in a competitive market is considerably higher.