The Century 21 Real Estate company was founded by Art Bartlett and Marsh Fisher in California in 1971. In 1977, the two initiated a public offering on the stock exchange in order to raise capital to expand their company throughout the US. By 1984, the Century 21 Real Estate company was bought entirely by the Metropolitan Life Insurance company. Like a lot of other companies of the 1980s, Century 21 Real Estate was the mark of big financial companies looking to expand their product lines to customers.

Eventually, Century 21 Real Estate was acquired by the conglomerate HFS, a company that had varied interests in other franchised companies. Subsequently, HFS and Cendant merged and the real estate division, was spun off. The new parent company, Realogy, would also control Coldwell Banker and ERA, as well as Century 21 Real Estate. This put Realogy in 25% of every residential real estate transaction conducted in the United States.

Worldwide, Century 21 Real Estate has over eight thousand offices and more than 140,000 independent agents, in more than 40 countries. Practically every major city in the United States, and a large majority of smaller cities, has at least one Century 21 Real Estate branch office.

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