About FCAR

Testimonial:

1971, right after graduating from Bunnell High School, I began working as a secretary for Trad Realty, the only real estate company in Flagler County.

Let me set the scene for you: The population of Flagler County was just 4,454. There was no Palm Coast, no Hammock Dunes, and none of the other large developments we know today. Flagler Beach was a quiet, laid-back beach town. The Hammock area wasn't yet a desirable place to live, although Bing’s Fish Camp, with its travel trailers, was a local attraction. At that time, there were only two traffic lights in the county – one in Bunnell at US #1 and another in Flagler Beach at A1A. The area was also home to an abandoned cement plant, with thousands of acres of land along the Intracoastal Waterway.

Around that same time, ITT Community Development Corp. (later known as ICDC) began secretly acquiring large parcels of land in Flagler County from the Lehigh Portland Cement Company and Rayonier Timber Company, along with several smaller properties. Charles Trad of Trad Realty was involved in some of these transactions.

As development began, ICDC would bring sections of land before the Flagler County Commission for approval, one parcel at a time. These early sales were being conducted off-site in other states and countries. There were still no roads, utilities, residents, or buildings. The toll bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway hadn’t been built yet. Flagler County did experience a brief uptick in property sales, fueled by rumors of a future city of 200,000 residents. A similar surge happened when the Palm Coast Toll Bridge was announced.

As time went on, salespeople from ICDC’s offices around the country began visiting the project, and some decided to stay and open real estate offices locally. Over time, these offices started communicating, although there was still no formal exchange of information or listings. Remember that this was before computers, fax machines, and the Internet. We were still using carbon copies inserted into paper contracts.

Charles Trad had been a Realtor® with the Daytona Beach Realtors® Association, and when I began working for him, I quickly became involved in preparing listings and contracts. I also started to see the commission checks and thought, “I want to earn that too!” So, I became a licensed Realtor® at the age of 19.

Soon, the real estate offices in the area began sharing listings, and we formed a voluntary paper-based MLS system. We’d make copies of our listings and distribute them to the other offices, and they did the same. As more brokerages opened, one office offered to store our MLS paperwork and became the central point for picking up and distributing listings.

Soon after, we decided to apply for membership with the National Association of Realtors® (NAR) and form our own association. Daytona Beach Realtors® objected, and NAR initially wanted us to have more members before allowing us to break off. But we eventually prevailed, and in 1979, we were formally incorporated as the Flagler County Board of Realtors®, which later became the Flagler County Association of Realtors®.

For a bit of historical perspective, I looked up the census data, and it’s fascinating to see that with the arrival of ITT and the development of Palm Coast, Flagler County’s population doubled nearly every 10 years. Here's a snapshot of the population growth starting in 1920: [Census Data].   Submitted by Barbara Revels!