MarketView Broker has three different entity classes: Agents, Offices, and Firms.  The definitions for Agents and Offices are pretty straightforward, but how do we roll these up to Firms?  We leverage the MainOfficeID field as defined in the MLS data for every office.  Offices that share a MainOfficeID are rolled up into the Firm, as are the agents in the offices with a shared MainOfficeID. 

If a franchise or brokerage has multiple offices but does not have a shared MainOfficeID applied to their offices, then each of their offices will show up as a distinct firm. It's not foolproof in that the application of a MainOfficeID varies from brokerage to brokerage, but we are continuing to brainstorm approaches to work around this lack of standardization.  Stay tuned!