The nation's largest residential real-estate brokerage company has acquired O'ahu's locally owned residential and commercial Coldwell Banker franchises.

NRT Inc., a subsidiary of publicly traded Cendant Corp. of New Jersey, yesterday announced its acquisition of O'ahu's Coldwell Banker franchises for an undisclosed price, making the state's largest residential real-estate firm a unit of the $20 billion conglomerate that in 2001 bought another Hawai'i business, Cheap Tickets.

The acquisition includes Coldwell Banker Pacific Properties Ltd., which employs 500 sales associates in five offices that sold about 4,000 homes worth $2 billion last year, and Coldwell Banker Commercial Pacific Properties Ltd., a single-office firm with a sales staff of 15.

NRT's purchase is a core part of its growth strategy focused on acquiring real-estate brokerage firms, especially in markets with higher-than-average home prices.

Coldwell Banker Pacific said it expects the sale won't have a negative impact on its sales agents, but instead will provide the company with improvements in marketing, technology and service.

"It's business as usual, just with more resources," said Judy Reeves, chief operating officer of NRT.

"NRT can provide resources far beyond what we could provide on our own," said Scott Bradley, who co-founded and co-owned Coldwell Banker Pacific with Herb Conley.

Bradley and Conley now serve as co-presidents of NRT's Hawai'i operation under the company's western region headed by Greg Macres, an NRT senior vice president.

"We're especially pleased to continue to do business under the Coldwell Banker brand, which has a great deal of equity for us and our associates," Conley said.

Reeves said it was unusual for NRT to buy a franchisee, but the opportunity came about during discussions over renewing Coldwell Banker Pacific's franchise agreement.

Coldwell Banker Pacific was established in 1995 after the merger of Dolman Associates, Conley Dew, Bradley Properties and Coldwell Banker McCormack Real Estate — a move that consolidated Hawai'i's residential real-estate industry during a slowdown in the market.

Coldwell Banker Commercial Pacific was formed in 1998 by Bradley and Conley, and is headed by Ron Teves.

Other Coldwell Banker franchises on the Neighbor Islands were not part of the deal with NRT.

NRT was created in 1997 by Cendant's predecessor with investment firm Apollo Management LP to acquire residential real-estate brokerages for operation under Cendant-owned brands that include Coldwell Banker, Century 21 and ERA.

In 2002, Cendant bought out its partner for $230 million, and has kept the acquisition spree in high gear. Last year, NRT acquired 21 real-estate brokerages for about $115 million, and sold homes valued at $204 billion.

NRT operates about 1,000 real-estate offices in 35 major metropolitan areas, helping make Cendant's real-estate business the biggest revenue generator for a company also entrenched in the vehicle rental, hospitality and travel distribution industries with brands such as Ramada, Days Inn, Avis and Orbitz.

Other Cendant brands include Budget Car Rental, Howard Johnson, Sotheby's International Realty and Cheap Tickets, a former Hawai'i-based ticket wholesaler Cendant bought for $313 million in 2001.

Last month, Cendant announced a plan to split into four publicly owned companies, organized by its four main industries, next year.

Reach Andrew Gomes at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com.