Robin Hackney so valued home that she made real estate her career, and she brought along as many of her friends and family as possible.

Hackney's latest venture is a high-profile partnership between her family-owned, recently rebranded Horizon Realty Group and Howard Hanna Allen Tate, a larger real estate company that's also family owned. "They're in 14 states and have 500 offices and 15,000 agents from Michigan, New York, all the way down to Savannah, Georgia," said Hackney, the branch leader and broker in charge. "So, we can pretty much help anybody do anything they need."

That "we" includes her older son, Deans Hackney III, who, after about a decade with the former Hackney & Co. is a partner in the new franchise. He concentrates on the commercial side of the business, which includes development services all over the Southeast. Hackney's husband, Deans Hackney Jr., runs the related Horizon Homes custom homes arm of the family enterprise.

In 2024, the power couple was inducted into the Wilmington-Cape Fear Home Builders' Hall of Fame for their years of helping clients, often retirees, fulfill their custom-build visions. Robin Hackney translates client needs and preferences into livable space, whether that's starting from scratch or sourcing an existing home. Deans Hackney III keeps an eye out for under-realized properties.

After Deans Hackney III got married last year, his wife, Ginny, became a real estate agent. "So, it has kind of come full circle," Robin Hackney said.

The circle is wide enough to include friends too. Her "third child," Alexander Coffey, a neighbor and friend of the siblings since youth, also works for Horizon Homes.

"Fortunately, we don't really have that going on, and I think it is because we're all kind of diverse," Robin Hackney said. "We all bring different qualities to the business. I feel like we are a collaboration, not a my-way-or-the-highway kind of company."

Robin Hackney first joined the biz with help from her friend Phyllis York Brookshire. "My best friend's father had a large commercial real estate company, York Properties. And when we were in college at Chapel Hill, he opened a real estate brokerage company. So, between our junior and senior year of college, we took the real estate course and got our real estate licenses."

Another friend got her interested in home appraisals, so she also learned that side of the business as Deans Hackney Jr. obtained his MBA from Wake Forest University. The couple relocated to Wilmington, where his work with developer Doug Cameron Echols awaited.

"Doug, unfortunately, passed away (in 2006), had kidney failure," Robin Hackney said. "We loved it here and just decided that we would stay and continue in the industry that brought us here."

She worked as an appraiser for a savings and loan, as well as for Prudential and Intracoastal Realty, before forming Hackney & Co. As their boys grew, the parents encouraged them to swing hammers. The family joined together for the Cape Fear Habitat for Humanity Builders Blitz in 2012.

"They were in high school, and we brought them on board to help us build two homes in seven days," Hackney recalled. "They got a full experience of start to finish, build a house as fast as you can."

The idea that work and family don't have to be opposing concepts continues to expand under Howard Hanna Allen Tate. Hackney's best friend, York Brookshire, in fact, worked there first. "She has been with Allen Tate for 18 years. She and I were on a girls' trip, and we started talking shop. She mentioned the affiliate program, and it just sort of clicked."

The reason the partnership is a good fit, the Horizon owner observed, is that the organizations have similar values. "Even though they are a very large company, the way they approach their agents, their training, all of that is like a family company," she said.

That's given Robin Hackney the feeling that she's still very much mid-career. "Their company has so much resource material, and just everything that they offer for an agent, that learning, has been very inspirational. In most worlds, I would be considered later in my career. I feel like I'm new to the business again, which has been fun."