NAR Honors Newest DSAs: Colleen Badagliacco and Jim Imhoff

The National Association of REALTORS® announced today that Jim Imhoff of Madison, Wis., and Colleen Badagliacco of Morgan Hill, Calif., are the 2024 recipients of the Distinguished Service Award, the highest honor outside the presidency bestowed on an NAR member.

Colleen Badagliacco, ABR, GRl, CRS, CRB, CIPS, ePro, AHWD, C2EX, SRES

Colleen Badagliacco’s career in real estate began as a temporary role while she awaited news of state funding to support her work as an educator. By the time the funding was approved a few months later, Badagliacco had decided real estate was where she wanted to be. More than 45 years later, she is an broker associate with Legacy Real Estate and Associates, an independent brokerage in Fremont, Calif.

“It’s a tremendous honor,” says Badagliacco. “So many of the leaders I most admire have received this honor, and to now be recognized as well is most humbling and a bit overwhelming. I hope to honor them in return with continued service to my community and the REALTOR® family.”

Badagliacco has served on the NAR Board of Directors continuously since 1995. She has chaired or served as a member of a diverse group of committees, presidential advisory groups, work groups and forums, including Executive, Strategic Planning, Business Issues, Multiple Listing Issues and Policy, Nominating, Finance, Business Issues, and Leadership Identification and Development. In 2008, she represented NAR on the Fannie Mae Advisory Board. In 2016, she served as an NAR Regional Vice President (Region 13), and in 2018, she was NAR Vice President for Association Affairs.

Badagliacco is a 2010 inductee into the REALTORS® Political Action Committee Hall of Fame and has been a longtime member of the President’s Circle.

“Colleen Badagliacco is the personification of a real estate professional,” says Joe Hanauer (2010 DSA), chair of the Distinguished Service Award Council. “Beyond her effectiveness in client interactions, she is a recognized leader in the industry. Her service as chair of some of the most critical committees on a local, state and national level has earned her numerous recognitions and honors acknowledging her leadership in developing the real estate profession.”

In 2007, Badagliacco served as president of the California Association of REALTORS® (CAR) and was honored as REALTOR® of the Year in 2007. She is also a past president of the Santa Clara County Association of REALTORS® (1992) and was named REALTOR® of the Year by that organization in 1991. In 2008, Badagliacco was honored with the Byron Brawley Lifetime Service Award, which recognizes industry service in her local market.

Badagliacco commitment to service extends to her community, where she has been an active member of the San Jose Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and multiple strategic planning groups and community associations.

In 2007, the San Jose Business Journal named her Residential Broker of the Year and the Legislative Woman of Distinction. This same year, she received the Mayor Service Commendation from the City of San Jose. She has supported or volunteered with numerous organizations and initiatives, including Special Olympics, Children’s Miracle Network and Habitat for Humanity. She is a founding member of the Housing Trust of Silicon Valley.

Drawing on her background in education, Badagliacco has been a real estate instructor for CAR and California Community Colleges, and she has been a speaker and panelist at numerous local, state and national conferences. She is a graduate of Santa Clara University and holds a master’s degree in education from San Diego State University.

Reflecting on her years of involvement with NAR, Badagliacco imagines her career would likely have been shorter and less fulfilling without it. “Through involvement, your commitment strengthens,” says Badagliacco. “We need to grow leaders who do what they do for the commitment to service, not titles. It’s the contributions that help the organization that are ultimately the most personally rewarding.”

Badagliacco and her husband, Dennis, have made real estate a family affair. Dennis Badagliacco, CCIM, is a broker specializing in commercial real estate Together, they have two grown children: a son, Robert, also a real estate professional and a CCIM designee, and a daughter, Laura. They have five grandchildren.

Jim Imhoff, GRI

Jim Imhoff, a licensed real estate professional since 1971, is Chairman Emeritus of First Weber Inc., a Wisconsin firm with more than 1,200 professionals in more than 70 offices, and a part of HomeServices of America.

Imhoff credits his father with instilling a commitment to be involved. When he told his dad, who was a general contractor, that he was going into real estate, his dad said, “If you do, you’d better be all in. Be involved in the industry. Get the education you need. Be part of the association. And that’s what I did from day one,” he says. “I’ve been active at all levels—local state and national—since the 1970s.”

That involvement has been invaluable to his business, he says. “Being able to share ideas with other brokers has allowed me to take those back to my firm.”

Of the award, Imhoff calls it “quite an honor. My name has been in consideration before, but I never felt bad when I didn’t get it because the people who did were well-deserving.”

As chair of the RPAC Trustees in 2001, Imhoff helped establish the REALTORS® Political Action Committee Hall of Fame and has been a member since its inaugural year, 2002. A longtime President’s Circle member, he is a passionate advocate for the industry and currently serves as chair of the American Property Owners Alliance, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization created to protect and support property owners.

Joe Hanauer (2010 DSA), chair of the Distinguished Service Award Council, calls Imhoff a “lifelong leader. Jim has applied the same skills used to drive his firm to its leading market position to helping drive RPAC’s success. And he has tirelessly served the local, state and national associations.”

Over the course of his career, Imhoff has spent some 20 years as an NAR director, and he has been a trustee of the REALTORS® Political Action Committee for more than 20 years. He was a liaison to the Leadership Team in 2015 and 2019. Additionally, he has chaired or served on a variety of NAR committees, work groups, advisory boards and presidential advisory groups, primarily focused on brokerage and advocacy issues. Among others, those include the Broker Engagement Committee and Broker Engagement Work Group, the REALTOR® Party Coordinating Committee; the RPAC Issues Conference work group; and the Issues Mobilization Committee.

At the state level, Imhoff received a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017 for outstanding service to the Wisconsin REALTORS® Association. He was president of WRA in 1991 and received that organization’s REALTOR® of the Year in 1993. The Madison Board of REALTORS® (now the REALTORS® Association of South Central Wisconsin) also named Imhoff REALTOR® of the Year in 1993. He was president of the local association in 1980. He helped establish and served as a director for RASCW’s nonprofit arm, the Greater Madison Housing Foundation, which provides housing purchase assistance for low-income families. In 1994, Gov. Tommy Thompson appointed Imhoff to the state real estate commission. He was elected chairman in 1995 and served until 2002.

Imhoff, a 1966 graduate of Marquette University School of Business, serves as a director on the Advisory Board of the University of Wisconsin–Madison School of Business, James A. Grasskamp Center for Real Estate, and on the Advisory Board of the Marquette University School of Business Real Estate Center, a program he helped establish. And his leadership has extended to many other community organizations. For example, he served 12 years on the Board of Trustees for Edgewood High School, three of those years as chair, and he was on the Edgewood College Board of Trustees for eight years. He was instrumental in forming the First Weber Foundation in 2005; to date, the foundation has contributed more than $4 million to deserving charities around Wisconsin.

A bank examiner early in his career, Imhoff continues to serve in the banking industry. Since 1978, he has served as a director of the Park Bank of Madison. From 1978 to 2021, he was also a director of a Madison, Wis.–based mutual fund, Madison Funds, with assets of more than $5 billion. He chaired the fund for more than 10 years.

Imhoff is a veteran who served for six years, from 1967 to 1973, in the Wisconsin National Guard.

He lives with his life partner of more than 30 years, Kitty Kuhl. Between them, they have four children and seven grandchildren.