Realtor Matt Difanis has been installed as the 2018 President of Illinois Realtors. He is a co-owner of RE/MAX Realty Associates, with offices in Champaign, Mahomet and Monticello.
Difanis took his real estate pre-licensing coursework in 1998 while still an undergraduate student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He subsequently worked full time as a Realtor while attending the University of Illinois College of Law and was featured in Realtor Magazine’s 2004 Class of “30 Under 30.” He has earned the Accredited Buyer’s Representative (ABR) and the Graduate, Realtors Institute (GRI) designations.
He led the Champaign County Association of Realtors as president in 2012 and was honored as its Realtor of the Year in 2013. He has served on the National Association of Realtors (NAR) Social Media Advisory Board and Business Issues Policy Committee, and is currently a member of the Professional Standards Committee and the NAR Board of Directors.
Difanis serves on the Illinois Realtors’ Board of Directors and has chaired the Strategic Planning Committee, Finance Committee, Digital Messaging & Communications Task Force, Public Policy and Government Affairs Member Involvement Group and the NAR Involvement Subcommittee. In 2018, he will chair Illinois Realtors’ Executive Committee and lead the state association’s Board of Directors.
A past board president of the Mahomet Area Youth Club, Difanis continues to serve on the board’s executive committee. From 2010 to 2013, he volunteered as the official photographer for Central Illinois Honor Flight, taking 12 trips with more than 700 World War II veterans as they visited war memorials in Washington, D.C. He has also volunteered as a photographer and sound board operator at his church, Windsor Road Christian Church. In 2015, Difanis was named Central Illinois Business magazine’s “Forty Under 40” Man of the Year.
Difanis and his wife, Angelle, live in Mahomet and are the parents of two children, Gabriel and Isabelle.
Installation ceremonies were conducted at the Illinois Realtors Inaugural Gala on Oct. 12 at the Chicago Marriott Naperville in Naperville.