Chief Economists Are the New Marketers

It’s 9:30 a.m. on a Monday, and the Washington, D.C., offices of Redfin, a 10-year-old real estate listings Web site, are just coming to life. They’ve only been in the space for about a year, and the office feels more like the tech start-up Redfin wants to be than the old-line brokerage it’s cribbing from: Computer workstations line the walls and free-floating tables stand ready for spontaneous meetings.