About 20 years ago, Adelaide real estate veteran Anthony Toop was approached by a co-operative group who said his business would cease to exist within a few years if he didn't join them. "It's very rewarding to think back and not even know or remember who the hell it was I had that interview with because they're long gone!" says Toop, the director of Toop & Toop which this month celebrates 30 years in business.

"After 30 years, you say 'I've got a lot of experience, but I'm also getting tired,' and I look at my competitors and think there's no way you can have done an intense 20 or 30 years and not be tired. That means the girls have a 30 year horizon," he says of his daughters Genevieve, 28, and Suzannah, 26, who have taken over the running of the business.

Toop says he is now taking a completely different role as he allows his daughters to take over the running of the firm. "You can't have a person there second-guessing," he says. "In my view you've either got to let them go for it, and have a very professional hand over, which is what we're doing, versus trying to retain the ego and all the clout that comes with it. So my new role is emerging very clearly as a mentoring role."

Genevieve and Suzannah decided to take over the business a few years ago when their father was diagnosed with cancer. "I was so sick that I could have been dead within three months, so it was a question of 'Do we sell it, do we bring in a professional manager, or do you want it?' and the kids, without any prompting at all said straight away, 'We are taking it,'" says Toop. "That was a really simple decision. In some ways I feel really sorry for people who are trying to get succession over the line without any pressure because I think it would be really hard, and for us it was really simple, when you don't have choices. And as it turns out I'm still around, so that's great for me, but we needed to act immediately and we needed to act without hesitation."

He admires their passion for innovation, particularly new generation marketing. "The girls are so passionate about that side of it, they're coming in understanding this new generation," he says.

Toop is happy his daughters willingly took over the family business, rather than feeling pressured to do so. "Because I felt that way with my family business which was an electrical business in the country, we were very clear in our communication that we've got no expectation whatsoever," he says. "There's no financial pressure so [succession] can be done in a really considered way. So if I have any advice to anyone, you wouldn't want to have what happened to us happen with a business that had financial difficulties or wasn't really running that well. It takes a lot of pressure off knee-jerk decisions."

Over the past 30 years, the real estate industry has undergone several changes, he says. "I feel incredibly proud that we're still as relevant as we were because in that 30 years when we started the business, the agencies that were our mentors and our aspirational brands, pretty much are all gone," says Toop. "In that 30 years we've actually seen the arrival of franchises and the co-operatives, and the co-operatives haven't powered ahead like the franchises have. In that time we've seen independents turn into franchises and co-operative models, and we've been through the era of the mergers and the franchises, and I think we're now entering the next phase now which is the rise of the independents."