Tell Me About Being a Realtor

[WayneLigon]

I need a change. I've thought about what it could be, and someone suggested 'Real Estate'. My best friend's mom is a realtor, and there are a couple other people I'm going to ask but I thought about asking here as well. If you're a realtor, or know a lot about being one, tell me what it's like? On average, what could I expect to make a year?

 

[Dire Bare]

Realty is a tricky career move . . . it works out extremely well for some types and extremely poorly for others. Most realtors you will talk to will tell you how wonderful a career it is, which it can be. You are an independent contractor, so any realty office that "hires" you usually has nothing invested in you. You pay for all of your training, your "stuff" (signage, etc), everything. It's a churn-and-burn industry on attracting new realtors, it's no skin off the realty companies backs if you fail, and if you succeed they certainly benefit. When I investigated it, every realtor did their best to convince me it was an amazing career choice and really downplayed the negatives.

Realtors generally don't like to be seen as salespeople, they want to position themselves as professionals like doctors or lawyers. And successful realtors can do just that. But to get yourself started you really need to be a good salesperson and have a lot of energy and drive. You'll get advice and help from your colleages, but all of the time and money to get you started is your own and can be quite considerable. And you don't get paid until you start selling/buying homes for clients.

I gave it a shot in Salt Lake City in the mid-90's when the housing market was doing real well. Lots of property changing hands. Everything was great until I actually completed my training and had nothing but a telephone in the office and the phone book to start making cold calls. A buddy of mine took to it like a fish to water and makes real good money now. I, however, am the anti-salesman and failed miserably. Which I accept for the most part except EVERY realtor I spoke to told me that being a good salesperson was NOT necessary to find success. I disagree now. I wasted a lot of money on training and other supplies.

As far as how much you can make if you take to it . . . there are part-timers who make maybe 20,000/year without too much work, there are the insane dude who work 80-hour weeks and have their faces on billboards all over town and make a gazillion dollars (or maybe six-figures) annually. Most probably fall in between, its a correlation between your ability to be both a salesperson and a knowledable professional, and how hard you work and how much time you dedicate to it.

My two cents.

 

[Torm]

Well, the first thing you need to do is learn to say "REAL-A-TOR", as most of the people in the profession refuse to accept that it only has two syllables.

 

[was]

My stepmother was a realtor for two years before going into property management. She was moderately successful at it, but absolutely hated it. She said: "it was nothing but a bunch of lying, backstabbing weasels who try to steal everything from each other." I don't know if that helps any.

 

[Darthjaye]

I'm currently working with a Title company and getting tons of exposure to realty companies and such by virtue of what I do. I am, most specifically, a courier for a title company and have found that I'm making a lot of contacts (with help from some of the escrow and sales people I work with) as well as learning the ins and outs while I am content with what I'm currently doing. I'll probably invest in some schooling down the road to be better prepared when and if I decide to stay with it. It does take a "people person" to do the job though. A lot of people think they can do it, but as I found out working in the food service industry, there are a lot of people who just aren't good with others on a first contact basis. Also, ingenuine people, although they think they aren't, are very obvious and annoying when they try to do these types of jobs too.

 

[Tarrasque Wrangler]

My advice is to go rent David Mamet's "Glengarry Glen Ross".

 

[devilbat]

I'm a Realtor (two syllables), and I may be able to give you a little advice and insight.

As to what it's like? It's an emotional roller coaster, full of stress. Not scared off yet? Ok, here we go.

I firmly believe that the key to being a succesfull Realtor, is dedication to the job. If you're not prepared to put in long hours, miss family events, work days and evenings, have people stab you in the back and be ready to pull your hair out multiple times every day, then Real Estate is not the job for you.

That being said, if you love to work, meet new people every day, are a self starter, are a good communicater, are patient, are willing to live without a bi-weekly cheque, and want to have a potentially huge income without years of schooling, Real Estate may be the career for you.

Being the ultimate schmoozer is not necessary, but it doesn't hurt. What's more important, is being fairly well connected. The more people you know, the more potential business is there for you. To be succesfull, you need to be meeting new people, and letting them know what you do for a living. Getting to know the in's and out's of the local Real Estate market, is fairly simple. But dealing with people, and making them feel confident in trusting you with the largest investment they are likely to ever make, is trickier.

I would suggest having enough money to live for five to six months without earning a penny, as the business is very expensive to get started. My biggest piece of advice would be to look into becoming a licensed assistant for an established agent. That way you can learn the ropes without a huge monthly bill.

If you have any specific questions, feel free to fire away.

 

[BOZ]

my uncle is one of the top realtors in the Chicago area for Remax. my wife once decided she wanted to find an easy way to get a lot of money, so real estate sounded good to her so i told her to e-mail my uncle. his response (i wish i still had it but i couldn't find it) was much like devilbat's, though twice as long and far more detailed. let's just say she lost interest pretty quickly.

if course, he did say that it could be very lucrative IF you were willing to put in a lot of work with little reward initially. it certainly has benefitted him! but just starting out he was as poor as anyone else.

 

[Dire Bare]

Well, the first thing you need to do is learn to say "REAL-A-TOR", as most of the people in the profession refuse to accept that it only has two syllables.

Darn it! I KNEW there was something else that held me back . . .

 

[der_kluge]

I've worked with several realtors, and my wife's step-Mom is a realtor. If you want to be successful, you have to be very aggressive, and works lots and lots of hours. If you have clients that want to look at houses to buy in the area, chances are they work during the week, or at least one of them does, and they'll want to look at houses on the weekend. So, I would imagine that most realtors spend all of their weekends driving all over town showing houses to finicky couples. If that sounds like fun, then being a realtor might be just the thing for you.