Anyone here spent much time in real estate world? I’m considering becoming an agent for personnel investment properties. The few agents I’ve had a chance to talk to say doing it part time is impractical due to scheduling if you have a another full time job, unless it’s for investment purposes. Thoughts?
No experience as an agent, but just from my observations recently buying and selling a house it seems like it would be difficult and probably impractical if you’re already employed full time. First off, if you’re an agent for say Re/Max you have to pay them an annual fee for office space, the name, etc… and I don’t think it’s cheap (I think it’s upwards of $30K). Second you’re at the whim of your clients so if they want to see a house at 9 AM on Tuesday what are you going to say, no?
If they want to call you and talk about x, y, or z or just to bitch during your normal work day what are you going to do, ignore them? I doubt that’ll go over very well. Third and probably the most troublesome is the inspections and actual closing of sales, which I’m willing to bet occurs the vast majority of the time between 9-5 on Mon-Fri. So every time you close or there’s an inspection you’d have to take off and closing doesn’t always go smoothly. Plus you’ve gotta be pretty flexible around client schedules, which would be difficult while working a normal job.
My $0.02 anyway.
Former agent here.
If you start in the biz helping people buy flips, or holds, you’ll be spinning your wheels for a very small ROI. Think about looking at 10, 20, sometimes 50 investment properties that are at the bottom of your market. I have made the mistake of looking at 30+ properties to ultimately assist on a $31k property. I earned $1500 for 20-30 hours of work. Not an ideal situation.
I love real estate, and think it’s an awesome opportunity. If you are going to get started part-time, consider listing properties only. You can prospect from your office or home during “money hours” 5-9pm. Go on listing presentations after work, and the best part is, you will rarely show the property yourself. You just learn how to advertise and market properly, and the buyer’s agents come to you.
Good luck!
[quote]usmccds423 wrote:
No experience as an agent, but just from my observations recently buying and selling a house it seems like it would be difficult and probably impractical if you’re already employed full time. First off, if you’re an agent for say Re/Max you have to pay them an annual fee for office space, the name, etc… and I don’t think it’s cheap (I think it’s upwards of $30K). Second you’re at the whim of your clients so if they want to see a house at 9 AM on Tuesday what are you going to say, no?
If they want to call you and talk about x, y, or z or just to bitch during your normal work day what are you going to do, ignore them? I doubt that’ll go over very well. Third and probably the most troublesome is the inspections and actual closing of sales, which I’m willing to bet occurs the vast majority of the time between 9-5 on Mon-Fri. So every time you close or there’s an inspection you’d have to take off and closing doesn’t always go smoothly. Plus you’ve gotta be pretty flexible around client schedules, which would be difficult while working a normal job.
My $0.02 anyway. [/quote]
I think those are valid points. My job is pretty flexible, but logistically it could be a MFer. There is also the danger in a perceived lack of dedication from my full time job.
[quote]ncrooks wrote:
Former agent here.
If you start in the biz helping people buy flips, or holds, you’ll be spinning your wheels for a very small ROI. Think about looking at 10, 20, sometimes 50 investment properties that are at the bottom of your market. I have made the mistake of looking at 30+ properties to ultimately assist on a $31k property. I earned $1500 for 20-30 hours of work. Not an ideal situation.
I love real estate, and think it’s an awesome opportunity. If you are going to get started part-time, consider listing properties only. You can prospect from your office or home during “money hours” 5-9pm. Go on listing presentations after work, and the best part is, you will rarely show the property yourself. You just learn how to advertise and market properly, and the buyer’s agents come to you.
Good luck!
[/quote]
Good post, thanks for the info!