Side Hustle Question: Home Inspector or RE Agent?

Question

Fellow BPers,I'm currently debating which role to pursue on a part-time basis: home inspector or real estate agent? A bit of background--I'm a relatively new investor (2 years and 3 properties/deals now under my belt) looking to take up a side hustle that will complement my investing and ultimately help me become a better RE investor. I am a single male based out of NJ and my full-time job is in finance, so I'm free most week-nights and weekends. Below are the questions that I'm looking to answer as part of this analysis. Any help/guidance is much appreciated.- Which role will improve my investing (buy-and-hold, BRRR strategy) more?- Which better suits my skills/interests? No help needed here, I'll take that one.- Which will better lend itself to a part-time side hustle?- Which is more profitable on an hour-by-hour basis generally?Please let me know any thoughts you may have or if there are any important questions that I'm missing as part of this. Both roles will involve a significant investment of time up-front to educate myself (I'm a life-long learner, so that part will actually be fun (I know, weird right?)). As such, I don't want to start going down one road and realize I chose the wrong side-hustle. Thanks so much!

Sam Sands · Answer

Home inspectors get paid for the work that they do on a daily basis. Many real estate agents put in hours of work and do not always close on the deal. I did two home inspections per week and earned a salaray over $42,000 in side income while working my 9-5 at the factory job at the same time. Going to turn it into a full time career when I turn 50 next year. The training is all online and no license required in Ohio: https://icaschool.com/training...You won't regret it.

Matthew G. · Answer

@Marc Weisi Being a real estate agent is really a full-time job. Developing relationships, getting pocket listing and off-market deals don't just happen because you're a licensed agent. A real estate agent is like being a small business owner. You have to market yourself and nurture your leads. How are you going to keep customers happy when you can only talk or meet with them at night or on weekends?My recommendation is just to continue building your network. As an investor you should focus on creating a team rather than trying to fill a role in your team. If you become an expert at building great teams, then you'll be able to invest anywhere.

Arn Cenedella · Answer

@Marc WeisiIf you want to be an investor primarily, I would say go the agent broker route.As an agent, you will come into contact with more buyers sellers investors.Networking is the key to investing.You can pick up construction knowledge as you go.Home inspection may lead to greater more predictable income out of the gate, but long term assuming your goal is to scale up investing than in my opinion becoming an agent is the way to go.At the end of the day, it comes down to what you want and where you want to be 5 10 years from now.Nothing against home inspection but that is trading your time for money.Investing is making your money work for you while you sleep.

Marc Weisi · Answer

@Brandon Svitak @Derek Mei 2 years later and... I'm doing neither! Instead, I'm focusing on syndicating larger deals vs. working on either of these side hustles. The reason comes back to my ultimate goal: to be investing full-time in the next few years. My conclusion after talking to a different inspectors, agents, and some of the most successful investors was this: If I'm trying to make real estate investing my full-time, then I should work on bolstering the areas I enjoy/am good at today instead of trying to do trades that only indirectly relate to my goal of becoming a full time investor. You see, I enjoy finding deals, raising capital, and acquiring properties but didn't think I could do this without understanding construction or having a way to find attractive deals. What I found out was that the greatest investors out there have team members for the things they're not good at/don't have experience with. Instead of spending time strengthening my weaknesses, I can put that time/energy into focusing on my strengths/core competencies and partner/hire out for the rest.A couple of years back, I found a partner (@Gonzalo Matia T.) with complimentary skills and we're now working on scaling our multifamily real estate portfolio with each of us focusing on the sides of the business that we know and do well at. I hope this helps others out there that are swayed toward thinking that they have to do a side-hustle only indirectly related to their goal (if that's investing). If I had to boil it down: Clarify your goal and double down on your strengths. That said, never stop learning/improving those strengths.

Marc Weisi · Answer

@Ravonne Evans Great to hear that someone else is facing the same dilemma! @Matthew G. Point well taken. Rather than work on developing these skill-sets, I should be leveraging the knowledge of professionals on my team. That would free up my time for more deal analysis, lead generation, and all of the other things that INVESTORS actually do. That said, I still think that taking the home inspector course can only benefit my knowledge of the elements that go into property renovations. While I have a contractor that I work with and whose opinion trust, I'd still love to be able to communicate my plans more effectively with him and I think this would greatly help that. That investment of time would be well worth it in my humble opinion.

Derek Mei · Answer

This is such an interesting thread and I'd be interested in seeing where you ended up, two years after making this post. I'm working a full-time job right now in a field completely unrelated to real estate but want to eventually get into real estate investing and feel like the weakest part of my game right now is my ability to understand the inspection/construction side of things.I'd love to learn more from someone else who got their inspection license part-time and how it's helped them since!

Steve Dale · Answer

@Marc Weisi I just recently got my home inspector's license. I have a construction background which really helped. The training is extremely technical and might be overwhelming if you don't have much of a construction background. I'm working on building up my home inspection business. That's going to be my full time gig and real estate investing on the side. I know investors who have their real estate license for the benefits but aren't an actively practicing realtor. Having your realtors or home inspector's license and being a practicing realtor or home inspector are very different things. From what I've seen having a realtor's license can open some doors for investors such as MLS access. Getting a home inspector's license will help you gain a lot of useful knowledge but it won't necessarily open any doors for you as an investor. I hope maybe this helped.

Marc Weisi · Answer

@Arn Cenedella Hahaha understandable. Will reach out.

Arn Cenedella · Answer

@Marc WeisiYes I was on Jerry’s webinar. Thanks for reaching out.Sadly, I was too tech lame to figure out how to get on the breakout sessions after the presentations. Jerry will coach me for the next one. 😀Yes glad to chat, let’s set something up after the first of the year.

Marc Weisi · Answer

@Arn Cenedella Thanks for the valuable insight! While I ultimately chose to not pursue either (see my post just above yours), it's because I've done what you said and gotten much more clear on my goals: to scale up my portfolio through commercial multifamily syndication. Btw, I think I may have been on a webinar with you a couple weeks back hosted by Jerry Sanchez and Richard Coyne. Would love to connect soon!