Should investors be agents?

[James Sotipalalit]

Hello my name is James Sotipalalit. I'm new to real estate and I would love some advice from some professionals. Now my question is do you suggest a newbie in real estate go get licensed to be an agent when starting out? Please leave all feedback and god bless.

[Bill Gulley]

Let's drill through the title of "investor" do you have money and credit to actually buy properties and "invest" or are you wanting to be an "operator" one who facilitates transactions earning money? As an investor, you'll have benefits of the MLS access and commissions saved on your deals. As an operator, you'll have a greater benefit of facilitating transactions legally and commissions are something you can earn openly that some try to hide as in wholesaling.

Either way, this is a social business, if you can list 100 people you know that you can approach about real estate (not that they would buy or sell anything, just know you can introduce yourself to them) then you would have a very good start as an agent. Same with operating or investing in real estate.

More importantly, starting out you need to learn real estate, not how to market real estate thinking you are getting a basic education in the industry. I suggest you take the class for agents if you can, after learning basic real estate matters you'll be in a better position to decide if being an agent is what you want to do.

At any rate, get a text book on real estate, like "Principles of Real Estate" and learn real estate!  Good luck :)