What is the best things to look for in your first Broker office?

[William Huston]

I am a newly licensed real estate agent who has started looking into the real estate brokers around me. So far i have been focusing on the offices the closest to me since the area around me has some of the higher priced homes in the area, but im probably going to travel 30mins to some of the offices closer to the center of Tampa, Fl to see what they have to offer. Overall it seems that most offer literally the same exact things, just some state it differently and others just clump it all together.... 

So i am lost on what is best for me as a new agent to look into ultimately... 

I originally was going to look for the office with the most training available, but literally all the offices i have been to offer roughly the same amount of training according to the calendars they gave, so that has kinda confused me in regards to what next to look into...

Right now the top 2 based on how i felt after talking to the brokers are Berkshire Hathaway and Florida Luxury Realty...

Berkshire Hathaway from the beginning seemed like a more cleaner operation, since both offices i stopped into had that new home feeling and presented very professional. Both offices had a good handful of bodies at the locations along with a few appeared to be customers onsite, but i'm a little worried about all the fees and monthly expenses i was presented with along with the commision rates. The business seems much larger, since there is 17 locations in the area and was told there are thousands of offices nationwide...

Commission:

level 1: $0-$25k 60%

level 2: $25k-50k 65%

level 3: 50k-70k 70%

level 4: 70k-100k 75%

level 5: 100k-150k 80%

level 6: 150k-175k 85%

Level 7: 175k +     90%

Fees:

$300/yr, E/O insurance

$100, new agent setup fee

$75/mth, marketing fee

$72/per 1000 business cards

$18/per name badge

$225, FAR/NAR Membership initiation fee

$460/yr FAR/NAR annual membership dues

$90, MLS setup fee

$350/yr MLS annual membership dues

$50, supra key setup fee

$275/yr, Supra key annual membership dues

$110, lockbox purchase

Florida Luxury Realty from the beginning was kinda hidden off the road, the office is hidden in the back of a business complex in regards to the one office i specifically went to, its very clean and professional looking, just the office overall is not very lit up or fresh looking...and when i dropped in there was noone at the location outside of the clerical person at the front desk from what i could tell, most of the office was completely dark... The broker returned my phone call immediately and drove 45mins from the office he was located at for the day to come visit me at the location i dropped into instead of asking me to drive out to him, we spent over 2 hours talking in his office going over everything the company has to offer, he really took a lot of time to make sure i understand everything the company has to offer, the commission seems to be very in the agents favor with 2 programs to choose from. The company is much smaller with no commercial division and only one office that does property management among the 9 locations in the area... 

Commission:

Program 1:

80% up tell $15,000, then 100% afterwards

No monthly membership fee

Program 2:

90% up tell $10,000, then 100% afterwards

$135/month membership fee

Fees:

$1,300/yr annual dues