What is the broker's relationship like with new agents?

[Carl Ohai]

I am starting the license course, and will be ready to start finding a broker to work with by the beginning of the year.

1. How does the broker dole out leads that walk into the door? Suppose a person just walks into a Century 21 to start looking for a house, how does the broker decide who gets that lead?

2. How much does the broker control, or limit, the online marketing of their agents? Are agents allowed to funnel traffic to their own website instead of their broker's?

3. There is a lot of talk about finding a brokerage that offers training and mentorship from more senior agents, but isn't that completely counterproductive for the senior agent? To create competition?

[Russell Brazil]

If you want to be a successful agent....you need to do it full time, and you should not expect to turn a profit til year 3. Agent stats are nearly the same as any other small business. First 2 years you typically lose money, year 3 you eek out a small profit, then you grow from there. 87% of agents fail out of the business altogether within a couple years which is right in line with the small business failure rate of 90%. 

There are many brokerages with many different business models. You have places with high commission splits and no support, then places with low commission splits but tons of support and everything in between.