Anyone REGRET going REI full time?

[David Zheng]

so day after day I ask myself when I'm going to "retire" or go full time real estate. right now my answer seems to be in the mid 30s but sometimes I think what if I do it sooner. sometimes I wonder if I should push it out cause of my inflated lifestyle.

Has anyone jumped ship from their 9-5 and realized it was a horrible mistake or think they could have held onto a W2 for a little longer?


Did you usually have to change your lifestyle significantly or was trying to live more frugal worth the extra time gained?

[Blair Poelman]

No.  I've never regretted going full time into RE.  Truth be told I've been self employed for 20+ years and have multiple endeavors going at any given time, with Real Estate always being one of them.  

I think if I was banking on client representation as my #1 source of income i would flame out in about 5 minutes.  For me, the real money in RE is made in doing deals.  I don't know very many agents that make a full time living off of just client representation - they are out there, but it's probably a fairly small segment of the population.  I know plenty of brokers that are killing it, but running a brokerage is a different ball game than just being an agent.

As a caveat - "full time" for me is about 70 hrs / week, which includes about 30 hrs of "commuting"  (which usually involves dirtbike or harley trips).  Working full time in RE has done nothing but help my moto game  :)