5 Challenges Women Face in Real Estate Industry

When you are a woman you might think it’s difficult to make it big in certain professions. However, the real estate landscape has changed so much in the past few decades. And if you count in the technology advantages of today, entering the real estate industry has never been easier. However, are there still challenges women face when it comes to entering the real estate profession?

Women of today can do many things. Depending on their ambitions, they can be mothers, wives, entrepreneurs, even real estate investors! However, there are still certain challenges women face that men don’t. These challenges are a result of many things, mostly socio-economic pressures and workplace inequality. This isn’t to say that people of all genders don’t experience problems in this – and every other – profession, but below are some issues that women specifically struggle with.

Pay Inequity

According to research published in CNBC, women make just 79 cents for every dollar men make. What’s more interesting, in a bad way, is that seniority increases the wage gap for women, especially in real estate industry. In other words, more experienced females will, in a lot of cases, earn less than their male colleagues.

Things change when we look at non-managerial roles, as women in those positions typically earned around 7.8% more than their male counterparts.

Limited Career Advancement

Another one of the big challenges women face is that they hold less leadership roles than men in real estate industry. Looking at the before mentioned issue, we can notice that this is probably one of the reasons why wage gap exists. Sure, there are a few brokerages lead by women, but the numbers can probably be counted in single digits.

Not just that, but career growth is a challenge for women in real estate. This happens even when women work hard, do extra hours and sell more houses. They are still often overlooked for executive roles. Another reason for this is that the company ownership is usually passed from father to son. This means that a woman will have to change multiple employers in order to advance in their career.

Gender Discrimination

Although this problem is losing in intensity in the latest years, in the lot of workspaces women still face discrimination. This discrimination can be subtle, but it can also be more obvious. Most large real estate companies are male-dominated and it’s hard for a woman to get a leading role. Apart from stereotyping, this has a lot to do with the priorities. Some of the challenges women face come from the fact that women choose to have a different work environment than men. For example, they often want a balance between their private life and their job. A lot of women lose promotion chances as they have to take parental leave more often than men.

Another non-dangerous but common discrimination women face happens during business communication online. If a women is to place an order on Fiverr or other similar apps under the name of a company, most people will immediately assume they are talking to a man. Same goes of you are signing just with your initials. This isn’t a problem in a stereotypical women professions, such as the beauty industry, but in real estate it most likely won’t cross anyone’s mind that they are talking to a female.

However, a study conducted by ULI show that there are less challenges women face in small firms. In fact, women who leave large real estate investment companies and start their own end up being more successful than women who don’t want to risk being leaders.

No Mentorship

A lot of women have problems finding the right mentor for their job. Again, this is usually the result of scheduling conflicts as women have more obligations at home, but there’s also a problem with the communication with their male mentors. Going to courses after work hours tends to be a lot harder for women, who are expected to take care of children and house in their free time.

Personal Safety

There are some challenges women face in Milwaukee that aren’t real estate exclusive, but that can be increased with this profession. When you are a real estate investor, often times you will be expected to go visit a client’s house in late hours, maybe even in bad, unsafe neighborhoods. These moments worry every woman out there.

Despite the worst case scenarios aren’t likely to happen, women still have to take extra precautions, especially if they work alone with their client. It’s even worse when the male client isn’t happy with the offer that’s been given to him. Most women fear their clients’ reactions, even when there aren’t real reasons to be concerned. Another of the common problems is dealing with unwanted communications via text or email after the initial meeting with the client.

Why Are Women Important for Real Estate Investing?

Despite currently being slowed down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the real estate market is on the rise. More people are buying and selling houses than in past times. And funny thing is, most of these people are women.

Studies show that single elderly women are the leaders when it comes to real estate investing. The number of females buying houses is increasing, despite all the challenges women face. Even if a man is the one buying the house, often times there is a woman behind him who is searching for the right house, the right agent, sometimes even providing the initial down payment.

It is important to be inclusive when talking about any professional market. Without women, the real estate market wouldn’t be what it is today. At the same time, women shouldn’t be discouraged by these challenges and they should still work hard to overcome them and to prove they can be successful – because we can!