All Forum Posts by: Jonathan Makovsky

@James Ritter

1. If you get licensed in NY you can apply for licensure through reciprocity in GA. (See the NYS website for all states that you can apply for reciprocity in: http://www.dos.ny.gov/licensing/realestate/re_reci...)

2. Finding a broker and working as an independent agent:

• a) Just about all brokers will qualify you as an Independent Contractor (IRS exemption to the rule), so there is almost nothing mandatory that they can impose on you. So there should be no such thing as "forcing you into an office" since this might make you an employee vs. an independent contractor - something that most RE brokerages are not interested in doing as it will be fairly costly to them.
• b) Speak to as many brokers as you can because they are all set-up differently: Some brokers impose high monthly fees because they carry a national brand name, but may have other benefits to offer you such as good lead generations and strong brand recognition. Other brokers have little to no monthly fees but you will be generating all the leads yourself. Also, some brokers may offer little fees but may take a high commission split and vice versa. You just need to shop around and speak to some to understand it more.

3. My three cents: 

• a) First focus on passing the exam; once you passed your exam then brokers will be more inclined to speak with you, than if you are planning to take the exam [even if you do follow through with it]. 
• b) If you will be generating most of your leads on your own AND you can prove to be a trustworthy "by-the-rule" agent, then you should be in a better position to negotiate with a broker, since they will not need to babysit you or cannibalize any of their own leads. 
• Really great thing about taking the RE exam in NYS is that you can take it online - I loved this feature.
  

Welcome @Steve Meeker!

Happy 40th @oldman @Joshua Dorkin Wishing you and your family many more successful years! You have certainly lived by the proverb: Give a (wo)man a fish and you feed them for a day; teach a (wo)man to fish and you feed them for a lifetime!

Thanks for all the fish! Keep up the great work!

@Nandy B. congrats - options are always a great thing to have!

I think everything you said sounds good - but of course most of it is personal so it needs to work for you.

@Tim Johnson when you're looking to tag someone in a post create the "@" symbol and then start typing the person's name and then underneath the reply box you should see their name pop up and you can click the person you intend to tag. (It took a while for me at first to do it too.)

 Did not know this either. Great stuff here - thanks.

@Raul Ocampo 

I have never had a formal mentor, so I cannot answer based on experience although I imagine like any deal, contractor, or product: there are good ones and bad ones.

Another alternative is if you can find someone on BP that's doing what you want to do in your area then speak to them and offer them your expertise (marketing, accounting, sales, construction, even envelope stuffing) in exchange for them mentoring. So essentially what you tell them is: I will free up some of your time with my expertise in exchange for you to free up some of your time for their expertise.

Best of luck with the decision you make!

@Frank Matanane I don't know much about LegalZoom other than the ads I hear, so I cannot opine on their service.

I would strongly recommend getting an attorney that knows your local law - if LZ has that service and is recommended by someone you trust then that can be a good source. However, if they are not specialized in local law, I would bite the fee and pay an attorney.

Many attorneys will talk to you (you might need to call a few though) without paying a fee to chat. My attorney actually spent considerable time with me before he earned a dime, however, now he's closed about a dozen transactions (including the title work) with us, so it definitely paid for him.

Best of luck!

Welcome @Shayne Mensing you are in the right place to learn. Hit the podcasts - they're gold.

@Clayton Miller welcome and you sound very motivated!

There are so many ways to structure a deal: 

First find out what your investors are looking for. Do they want to be debt (a lender) or equity (a partner)? Debt is safer, but equity will [hopefully] provide more upside. You might get some investors that want to be debt and some want to be equity. In both scenarios find out what returns will make them happy with the deal (some of it is going to be hard to really find out without a deal in place, yet it's probably hard to find a deal without the money in place - so you're caught with the chicken-and-egg conundrum.) 

Once you find out what return they are looking for and how much money they will [hopefully and actually] invest, then you can see what the total return is and how much you will make on the deal after you put the numbers together.

The best advice I could give is to gain experience, and that's how you get out of the chicken-and-egg juggernaut. So with that said - and you may not want to hear it - is just get your first deal done with two criteria: 1) Make sure your investors make money and 2) they are happy with your style. If those go well and you make any money on your first deal chalk it up to a bonus, but you got the hardest part out of the way: the experience!

Best of luck and I know it's tough being a newbie, but once you get rolling it gets a whole lot easier.