All Forum Posts by: Josh Middendorf

My advice @Josh Middendorf would be to focus on what you know best, Construction, and hire a professional Realtor to handle your sales. It will end up costing you much more while trying to save on commission.

 I am calling tiny brokerages fly-by-night; the new agent is just green. They will hire anyone who is willing to split commission with them, but they don't have anything to offer in terms of training, support and legal/compliance reviews. 

90% of bad interactions I have are with these small outfits. When an agent from a larger firm screws up (and thinks they didn't) or ghosts a deal (does not respond for a week to emails, texts or phone calls), I can call the supervising broker and trust they get things straightened out. With a one man show brokerage there is nobody to call except the State Board but that's a long process and the transaction is lost or goes into litigation.

80% of the deals get done by 20% of the agents and you can ask any of the top 20% what they think of the other 80%. I would be in favor of a minimum number of 24 deals per year to maintain your license, this would reduce the number of part time an amateur agents greatly and improve the reputation of the industry.

You are in construction; you would not hire a weekend warrior with a nail gun as a framing carpenter and send him to frame a house by himself. Imagine what the city inspector would find!

So if you’re looking to get new license, you would be getting your real estate license not a broker license as most states require a minimum experience of at least two years before becoming a Broker @Josh Middendorf. Why are you getting licensed if you don’t plan to sell real estate?  There are many investor-friendly brokerages out there but of course they will want to make money from their time in training they invest in you.  Many brokerages won’t take on part-time agents who aren’t committed to selling to the public so I understand your challenge. You may want to consider eXp Realty which is nationwide, but again, you would need to produce something for the Brokerage beyond your personal sales. You might also consider working referrals as many agents can make a good living just connecting buyers and sellers with other agents and taking a 25% commission split. Happy to have a conversation if you’d like further advice.  Otherwise best of luck!

@Josh Middendorf that's a bad idea. It is very easy to get licensed, but not very easy to get good at what you do. (I would know, because I got licensed as an investor first, but fortunately joined a large brokerage and the first thing I learned was that I don't know anything). 

A larger brokerage will supervise your first 10 or so transactions to make sure your are not getting them, yourself or clients in trouble. What you are looking for is a fly by night outfit, usually a 1-5 people brokerage with no systems or training. There are plenty and they give the industry a bad rep.

You would not hire yourself for a good reason, just like you would not hire a "plumber" who did an online course to learn his trade.