When someone claims to have completed “1000s” of deals successfully, we’d need to see purchase and sale docs on each one to verify their track record.  

Many brokers are open to part-time agents, especially those focusing on investing rather than traditional sales.

My $10,000 went to the EM for the sale.

I’m going to disagree with @Chris Seveney and say whether an assignee could force a sale directly would be a state law issue and heavily dependent upon the contract terms. 

However, electing partnership or corporate taxation could be seen as a sale, causing unintended tax consequences.

But you have to purchase new investment property of at least as much as your net sale to avoid tax. 

I am curious at what stage of land development the sale was struck with builder.  

.: Quote from @Basit Siddiqi: I think it lies in that a lot of service providers in the real estate space are incentivized(money wise) to promote thier business.Real Estate agents are a small business, the more clients they have, the more money they make.Property managers are a small business, the more clients they have, the more money they make.Lenders, correct me if im wrong, are tied to some sort of bonus structure, the more loans they generate, the more money they make.More promotion leads to more awareness which leads to more money With all do respect I think REA's are commissioned sales people.

If not then sale.  

of course the sale of hurricane damaged houses also confuses the issue (my house had no such damage but is only about 4 blocks from houses that did).