Take My Broker. . .PLEASE!

August 29, 2006 |

I realize that as far as my real estate career is concerned, I am a pretty lucky guy.  I get to work with my wife, who is a great agent, and my Broker is a great agent as well.  And I’m not saying that just because she is my Mother-in-law. 

I also realize that not every REALTOR gets to work in that type of environment.  I have some first-hand experience in that regard as well.  I recently wrote a post about how much experience matters in the real estate industry.  My post was in response to an article I read that seemed to be bemoaning that the many problems in the real estate industry are coming from the influx of new agents.  I happen to disagree.

In the comments on the post, Todd Tarson, a REALTOR from Arizona (his blog is in the blog roll), responded thusly:

I want to tell these brokers that I think the real problem is that it’s
entirely too easy to become a broker and there are too many bad brokers
for newbies to choose from. But I know thats a fight for another day.

Well, maybe that day is today. . .and maybe not. 

While Todd may have a point, I don’t think that it is entirely fair to blame the Broker licensing requirements.  First, I would have to subscribe to the premise that it truly is too easy for agents to become brokers.  On their face, the requirements to obtain a Broker’s license don’t seem too easy, at least in Virginia.  I am about to find out in person how difficult the requirements are, as my wife and I will be beginning the education requirements later this year.  At the very least, the requirements to become a Broker are no more lenient than the requirements to obtain a salesperson’s license.  As far as I’m concerned, when you compare the two, it’s a wash.

Of course, I am merely referring to the requirements of the licensing body.  Obtaining a broker’s license from the licensing body is only half the battle.  Once someone has the license in hand, that person is not automatically placed in charge of a herd of newbie REALTORS.  One must either become a Managing or Supervising Broker of an existing firm, or take the substantial risk of starting a brand-new firm as the Principal Broker.

The latter of those two options is exactly why I am in my current, and optimal, situation.  Myself, my wife, and my Mother-in-law made the decision that we were better off on our own, so we did it.  My Mother-in-law took the risk of being the Owner/Broker, and Kari and I took on the responsibility of managing just about everything else. 

Trust me when I tell you this, the barriers to becoming a Broker are many, when it comes to being a Principal Broker.  As just about anyone who has started a business can tell you, it isn’t easy.  It takes quite a bit of money, and even greater amounts of good Ole fashioned hard work.  It is completely worth it, but it definitely cannot be described as "easy."  I can’t imagine that it is very easy to become a Managing or Supervising Broker of an existing firm, either.  Moving up the corporate ladder requires its own commitment. 

Now, don’t mistake me.  I’m not saying that every Principal or Supervising or Managing Broker is a saint, or even competent.  What I am saying is that it isn’t easy, no matter how you do it.  I fully recognize the fact that there are incompetent real estate Brokers out there, just as there are incompetent managers in just about every corporate endeavor; but to say that the incompetence of those individuals is due to the facility of their rise to power is too simple.

The problem with Brokers is the same as the problem with newbies, some of them are bad as individuals.  Some of them are really, really bad.  Chances are, those that are bad brokers were bad agents as well.  Sometimes they have been able to hide it, sometimes they have just been lucky enough to escape scrutiny, but they are definitely out there.  I don’t think that either of these awful specimens are merely a product of the system.  They are the product of something far more powerful– genetics.  Perhaps there is a small margin of each group that could be made better by some additional training or supervision, but that margin is very small.  People who do bad things as REALTORS don’t just go home or go to another job and act ethically.

One of the benefits of working in an industry that is subject to little government regulation is that people are exposed for who they truly are.  They act the way they do because they don’t think anyone is watching.  You wanna know someone’s true character?  Put them in a situation in which they don’t think they have any responsibility to anyone else, and see what happens.  Don’t believe me?  check this out.

There are people in this world who are willing to shock other people to near death, as long someone they trust gives them approval.  In this case, the people administering the shocks were able to put their conscious aside because they were being given the approval of a person whom they perceived to be a "scientific authority." 

So if the problem isn’t the Brokers, and the problem isn’t the newbies, who is responsible?  I hate to be sound facetious, but the answer is both.  Or, to be more specific, every agent out there who holds the title, REALTOR.

You’ll have to wait for another post for me to explain how REALTORS continuously give their approval to activities that are to the detriment of the profession. 

Posted by Daniel | Filed Under Industry Issues 

Comments

One Response to “Take My Broker. . .PLEASE!”

  1. Todd Tarson on August 29th, 2006 1:08 pm

    Again, thanks for the mention. I would like to just clarify for just a moment on something though. As Association president I deal with a wide array of brokers on a weekly basis, and often my comments stem from looking at the situation from that perspective.

    I’ve looked into becoming a broker myself, in fact I was really thinking that after my third year in the business I’d open my own shop because of these great ideas (cough, cough…delusions of grandure… cough) I have. I will say that I respect any who make the plunge to set up their own shop. There are many costs and risks involved (which pretty has kept me on the sideline for the last two years anyway).

    But again, with my Association president hat on, I routinely have been asked by brokers to offer more to the new Members. More training, more information, more education, more resources… more. Well, wait a second… isn’t some of this on the broker?? I think so. This is where my beef really is.

    I think some brokers need to tell newbie’s that their office is not for them. Why?? Because that broker probably isn’t going to invest time and effort in a newbie and would be better off with a more veteran agent. Oh this surely would be a dangerous business plan, but in reality it would save a lot of grief for newbies that get burned through the system because they chose the wrong broker that only thinks about numbers instead of humans.

    I think some brokers should specialize in newbie’s. Train them, teach them, encourage them, mold them… then tell them when they are ready to leave the nest, and nudge them if they have to.

    These are two extreme examples. Of course any brokerage could be all things to any new agent. Could be. I’ve hung my license at two different brokerages that actually describe the above… but neither advertises the fact of what they are. As a result, while I have no personal or professional problems with either broker, there is a sort of negative stigma that each office holds here locally.

    And sometimes the agents that emerge from those brokers are also tagged with the same stigma… unfairly in most cases.

    “He doesn’t know anything and I have to do the work for him on the deal.” I’ve heard said about one such agent.

    “He thinks he knows it all and has all these crazy demands for paperwork that HIS broker requires.” Another example.

    Both of the above were quotes that described me, actually, at different times under the kind of brokerages I described earlier.

    This is just part of what bothers me about the current state of brokerage. Of course there is more, but I don’t want to waste all your bandwith.

    By the way, today I’ a 100% agent (non split). I rent my office from my broker and my broker is pretty much leaving me alone to practice RE the way I choose to. I practically feel like my own broker. It’s just not my name on the front door.

    [Reply]

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