But despite that they are very proud of what they do
Life as a real estate agent can be tough but also highly rewarding but how do America’s realty experts feel about the work they do and the state of the industry?
That’s what a new national survey of real estate agents commissioned by Redfin aimed to find out, with some interesting results.
For example, although 99% of respondents said they are proud of their work, just 1 in 5 would recommend it as a career. The statistic that around half have a second job including one third of those outside real estate, shows how bringing in the bucks can be a challenge.
Of agents with at least five years of experience, 49% said commissions have remained about the same over the past five years, 31% said commissions have declined.
"As a company that has long aspired to be the best employer in real estate, Redfin commissioned this survey to understand, at a time when billions in private and public capital is being invested in US real estate brokerages, how the life of an agent has changed, and what we can do to attract a new generation of talent to our profession," Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman said.
Marketing success
Asked about their lead generation successes, 41% of agents said posting on lead generation sites has a positive return on investment.
But respondents were split on whether the internet had increased or decreased the work associated with a sale, with around a third for each.
Relationships with customers and entrepreneurial independence are what agents enjoy most about their job, with 86% of respondents selecting those responses, while 81% said their favorite thing about being a real estate agent was helping people whose lives are in transition.
More than half of respondents said Gen-Xers were the easiest clients to serve while Millennials followed by Baby Boomers deemed the toughest.
"The lessons for the broader industry are first that rumors of the agent's demise are greatly exaggerated. But we should also pay heed to agents' broad frustration with technology, their struggle to make new lead-generation channels profitable and to meet the demands of a new, more fickle set of young homebuyers," added Kelman.
Racial bias remains
Racial bias remains a challenge within the industry with 33% of non-white agents believing that bias is pervasive, compared to 18% of white agents.
Asked about the races and ethnicities of their last 10 clients, the survey found white agents were far more likely to work with white clients compared to non-white agents.
White agents said an average of two of their clients were not white, compared with an average of four non-white clients served by non-white agents.
Sexism is also an issue with 13% of female agents reporting sexism or harassment from customers, 6% from colleagues.
