Real Estate Agent or Loan Officer? Which is the easiest.....?

Question

for a person who is trying to get into the Real Estate field. My father and stepmother have there own Real Estate Agency, and trying to get me to do it. Is it worth it? I mean is it hard.

What's the startng salary on a Loan Officer?

Answer 1

Hmmm, well, neither one are "easy" but neither one are rocket science, either. It seems to me that it would be a BIG win for all if you got into the finance side. Your folks could feed you referrals, which is the biggest hurdle in both businesses. Additionally, once you get established, you will be able to refer clients to your folks because you will have customers who want to get pre-qualified to buy a house. Once you pre-qualify them, they will need a realtor, and bingo, you send em to your parents.

It's hard to ignore the effectiveness here of the reciprocating referals between you and your parents. It could be a huge win for all of you!!

Don't try it because you think it's easy. Try it because you WANT to, and if you work hard you can make all the money you want. Good luck to you!

Answer 2

Sounds like the two best people you should talk to are your folks. If they own an agency, they know the local market and conditions and surely they will not steer you wrong.

I am a Realtor and before getting licensed I thought I did my homework and asked all the important questions, but I have learned that a lot of people already in the field told me what they thought I wanted to hear. Real Estate is a tough, competitive business and if you don't "kill it, you don't eat it".

As far a commission, Realtors make more per transaction than a Loan Officer, but Loan Officers usually do more deals per month. Also, the Loan Officers I know have multiple Realtors referring them business and there are few times that they are able to reciprocate because the customer already has an agent.

Another thing to consider is whether you have a large sphere of influence. 78% of your business will come from the people you know and the people they know and so on. Maybe your situation will be different with it being a family brokerage. ?

Answer 3

Romagu gave you a good answer, but as a loan officer you will get calls all day long as to when you are closing on a loan. The Realtors do Not understand that it is in the hands of an underwriter and they are constantly calling you about their one deal and you have 10 of 15 going on at all times. As a loan officer you need to set some guidelines with Realtors as to when you will take their calls and when you will not as they have tried to call me as many as 10 times a day and you can not get all your other work done if you are getting bombarded with their calls.

Answer 4

There is no salary, you will be on a commission as a Loan Officer. It's for someone who is determined to build their pipeline and find business on their own. If you take the job and sit there and wait for your parents to feed you business, don't even bother. This job is for the self motivated individual who sees the upside of paying their dues for years and eventually making great money AND not having to work as many hours.

Answer 5

I would say that neither is easy! Both positions require investing time and gaining on the job experience and then are typically 100% commissioned. You may work for hours on a lead only for it not to pan out.

The job market is very tough right now for both of these positions. Of course, there are different situations in each market place.

I would suggest spending a day (or longer) with a person in each position to help you understand what is involved. Best wishes to you!

Answer 6

If you think real estate is hard then you need to find something else to do... Real Estate is consider one of the easier proffession.. Yes it can be time consuming with work on weekend and at night.. But theres not a whole lot of stress to it.. Find something you like and go with it..