Good morning everyone,
I was reading through a lot of pages through out this forum and it struck me that there are a lot of agents starting out part time and just as many experienced agents telling them they are misguided or not in the right frame of mind.

I am starting part time as I have the savings to allow me to do nights/weekends and a few half days per week. I have 2 young children, so no direct income makes it almost impossible for me to pay for daycare full time.

In saying that, my ultimate goal is to be full time. It may take me a year to get to that point, but it is where I see myself inevitably.

I may not be in the office full time, but I have access to my email/phone and will always be on call.

I am curious to know how/why this may be the wrong mind set? I know I will get out of it what I put in, and though I will be at home for a good part of my work day, I do still plan to work. i.e marketing myself, emailing and in contact with my broker.

Am I crazy to think that I can't build up my reputation based on that ethic? My husband is very supportive and knows that I will be spending evenings at the office as well as weekend hours and (hopefully) open houses.

Is this a pipe dream? Or can my desire to succeed and my ability to maintain focus see me through until I can devote full time hours be enough for me to grow on?

Hi:
I am a part-timer and I also have two young boys. My husband has a full time job and doing real estate is just something I do when my kids are at school.
I take on one or two clients at a time. When they got difficult, I refer them out to my colleagues. I work with buyers only, and I hire Transaction Coordinator to help me with my paperwork. My clients never know that I am doing this part-time as I am always available 8 am-3 pm and weekends. Luckily most of my clients are free only in the weekends, so it works out perfectly.
That being said, I have only two or three closing a year =(

My broker is flexible and we actually don't have an office. I work from home and we have meetings and training once a month.
If you are a rookie, go with big names companies. I was with Keller Williams and the training was really good. But then because of my low production and I saw a big chunk of commission went to KW and mentor, I switch to a 100% commission broker. Still good, but the training material is nowhere near KW.

Hope this helps.

I have never seen a part-timer be successful. But once they cross the line to full time, they produce well because there is no safety net anymore...

It is very very rare for a part time agent to achieve success. The big problem is that real estate is an easy business NOT to do. Most part timers spend very little time actually working. My best advice to you is to set definate business hours and stick to them.

NL - I posted a blog on this topic today at Active Rain, and linked to several others I've written about it.

The thing is... selling real estate is a full-time job. No amount of good intentions or strong work ethic can overcome the fact that, especially when you're new, you need to be THERE.

The stuff you need to do to be successful (and build that reputation) will not work around your schedule. Yes, you can market yourself in your free time, but if you actually get any business from your marketing, the other players will expect you to be reasonably available during business hours. 24 hours a day? No. But 10am on Tuesday for an inspection? Yes.

There is also so much to learn and master, and if you're exhausted and frazzled from too much candle-burning, you'll cut corners and lose clients because you're not prepared and don't appear competent. Because... my love... you won't be. And you'll be miserable.

That said... if you want to stick your toe in the business, you can certainly do that and you'll probably learn a lot. Just don't count on making any semblance of a living for your time and effort... and have good E&O insurance.

KL, I agree with the other posters, if your treating Real Estate as a part time job then you probably will not be very successful. However, if you have a mind set that it's a full time job with very flexible hours then you'll have every chance at success.

Your situation is similiar to how we started out, what you need is a flexible daycare arrangement (ie Grandparents). Your success will depend on your ability to be able to show a property when a client wants, and make it to the Tuesday 10am inspection etc.

But there is no reason why you cannot spend Tuesday afternoon looking after your kids as long as your willing to work in the evening. Your not going to be with a client every moment so Real Estate allows you to be flexible when you do some of your work.

But don't fool yourself it's not that easy to work from home with the kids around. Sometime you need to contact a client at 2pm, however it's not very professional to be on the phone and constantly having your kids asking your for more juice.

Your biggest pitfall will be that it is very easy to decide you have something better to do than work Tuesday evening after the kids are in bed.

Goodluck.

Thanks for all the great advice!
I know that the road ahead is hard, but I am fortunate to have a broker/friend who is willing to work with me as a team so to speak until I am able to devote full time hours to my business.

That being said, I have worked out an hourly schedule that I think will allow me some room to wiggle. I will have daycare part time during the week and evenings and weekends at my disposal. I am lucky to have a very supportive husband :)

I know that I am not going to make a killing working "part time" and I am prepared for that. I also know that within the next year-ish, I will have even more flexibility as far as hours.

I am determined to make this all it can be. I am very excited to start and I am working with my Broker part time learning the MLS, going over forms, practicing filling them out for him and I will be going for a "ride along" to a few closings as well as some previews and an open house with him. He and I have an appointment to sit down and go over my business plan and to talk about all the other ins and outs. I feel very fortunate to have his experience to guide me even while I am still taking my classes.

I am really enthusiastic about everything ahead of me! And I know that , in time, I will be stepping in full time, so I suppose I am using this as a time to learn and really get my feet wet.

I really appreciate all the advise I find on this site!

First, business is business. Part time or not. Both part-time and full-time agents can be just as successful on a scale. Don't let anyone tell you part-time agents are not as good. I have seen just as many good part-time agents as full-timers in my short 1 year in the business. So, if a full-time agent is working with 10 clients, and you are working with 1 client, there is no difference in my opinion. Also, besides what anyone says, what is the bottom line for you? If you make more money doing full time work and part-time real estate, and make money doing it, then do it. If I make 70k at my full time job and make 30k at real estate. I still make as much as an agent making 100k a year. It is the bottom line. That said, I only take on 2 clients at a time and refer any others out to my associates as well, just like Susan said. I don't have a problem with that. If they want to wait for me, that is good, if not, I give them away.... Most agents start part-time anyway, so even those telling you part-timers are no good, they probably also were a part-timer at one point.

All I can tell you from years of observation is that part time agents do nothing but fail. They fail their clients, they fail their fellow agents who have to pick up their slack when they are busy with their "day job", and most significantly they fail themselves by not realizing their full potential. Real estate is not even a full time job: it's a way of life. And attempting to do it part time will result in failure 95%-100% of the time. That's just an empirical fact.

I've been a Rookie agent twice (moved after building a business for 3-4 years... oh what fun) and both times sold over $12 Million. It's actually a simple (notice I didn't say easy) path, but I do believe anyone can do it if you follow the right steps. I put together a free training series specifically for Rookies here: http://10MillionInYour1stYear.com

Always someone else with a dopey seminar on making millions. Will it ever end?

navarac,
I made 10 million my first year. And this year I should make 15-76 million! Send me 19.95 and I will show you how!

No, it can't be true for only $19.95. Make it $599 to start and $200/year to maintain. Then maybe I'll go for it.

AWESOME! JUST TOO COOL!

[quote=navarac][quote=RallyRE]First, business is business. Part time or not. Both part-time and full-time agents can be just as successful on a scale. Don't let anyone tell you part-time agents are not as good. I have seen just as many good part-time agents as full-timers in my short 1 year in the business. So, if a full-time agent is working with 10 clients, and you are working with 1 client, there is no difference in my opinion. Also, besides what anyone says, what is the bottom line for you? If you make more money doing full time work and part-time real estate, and make money doing it, then do it. If I make 70k at my full time job and make 30k at real estate. I still make as much as an agent making 100k a year. It is the bottom line. That said, I only take on 2 clients at a time and refer any others out to my associates as well, just like Susan said. I don't have a problem with that. If they want to wait for me, that is good, if not, I give them away.... Most agents start part-time anyway, so even those telling you part-timers are no good, they probably also were a part-timer at one point. [/quote]

All I can tell you from years of observation is that part time agents do nothing but fail. [font:Arial Black]They fail their clients[/font], they fail their fellow agents who have to pick up their slack when they are busy with their "day job", and most significantly they fail themselves by not realizing their full potential. Real estate is not even a full time job: it's a way of life. And attempting to do it part time will result in failure 95%-100% of the time. That's just an empirical fact.
[/quote]

Being restricted to certain hours is a definite negative. I refered a buyer to a new colleague in my office that my manager wanted to get going and later found that she could only take them out on weekends, I think that made me look bad. I will never do that again.

You find part timers everywhere. I stopped at a BMW dealer yesterday and the salesperson told me she had an RE license and kind of "dabbles"in the biz.
Imagine the scenario. "You can't qualify for a mortgage, but what will it take to get you in a new car today?"

In my opinion you can be successful as a part time agent. We have a couple in our office that outsell full time agents. I believe you want it bad enough you will make it happen.

I agree with you rally!!! if you are hungry regardless of what status of part time or full time you will be successful...

I think you can do fairly well if you do real estate part time, but there is no doubt it will severly limit the ultimate potential you could have if you did it full time with great running systems. However, if this is not your goal then yes part-time can be profitable.

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I would say that you need to be be able to survive and pay your bills. If you really have what it takes to succeed in real estate then it shouldn't take long to find out. Once you are successful part-time you should feel more comfortable going at it full-time.