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Real Estate School - May have just avoided a mistake

LiveFire

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Last week, I had decided that I would try to open up new opportunities by going to Real Estate School so that I could learn more about Real Estate.

This evening was the first class. I didn't know what to expect until:
  • Upon receiving the 560 page book of Modern Real Estate Practice.
  • A thick note book full of contracts/forms.
  • Requirement to successfully complete the Pre-Licensing 60 hour course with Letter of Completion (pre-req to taking the actual Exam)
  • Eventually a 30 hour course for New Affiliates.
  • Successfully pass the state and national exam.
I sat in a daze for a moment as the information was being shared. The class is getting ready to start. In my gut, something was not right. My intention was not to become a Real Estate Agent. I don't need a second job to work for someone else. I am trying to build a plan to get away from that, not do the same plan in a different industry.

As the class was getting ready to start, I knew the window was closing by having any chance of getting a refund back. I jumped up instantly as the Instructor walked down the isle to the front. I went to the back office for the refund. Thank you @ZCP for saying what you did last week to me - I was getting ready to make a mistake. I am not saying it is a mistake for someone else, I am saying it is a mistake for me.

My intention is that I want to be more of an Real Estate Investor (such as acquiring and owning rentals) to generate passive income, and eventually own the rental asset(s). New course of direction (pick up a good REI book to get the basics and start attending a local REIA?)

Thank you.
 
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NadiaZ

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Last week, I had decided that I would try to open up new opportunities by going to Real Estate School so that I could learn more about Real Estate.

This evening was the first class. I didn't know what to expect until:
  • Upon receiving the 560 page book of Modern Real Estate Practice.
  • A thick note book full of contracts/forms.
  • Requirement to successfully complete the Pre-Licensing 60 hour course with Letter of Completion (pre-req to taking the actual Exam)
  • Eventually a 30 hour course for New Affiliates.
  • Successfully pass the state and national exam.
I sat in a daze for a moment as the information was being shared. The class is getting ready to start. In my gut, something was not right. My intention was not to become a Real Estate Agent. I don't need a second job to work for someone else. I am trying to build a plan to get away from that, not do the same plan in a different industry.


As the class was getting ready to start, I knew the window was closing by having any chance of getting a refund back. I jumped up instantly as the Instructor walked down the isle to the front. I went to the back office for the refund. Thank you @ZCP for saying what you did last week to me - I was getting ready to make a mistake. I am not saying it is a mistake for someone else, I am saying it is a mistake for me.

My intention is that I want to be more of an Real Estate Investor (such as acquiring and owning rentals) to generate passive income, and eventually own the rental asset(s). New course of direction (pick up a good REI book to get the basics and start attending a local REIA?)

Thank you.

Interesting. I kind of felt the same way because I felt like so much of the Principles book is super boring.

I'm signing up to get my real estate license but I really want to become a real estate developer and work for myself. I'm studying this stuff and just taking an online class to get my license but most of the investors I know in my area are real estate brokers or have been agents in the past.

I'm pretty against useless education but a lot of the stuff they teach is just useful information about houses (like how to measure it, laws about being an agent, contracts, inspections, yada yada). It's definitely helped me learn more about real estate even though it never talks about selling the house.

Currently, I'm learning how to flip houses and I manage a couple vacation rentals as well as one house in Kansas City. I've learned a ton from that as well.

It might also help you to join a facebook group with real estate investors in your area. I live in KCMO and I'm planning on joining MAREI. Many in mine are former brokers or agents and work for themselves.
 

LiveFire

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Also, welcome to the forum!

Interesting. I kind of felt the same way because I felt like so much of the Principles book is super boring.

I'm signing up to get my real estate license but I really want to become a real estate developer and work for myself. I'm studying this stuff and just taking an online class to get my license but most of the investors I know in my area are real estate brokers or have been agents in the past.

I'm pretty against useless education but a lot of the stuff they teach is just useful information about houses (like how to measure it, laws about being an agent, contracts, inspections, yada yada). It's definitely helped me learn more about real estate even though it never talks about selling the house.

Currently, I'm learning how to flip houses and I manage a couple vacation rentals as well as one house in Kansas City. I've learned a ton from that as well.

It might also help you to join a facebook group with real estate investors in your area. I live in KCMO and I'm planning on joining MAREI. Many in mine are former brokers or agents and work for themselves.
 

MJ DeMarco

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If you're flipping houses or investing, a RE license is good to have.

I think @JScott mentioned his wife is a RE agent and she is instrumental in the flipping process.
 

danipepino

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Thanks for the insight @JScott! Got my RE license earlier this year for that reason, but you just made the dream a bit more vivid for me!
 

NadiaZ

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If you're flipping houses or investing, a RE license is good to have.

I think @JScott mentioned his wife is a RE agent and she is instrumental in the flipping process.

If you're flipping houses or investing, a RE license is good to have.

I think @JScott mentioned his wife is a RE agent and she is instrumental in the flipping process.
While I wouldn't recommend getting a license before you do your first deal, there are a lot of advantages to having your real estate license once you are an active investor. The three big advantages for us:
  1. Access to MLS. First and foremost, having your license means getting access to the local MLS. While there are certainly other ways to get access to the MLS, having your license will allow you access without having to rely on other agents, friends or colleagues to get access. This means you don’t have to worry about it going away, and you don’t have to worry about anyone getting in trouble if they’re giving you access to their account “illegally”.

    When we first decided that my wife would get her license, this was the impetus. We wanted access to the MLS not just to be able to run search queries and find candidate properties, but also because we wanted access to the wealth of historical data that the MLS provides. I have spent literally hundreds of hours on the MLS mining data to determine which areas to focus on, which types of houses to focus on, and which types of buyers to focus on.

    I credit this research with much of our early success in this business. And I never would have had access to this data without access to the MLS.

  2. Make More Money. Many investors realize that every time they sell a house through another agent, they are spending about 6% of the sale price in agent commissions. What they don’t realize is that when they buy property, their agent is also collecting up to 3% for facilitating the transaction.

    This means that on a typical purchase and sale of a property, an investor has access to up to about 7-8% of the total sale price of the property in extra profit, if he didn’t have to give that money up to his agent. If you buy a property for $50K and sell it for $100K, that’s $7500 in additional profit (assuming your buyer didn’t have his own agent) you could have if you were your own agent on the purchase and sale of that deal! Doing just four deals per year, having your real estate license could earn you an extra $30K.

    Over the course of our investing careers, we have saved/earned hundreds of thousands of dollars by not having to use another agent. Even with the brokerage/MLS fees, if you're doing at least one deal per year, you're probably earning $$$ by having your license.

  3. Controlling Our Deals. Being our own agent for our purchases and sales allows us full control over our deals. We can submit offers to and negotiate directly with listing agents. We deal directly with the lenders, the appraisers, the inspectors, the closing attorneys, and all other parties involved in the closing of our transactions, both on the buy and sell side. We control our marketing, our sales, and the showing of our properties to prospective buyers.

    While there is certainly overhead involved in being the agent for your own deals, that headache is far outweighed by the fact that you have full control over every aspect of the deal. Will your agent drive to your property before every showing, turn on the lights, open the windows, and put out fresh cookies? Will your agent follow-up with everyone who has viewed your property to get feedback and recommendations? Will your agent send marketing materials to renters in the neighborhood who might be looking for a house to buy? Will your agent make sure to be at the house with the appraisers to ensure that get a favorable viewing of the property?

    Probably not…but because all aspects of the transaction go through us, we can (and do) do all these things. It’s a good part of why our typical property only spends two weeks on the market before we get our first offer.

Studying to get my license in 2 weeks or so. This was super helpful! Thanks for taking out your time and writing this all out!
 
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WJK

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Last week, I had decided that I would try to open up new opportunities by going to Real Estate School so that I could learn more about Real Estate.

This evening was the first class. I didn't know what to expect until:
  • Upon receiving the 560 page book of Modern Real Estate Practice.
  • A thick note book full of contracts/forms.
  • Requirement to successfully complete the Pre-Licensing 60 hour course with Letter of Completion (pre-req to taking the actual Exam)
  • Eventually a 30 hour course for New Affiliates.
  • Successfully pass the state and national exam.
I sat in a daze for a moment as the information was being shared. The class is getting ready to start. In my gut, something was not right. My intention was not to become a Real Estate Agent. I don't need a second job to work for someone else. I am trying to build a plan to get away from that, not do the same plan in a different industry.

As the class was getting ready to start, I knew the window was closing by having any chance of getting a refund back. I jumped up instantly as the Instructor walked down the isle to the front. I went to the back office for the refund. Thank you @ZCP for saying what you did last week to me - I was getting ready to make a mistake. I am not saying it is a mistake for someone else, I am saying it is a mistake for me.

My intention is that I want to be more of an Real Estate Investor (such as acquiring and owning rentals) to generate passive income, and eventually own the rental asset(s). New course of direction (pick up a good REI book to get the basics and start attending a local REIA?)

Thank you.
There is a lot of information in a class like that. I've been in real estate since 1976 -- a day or two. Start reading and learning. Maybe then you'll be ready to learn what's in the huge book. It looks easy from the outside -- the only really easy part is to loose a lot of money by missing a detail on a deal. I know that sounds negative. It's the flat-footed truth. BUT there are ways to dip your toe into the water and start with a lot less risk. Real estate, for new investors, works the best when they start out slow and work through the long learning curve. Most people try to jump right in -- and end up loosing their shirts. Almost every great fortune, that has ever been built, is based on real estate. It's an awesome business!
 

advantagecp

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If you're flipping houses or investing, a RE license is good to have.

I think @JScott mentioned his wife is a RE agent and she is instrumental in the flipping process.


Well, here I go. Fastlane to Popularity by disagreeing with the guy who wrote the book.

Anyway, in the State of North Carolina, if you are flipping houses you probably do not want to be a licensed Real Estate Broker. The problem is that the NC Real Estate Commission holds you to a very high standard in the area of fiduciary responsibility to the public. The key to flipping is buying right, and the only situation where I would be comfortable doing that as a licensed broker is in a case when the property is already listed for sale by another brokerage. Something for sale by owner? Nope. A property listed for sale by the company I work for? Hell no!

Let me give a couple of examples of situations that a flipper would love to encounter:

1. You receive a call from a guy who wants to sell. Now. He doesn't have time to wait for some bozo to apply for a loan and go through underwriting. Now. He's happy to get $90,000, right now. You think you can put $20,000 into the property and sell it for $180,000. You buy it and in 3 months you have flipped it for a $60,000 profit.

2. (This one actually happened roughly 14 years ago to a broker about 12 miles from my office) You are an agent with a company which has had a property listed for almost a year. You see the market trend (strongly upward) and think that you can buy this property and flip if for a profit. You buy it and sell it about a year later. The market has been on FIRE. You make a 6 figure profit on the flip.

Two great situations, right? Two nice winners, until the original owner writes a complaint to the NC Real Estate Commission that you took advantage of them. And then you lose. You will lose. 100% certainty.

I read about #2 in the Disciplinary Action section of the NC Real Estate Commission Bulletin. I happened to run into the guy, who I didn't previously know, and asked him about it. The original sellers see (public record) how much you sold the property for and file a complaint with the NC Real Estate Commission. Long story short: You and your attorney go to a meeting in Raleigh, there are many more attorneys sitting on the other side of the table, you write a big check, and you get your name dragged through the mud. This agent did not screw over the sellers. He simply predicted where the market was going. He could have been wrong. He took a risk, won, and then had to give up all of his gains plus more, because of the APPEARANCE of impropriety.

TLDR: In my opinion, in the State of North Carolina you will be much better of NOT having a Real Estate License if you are flipping properties. The commissions earned on a good flip is chicken feed compared to the flip profits. Find an aggressive agent to represent you. Be happy when that agent earns commissions.

I held a NC Real Estate Broker license for over 20 years, spending much of that time managing sales and property management brokerages which I owned. I flipped properties on a regular basis.
 

advantagecp

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It's all good. And don't lose sight of the fact that I am not talking about a lawsuit. I am referring to action by a consumer protection agency, The North Carolina Real Estate Commission. You want to fight a legal battle with their battery of attorneys? Even if you win, you lose.

My example #2 is beyond a bold claim. It is fact. I am not going back into the archives of the NC Real Estate Commission's Disciplinary Action to find it, but it is there. If you don't believe me, OK.

My contention is very simple, and it is based upon my experiences and observations in that world over many years: It is not to your benefit to hold a North Carolina Broker's License if you are flipping property in North Carolina.

Your mileage may vary.
 
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DustinH

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I was going to say something like this as a reason it is NOT beneficial to be licensed but you beat me to it. There is more scrutiny as a licensed agent.

There is a guy in Colorado who has his own brokerage but does a ton of flips every year. He has done it in a very successful manner. His website is Invest4More I think. So, there's possible benefits either way. You just need to do a lot of due diligence to make sure you know what your obligations are as an agent and an investor.

Well, here I go. Fastlane to Popularity by disagreeing with the guy who wrote the book.

Anyway, in the State of North Carolina, if you are flipping houses you probably do not want to be a licensed Real Estate Broker. The problem is that the NC Real Estate Commission holds you to a very high standard in the area of fiduciary responsibility to the public. The key to flipping is buying right, and the only situation where I would be comfortable doing that as a licensed broker is in a case when the property is already listed for sale by another brokerage. Something for sale by owner? Nope. A property listed for sale by the company I work for? Hell no!

Let me give a couple of examples of situations that a flipper would love to encounter:

1. You receive a call from a guy who wants to sell. Now. He doesn't have time to wait for some bozo to apply for a loan and go through underwriting. Now. He's happy to get $90,000, right now. You think you can put $20,000 into the property and sell it for $180,000. You buy it and in 3 months you have flipped it for a $60,000 profit.

2. (This one actually happened roughly 14 years ago to a broker about 12 miles from my office) You are an agent with a company which has had a property listed for almost a year. You see the market trend (strongly upward) and think that you can buy this property and flip if for a profit. You buy it and sell it about a year later. The market has been on FIRE. You make a 6 figure profit on the flip.

Two great situations, right? Two nice winners, until the original owner writes a complaint to the NC Real Estate Commission that you took advantage of them. And then you lose. You will lose. 100% certainty.

I read about #2 in the Disciplinary Action section of the NC Real Estate Commission Bulletin. I happened to run into the guy, who I didn't previously know, and asked him about it. The original sellers see (public record) how much you sold the property for and file a complaint with the NC Real Estate Commission. Long story short: You and your attorney go to a meeting in Raleigh, there are many more attorneys sitting on the other side of the table, you write a big check, and you get your name dragged through the mud. This agent did not screw over the sellers. He simply predicted where the market was going. He could have been wrong. He took a risk, won, and then had to give up all of his gains plus more, because of the APPEARANCE of impropriety.

TLDR: In my opinion, in the State of North Carolina you will be much better of NOT having a Real Estate License if you are flipping properties. The commissions earned on a good flip is chicken feed compared to the flip profits. Find an aggressive agent to represent you. Be happy when that agent earns commissions.

I held a NC Real Estate Broker license for over 20 years, spending much of that time managing sales and property management brokerages which I owned. I flipped properties on a regular basis.
 

MJ DeMarco

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Well, here I go. Fastlane to Popularity by disagreeing with the guy who wrote the book.

Not at all man, you're good. I don't live in NC and I'm not privy to all the nuances of each state's law.

But generally speaking, you will be held to a higher standard. Nonetheless, full disclosure should be in order at all times, licensed or not.

Thanks for the clarification!
 

DustinH

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Yup, Mark Ferguson is the guy, and he's doing 50+ flips a year these days, while managing a brokerage that handles hundreds of deals per year. He is my co-author on my most recent book about negotiating for real estate investors...

Really? I just bought your book but haven't started it yet. I follow Mark on FaceBook and look at his flips on there.
 
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Regarding the real estate class, course material, etc. it's really irrelevant. I don't use it in my day to day as an agent. Not many people do. Like college, you're just paying for that piece of paper, or in this case, license. But I think it's almost always worth it.

I started as an agent 5 months or so ago. I'll tell you this, shopping for real estate with other people's money is not only fun, but is super helpful (for me at least) with respect to where I want to end up (developer, investor, builder). You end up creating a team (lenders, attorneys, inspectors, contractors) through your daily business. The majority of agents don't make it, but if you do, you'll literally be paid to learn real estate.

As for flipping with a license, a lot of the builders, investors, developers I work with are brokers themselves. I feel like most people who hold a profession in real estate hold a license, unless they're wholesaling. Sure, you're held to a higher standard, but why would/should that ever deter you? And if it really does, it's just as simple as hiring a solid agent, right?
 
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LiveFire

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I believe what I realized is that for now, this would have just made me get a "new" job. It may not be a mistake in the future to acquire the RE License. Just at this stage, I feel that it is not the best option for me. I have acquired a few books to build a foundation in the direction I need to head.
 
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While I wouldn't recommend getting a license before you do your first deal, there are a lot of advantages to having your real estate license once you are an active investor. The three big advantages for us:
  1. Access to MLS. First and foremost, having your license means getting access to the local MLS. While there are certainly other ways to get access to the MLS, having your license will allow you access without having to rely on other agents, friends or colleagues to get access. This means you don’t have to worry about it going away, and you don’t have to worry about anyone getting in trouble if they’re giving you access to their account “illegally”.

    When we first decided that my wife would get her license, this was the impetus. We wanted access to the MLS not just to be able to run search queries and find candidate properties, but also because we wanted access to the wealth of historical data that the MLS provides. I have spent literally hundreds of hours on the MLS mining data to determine which areas to focus on, which types of houses to focus on, and which types of buyers to focus on.

    I credit this research with much of our early success in this business. And I never would have had access to this data without access to the MLS.

  2. Make More Money. Many investors realize that every time they sell a house through another agent, they are spending about 6% of the sale price in agent commissions. What they don’t realize is that when they buy property, their agent is also collecting up to 3% for facilitating the transaction.

    This means that on a typical purchase and sale of a property, an investor has access to up to about 7-8% of the total sale price of the property in extra profit, if he didn’t have to give that money up to his agent. If you buy a property for $50K and sell it for $100K, that’s $7500 in additional profit (assuming your buyer didn’t have his own agent) you could have if you were your own agent on the purchase and sale of that deal! Doing just four deals per year, having your real estate license could earn you an extra $30K.

    Over the course of our investing careers, we have saved/earned hundreds of thousands of dollars by not having to use another agent. Even with the brokerage/MLS fees, if you're doing at least one deal per year, you're probably earning $$$ by having your license.

  3. Controlling Our Deals. Being our own agent for our purchases and sales allows us full control over our deals. We can submit offers to and negotiate directly with listing agents. We deal directly with the lenders, the appraisers, the inspectors, the closing attorneys, and all other parties involved in the closing of our transactions, both on the buy and sell side. We control our marketing, our sales, and the showing of our properties to prospective buyers.

    While there is certainly overhead involved in being the agent for your own deals, that headache is far outweighed by the fact that you have full control over every aspect of the deal. Will your agent drive to your property before every showing, turn on the lights, open the windows, and put out fresh cookies? Will your agent follow-up with everyone who has viewed your property to get feedback and recommendations? Will your agent send marketing materials to renters in the neighborhood who might be looking for a house to buy? Will your agent make sure to be at the house with the appraisers to ensure that get a favorable viewing of the property?

    Probably not…but because all aspects of the transaction go through us, we can (and do) do all these things. It’s a good part of why our typical property only spends two weeks on the market before we get our first offer.
 
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