Let’s face it: flexibility and unlimited earning potential are two of the main draws of becoming a real estate agent. The thing is, work-life balance isn’t necessarily guaranteed, and it’s up to the individual real estate agent to achieve the freedom and flexibility they’re looking for.
Fortunately, there are plenty of real estate agents who are able to create some “breathing room” in their schedule with a little help from proven systems and a whole lot of intentional time management.
From knowing how to choose a real estate brokerage to work for to mastering the art of delegation, here are a few tips for achieving the work-life balance you crave.
Key Takeaways:
- Different brokerages have different work cultures; find one aligned with your goals.
- Look for brokerages offering in-house services like marketing and lead generation.
- Listing agents have more control over schedules compared to buyer’s agents.
Choose a Brokerage With a Work Culture That Aligns With Your Goals
As with any place of work, different brokerages lend themselves to different work cultures. If you’ve worked in the corporate world before, you know there are some companies that pride themselves on “hustle” and “hard work” and others that strongly encourage work-life boundaries and balance. The same is true for your local broker or brokerage firms.
For instance, some brokerages may not “announce” their expectation that you put in long hours and sacrifice holidays or family time, but the general culture may say otherwise.
You might assume this only happens at big real estate companies, but it can be true of your local boutique brokerage as well.
That means knowing how to choose a brokerage to work for is key for creating the life and schedule you feel most comfortable with. In fact, knowing how to choose a brokerage to work for is arguably the most important part of creating a schedule that works for you.
So, before you decide how to choose a brokerage to work for based only on their commission splits or training program, consider their culture around work-life balance, too.
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Master the Art of Delegation
Again, while you may be tempted to decide how to choose a brokerage to work for based on financial gain or their training opportunities, other factors to consider are the services they provide in-house.
Once your career picks up speed, you’ll want (and need) the extra support from services like listing photography, done-for-you marketing, or even lead generation.
In other words, the best real estate companies are the ones that have the services you’re looking for in-house, or those that are willing to let you outsource those services if they don’t provide them for you.
Some tasks you’ll want to delegate as you grow are:
- Transaction coordination
- Email marketing
- Listing photography and copywriting
- Content creation for your website
And you may even choose to outsource lead generation.
Work Towards Becoming a Listing Agent
While it’s not impossible to control your schedule as a buyer’s agent, some of the best real estate agents know that it’s much easier to predict your schedule as a listing agent.
Why?
Because as a buyer’s agent, your schedule depends on your buyers’ availability to go see homes and attend open houses. As a listing agent, you have more control over meetings and other important dates.
The catch is, it often takes a bigger budget to break into listings, since you’ll be the one taking care of the marketing budget and may have to work a bit harder to market your own services.
For most new real estate agents, starting out as a buyer’s agent gives them the momentum and funds they need to roll over into listings after their first year.
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