Since it’s now all official, I guess I can let the cat out of the bag - a little over two weeks ago, on August 7th, I passed my Indiana Real Estate Salesperson’s Exam, and decided to become a full-time real estate agent. I’m affiliated with the F.C. Tucker Company, Inc., the “big dogs” of residential real estate in Indianapolis.
Why the rather dramatic change in direction? There are several reasons, actually, but the biggest and most important was probably my growing disillusionment with technology and manufacturing. There’s not much exciting going on in either field right now, and both have started to “eat their young” as they struggle with the moribund economy and labor market. Worse, I’m tired of dealing with the short-sightedness of senior management, and in Corporate America in general, which drove me to consider leaving the business-to-business marketplace entirely
In short, it just isn’t a fun place to be right now, and I don’t think it’s going to be fun for a long time to come, at least not for me. I’m tired. I’ve fought the good fight one too many times, had to lay off friends too often, spent too many sleepless nights worrying about where the next payroll is going to come from. I spent five months marketing and selling my consulting business - and every client I found was a repeat of the hell of the past decade. I couldn’t face doing it anymore.
What I did find out was that I really enjoyed the marketing, networking, and selling aspects of what I’ve been doing, though. I like meeting new people all the time, and helping them solve problems. I like being a consultant - but only where there are resources to work with and people actually want to get something done.
The more I studied the real estate profession, the more interested in it I became. One morning, I woke up and realized that I could do all of the things I really enjoyed, and not do most of the stuff I hated as a real estate agent.
That was about three weeks ago. Within the week I’d interviewed at several real estate companies - and that was the first pleasant change. These guys actively recruited me. They courted me, and genuinely tried to convince me to join their organizations. There are a lot of reasons for that, many of which have nothing to do with me or my skills, but it was nice, for a change, to be actively wanted.
There really never was much doubt, though, about which company I was going to join. I knew I wanted to be part of Tucker. I’ve bought two homes through them and sold one, and our agent on all three transactions is a good friend. He and I have had several conversations about the field of real estate sales over the past year, and I knew that Tucker had not only a great training program, but that he would act as my coach as I started my practice.
I took my exam in the morning, and before noon I was signed up with Tucker.
The last couple of weeks have been hectic as I get things rolling and dive into this new career. I have a two-week training program to attend at the beginning of September, but I’ve already started doing business. As I write this, I’m sitting in an Open House, waiting for prospective buyers to come through. I’ve sent out over a hundred announcement cards, and made about as many prospecting calls.
It’s already paying off - this past Friday I took my first listing and picked up my first buyer to represent. When those deals close, I’ll have made more money from just those than I made in five months of consulting. I’ll have done it with a lot less stress and heartache, as well.
Fifteen years ago, technology was a hobby to me, something I did because I enjoyed it. It was a useful tool. I decided to make it my profession, and it’s made me miserable for a long time. The days of it being a hobby and a tool are back, and I’m glad.
Later: The Open House is over now, and it went well. You can see a picture of the house I was showing here. I picked up a couple of new prospects, one of which wants to see the house I listed Friday. I was supposed to have the house open from 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM; right around 2:00 I had a deluge of visitors so I stayed open an extra hour.
A couple hours after I came home my cell phone rang - it was my licensing class instructor calling, just to see how I was doing getting started. He made a point (again) of telling me how he knew I was going to be successful, and that I should feel free to call him with any questions I had, at all. For the first time in years, my phone rang on a Sunday night, and it wasn’t the prelude to a shit storm. God, I love this job!
