The Life of a Real Estate Agent

There’s no such thing as a typical day in the life of a real estate agent; since they do their schedule according to their clients’ free time, agent X’s Sunday can be very different from agent Y’s Sunday. And, activities wise, it all depends on their specialty – the life of a real estate agent specialized in selling a home will have a different day from the so-called buyer’s agent. Not to mention their experience, right? If its someone straight out of real estate school, chances are he/she won’t have a lot of clients or will even have the obligation of working together with a more experienced agent. So it really varies.

That’s not to say there’s no routine in this field of business. There are some things that they all do, so, in this post, we have envisioned a week in the life of a real estate agent.

For demonstration purposes, our Real Estate Agent – let’s call her Susan – will not be a specialized agent. She is an all arounder: that helps sell, buy and rent properties.

Monday

Rise and shine, Susan! You have a long busy week ahead!

After working out and taking her kids to school like she does every time, Superwoman Susan arrives at the office where she works at 9am. The first thing she does is take care of some spillover administrative duties from last week and answers some emails, social media messages and phone calls – all of which she will do throughout the week, with no specified time; whenever it happens.

At 11 pm Susan and the other agents have a meeting with the Principal Broker. It is common for all of them to gather on Monday and share details regarding listings they represent. There’s always some update, some way they can help each other out. And, in fact, that’s what happened this Monday: Susan has a client looking for a Villa and guess what new listing one of her colleagues is going to put on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) today?!

Right after she gets out of the meeting, she calls her client which is a homebuyer, and shows the picture first hand. He likes it, but because he is a busy guy, he will only be available to go to a showing on Sunday. So, it looks like Susan will work the weekend… occupational hazard, Susan! Occupational hazard.

Tuesday

Susan doesn’t normally do this, but since the photographer she’s working with is new, she is going to a house she is about to list on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) to supervise his work and give him the tricks of the trade.

Because of her real estate experience and the house exterior is quite nice, Susan asks the photographer to take a photo of her – she’s always well-dressed and with makeup because agents have to look sharp all the time; you never know when a client might drop by. The picture looks great, so she – a social media savvy agent – posts the picture on all her profiles, showing their clients how busy the life of a real estate agent (and her business) is: even though, after that appointment, the rest of her day was spent at the office, doing boring data entry for that house on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS). Because the photographer took a little bit to edit the pictures – he’s new to this field, remember? – Susan did a little overtime and arrived home with the kids already asleep. But she hates doing that and almost never does it. Time with family is sacred!

Wednesday

Great news! A lingering negotiation of one of Susan’s houses for sale is finally concluded! The homebuyer and the home seller finally reached a Fair Market Value to the house, so now, just’ like that 90’s pop-rock hit, it’s: Closing time. Susan’s week is about to get eventful!

First thing she does is notifying her principal broker, not only to receive her due congratulations but also because he’s the one responsible for most of what’s about to come, dealing with Appraisers, Lawyers, the buyer’s agent commission and everything related with closing and its costs. He is excited and believes in less than a month closing will get done and Susan’s home seller client will have money in the pocket. So, throughout the week (and the month) she’ll be going back and forth with everyone involved in the process, always representing her client’s interest.

Thursday

We forgot to mention Susan’s assistant! He’s straight out of real estate school, a hard-working guy who helps with several administrative duties and is being tutored by Susan, learning some really good real estate tips. He reminds her of the open house event she’s hosting Saturday and Susan gets terrified! Not only did she almost forget – there are still some minor details pending regarding the home staging for the event – but she realized she will have no rest this weekend with the open house on Saturday and the Villa showing on Sunday. Not fair! But what are you going to do, right? Better seize the busy week; there will be uneventful weeks in the life of a real estate agent too, no doubt about it.

Susan, then, tells the assistant to run down to a store to get balloons, and to print informational flyers regarding the house for sale, business cards and open house signs with the logo of her firm and also her picture – she has the art done already; Susan is a busy real estate agent.

Then she heads to the home of the open house to check in with the home staging professional she hired. It looks perfect! The home staging made the windows look bigger, the light is coming in, the lawn is perfectly done, and now they pick together scents that attract home buyers. Susan knows you have to think of every little home staging detail when doing an open house.

Friday

Because of that picture she posted on her social media on Tuesday, Bob, a former client of hers, calls and says he wants more details about the house on the picture. She tells him the house was just listed, talks a little about it and Bob gets excited; says he wants to make an offer. Susan warns that she is the listing agent representing the home seller, so if she were to represent Bob on this one, she would incur in a Dual Listing. Bob says he has no problem with that, but Susan still has to ask the home seller if she’s okay with it, otherwise it’s an illegal act and Susan is perfectionist about how she deals with things.

Later that day, Susan has a meeting at a young couple’s home. They want to sell their house but, first, they want to buy a new one. They just had a baby, so they can’t go to her office. That is common. With new clients, sometimes you do the introductory meeting at cafes, restaurants, country clubs, sometimes in their homes, sometimes in the office… it’s always a new experience, and this one was the highlight of the day because the baby is adorable so she even got to play a little bit and relax from the hectic week it’s been. Susan was highly recommended by a former client of hers that is good friends with the couple. Plus, their situation is really specific – having to buy a house before putting their own house for sale – the conversation went great and they really clicked; so she decides to ask for an Exclusive Right to Sell Listings deal. They agree and the assistant will draft the papers so they are in business.

On her way back home, Susan drives paying attention to houses for sale. That, and searching through the Multiple Listing Service (MLS), is something she constantly does because there’s always something she might have missed and makes sense to one of her clients.

Saturday

It’s open house day and Susan is bright and early at the house waiting for people to walk in. There’s not a lot of people coming in, but Susan knows The Ugly Truth About Open Houses, so she doesn’t bother to get discouraged. She endures the long hours, makes the most of it, tries to have some fun during the event and makes some good contacts that might, down the road be fruitful – for the house for sale and for herself.

Sunday

Susan picks up her client Bob, at his house and drives him to the showing of her colleague’s listing. The seller’s agent (Susan’s colleague) is at the house waiting for them to do the showing, but it is not unusual for the buyer’s agent to do the showing alone to the homebuyer. The reason the seller’s agent is there, aside from the deference he is giving to Susan and the client, is the fact that the house is under a Net Listing Agreement, so Susan’s colleague wants to go the extra mile and push for a nice offer coming from Susan so he can earn a great commission in the end. Unfortunately for him, Susan is a hard negotiator and found some things that could devalue the house; so their offer won’t be as good as he wishes.

But that story will only be settled like a month from that day and this article only covers one week in the life of a real estate agent. If you wish to know the ending, maybe go to real estate school and become a real estate agent yourself! Like we said, outcomes vary, the life of a real estate agent is very dynamic. However, independently of that, they are surely very interesting and eventful lives!