In 2005, you couldn’t throw a rock in Phoenix without hitting a Realtor, but that isn’t the case any more. Apparently a lot fewer people are signing up for real estate school these days. [Hat tip Asset Hunter!]
Connie Ross wonders a little when people tell her they want to enroll in real-estate school.
Ross, a partner at one such school, said she’s surprised not because she believes a declining market is necessarily a bad place to start a real-estate career, but because it’s an unforgiving environment for those unwilling to pay their dues.
"A lot of people that got their license in 2005 aren’t in business anymore," Ross said. "They never learned how to work."
Connie Ross wonders a little when people tell her they want to enroll in real-estate school.
Ross, a partner at one such school, said she’s surprised not because she believes a declining market is necessarily a bad place to start a real-estate career, but because it’s an unforgiving environment for those unwilling to pay their dues.
"A lot of people that got their license in 2005 aren’t in business anymore," Ross said. "They never learned how to work."
Not only are there fewer students, but schools are going out of business and agents are moving on to other lines of work.
The Arizona Department of Real Estate, which licenses real-estate schools and their graduates, shows the number of licensed schools in Arizona increased from 167 in 2005 to 264 in April. But calls to the state’s list of approved schools reveal that several no longer exist.
Phones at the Apollo School of Real Estate in Phoenix, for example, have been disconnected, and its Web site was taken offline in April.
Ross said her school has picked up some business because of the closures, contributing in part to its continued success during the market slump.
The real estate department, which also issues two-year licenses to real estate agents and brokers, saw a 25 percent increase this year in the number of license holders no longer practicing their trade.
John Foltz, president of Realty Executives Phoenix, said those numbers don’t even reflect how dramatic the drop-off has been in the number of practicing agents since the downturn began.
Ross agreed, saying the buzz in her industry is that roughly half the agents licensed in 2005 no longer work in the field.
The National Association of Realtors has boasted of their "low barrier to entry" for years. Getting in has been easy. Now, staying in is hard. Hopefully a little real estate "Darwinism" here will do what the NAR has never done—weed out the bad apples.
These agents won’t be missed– by either their fellow agents or former clients.
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“Stupid is as stupid does” – Ms. Gump
Igor is on his game again today: the extra realtors are “useless”