Hello,
I`ve joined your office (prior to reading your post) and from what I see so far, you are 100% right! Very happy here, and looking forward to the future in this business...
Watch for me around the office, would be good to meet you!
Steve Throndson
403 837-7368
PS. If I can take you for coffee to see if I can learn a few tips and tricks, that would be great... Call me!
QUOTE (dellison @ Oct 16 2007, 10:28 PM) Hey Steve,
I just joined the REIN forums, and yours was the first post I came across. I just had to reply.
I have been with my brokerage for 1 year now, and I can`t be happier! While I pay very low monthly fees and keep almost all of my commissions, I get huge amounts of support (overwhelming actually) from my office. There are several brokers and associate brokers to help answer questions anytime of the day (even when putting that deal together at 11pm!). I have taken full advantage of this and have had to call on almost every one of my deals so far. They never seem to tire of answering my questions!
The secretarial staff is awesome and knew my name long before I knew theirs. They are constantly sending other realtors my way for open house sittings. I can honestly say that any lack of deals is not a result of my brokerage, but my own fault!
I have taken a formal training "Jumpstart" program which was very inexpensive and was extremely informative and helpful to hit the ground running.
I interviewed with other brokerages and found:
A. Couldn`t get a hold of them easily to set up an appointment to interview - not a good sign.
B. Their fees were astronomical (4 times what I pay now per month)
C. I didn`t get a good vibe from my interviewers. Where they distracted? How did they answer my questions? Did they focus their presentation on SUPPORT? They might be trying to justify their higher fees.
I even asked the main broker/owner why their fees were so low compared to the others I interviewed with and his response was that their overhead was too big for their associate base. They need the higher fees to compensate.
How big is their office space/building? Where is it located? How many associates work out of that brokerage? Do the fees include personal office space? Do you need office space? Can you work from home instead? How much are the deal fees/conveyancing fees?
The better location, the larger square footage, the less sophisticated the office staff, the more overhead - get what I mean?
Also, what is included in the fees? Business cards? Lawn signs? Other marketing?
Ask yourself if you need someone else to pay for that when you might be able to do that yourself or pay for what you need when you need it instead of each month when you may not need it.
Also, working from the same office as a bunch of top producers will not make you a top producer (this is not osmosis). Although it may help to be able to chit chat with a top producer and get some ideas, I think you will find that most offices have someone who is a very experienced, and would be will be willing to do this over a coffee or lunch!
Hope that helps and gives you some ideas of some questions to ask.