Realtor Bubble In California

The housing boom isn't just reflected in prices, the number of RE agents are growing, according to the Santa Cruz Sentinel. "There are far more agents in Santa Cruz County than there are homes that can be bought and sold. It doesn’t take much to do the math."

So many, in fact, that they are starting to undercut each other. "'We’re already on the cutting edge, at the forefront of commissions coming down because the values are going up.' The usual agent fee rate of 6 percent per sale has dropped to 5 percent for the majority of transactions in town and, in some cases, is down to 4.5 percent, he said."

"And while there are no statistics to back this up, anecdotally, local industry observers say the bulk of the sales are completed by a small percentage of the work force."

Here are some stats from the bottom of the page.

Year Realtors Houses sold

2000 1,056 2,422

2001 1,083 1,784

2002 1,099 2,290

2003 1,250 2,355

2004 1,452 2,801

2005 1,473 294