Realtor Bubble Gets Ugly
This NY Times story about RE brokers behaving badly includes some surprises. "'In the last five years it seems like everyone wants to be a broker,' said Diane Saatchi, a senior vice president for Corcoran . 'There's not enough time on the part of the senior brokers to really do the proper training because many of us are too busy making money.'" That's an excuse?
"The National Association of Realtors says its membership has swelled to 1.1 million now from 766,560 in 2000, a rise of 46 percent. In Manhattan the number of brokers and sales agents has jumped 42 percent, to 26,220, in the same period."
"That means too many agents are chasing the same deals. Dennis Pantano, a broker in Belmont, Calif., said 45 percent of the agents in Silicon Valley 'sold no houses last year.'"
7 Comments:
If you right click on the link, copy & paste into google, you can get the first half of the story free.
I believe one can register for free at the NY Times website and read all current articles in full.
A bit OT, but I just walked into the Red Carpet Club at Dulles airport. Guess what the people at the desk were so engrossed in that they hardly noticed me -- their real estate investments!
Remember the NYC cab drivers who traded Cisco on their PDAs in 1999-2000?
"I'm an actor/model/real estate agent. The specials tonight are grilled tuna..."
One of the reasons that you see increased numbers of inactive agents, and agents overall, is that getting a RE license is a no-money-down gimmick. I worked with a guy who told me that he was licensed in GA, and his wife in FL, and they used the licenses to charge a buying agent commission from builders on their own investment properties. In essence, they get 3% cash back at closing, which they use for most of their down payment on an 80-15 loan.
I think they learned this trick from one of those seminars. So I think this gimmick is leading to higher RE licensing and higher numbers of infrequent participants.
I have a long time friend, who has been laying asphalt for 30 years, he just got his license.
I own a small manufacturing company, one of the machinists working for me just got his.
http://www.bugmenot.com/
Useful for bypassing free sites that require registration, such as the NY Times.
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