Contract with Keller Williams as a business?
Hey, I've decided to take a different angle to enter the real estate market. Becoming an agent will solve several problems I faced as a wholesaler. Plus, I'm migrating to real estate from being a full-time Software engineering Contractor, so I have the aptitude for building a contracting business.
To protect myself, I plan to operate my new real estate contracting business as a business, and not under my personal name. That will afford me asset protection, anonymity, and to some extent, tax benefits. (Ex. Car bills or mileage)
I chose Keller Williams because they are well known for their excellent training programs, but I've heard that sometimes agencies don't like to contract you under a business name. Sometimes you need to put your name in your business name to get them to make an exception.
Does Keller Williams allow agents to contract with them as a business? I'd appreciate it if you post a link to where I can read more about their policy on this.
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I work for KW in Tacoma Washington and KW pays my commissions to my LLC.
Even though it sounds like you've made up your mind, in my opinion, you're better off with an Independant where you get to keep most of your $$. Especially since you plan to approach real estate in a non traditional sense. You won't get training on wholesaling at KW unless you join a team that already specializes in that. If you haven't already, talk to a cpa about the set up of your biz. Unless you're engaging in super risky stuff, your e&o and a nice personal umbrella policy should be just fine. Your state will have rules set by your bureau of real estate about how you can use a team/business name as a licensed real estate agent. I can't imagine a brokerage telling you that you can't have an SCorp or something like that since you're an independant contractor.
Either way, best of luck.
I'm not looking for wholesale training; I've already completed that. Being an agent will help me avoid problems I was facing with the market in wholesaling.
@Rick MacGills are you looking to setup your own brokerage under an LLC name or have you listed as an independent contractor as an agent under your LLC?
@Michael The latter.
I work for KW in Tacoma Washington and KW pays my commissions to my LLC.
@Timothy Tooker Perfect. That's what I was wondering. Does your LLC have your name in it's name or is it an arbitrary name? (Ex. Keller Williams, or McDonalds versus Bigger Pockets or Vista Print)
My advice is to check with your state's Department of Licensing to see what rules they have regarding names for real estate companies.
@Timothy Tooker I'll call the Division of Real Estate tomorrow. Thanks for your help.