Hey,

I live in Louisiana and I just finish my pre licensing course to get my salesperson license. I take the state and national exam in about week. I heard that finding real estate brokerage firm to work for is basically your interviewing the broker. My questions are, what are some of the key things I should be looking for when picking one? What questions should I ask? And any other additional information. Thank you

@Lydia Woods as a new agent you are going to want a brokerage that will support you on your new journey! Ask what kind of mentoring and training they offer. Ask what their commission splits are. Do they offer anything to help you get leads? Keller Williams is a great brokerage for new agents imo but they also have a 36% commission split which is steep but worth it if you get the help you need to get started. Good luck!

@Lydia Woods - As an individual agent, I highly recommend that you start by joining a team or working under a great agent in a brokerage office that’s invested in training you and helping you succeed. I was too blind to take advantage of initial “join my team” opportunities, bummed that I’d have to share so much of my money (usually 50% or more) with someone else. Not realizing that 100% of 0 is 0. All of the brokers advertise training and mentoring, but you’ll actually get it from an agent or team that is relying on you for results. The biggest challenge for an individual agent is getting the phone to ring so you can make money. Most new agents fail and quit because they don’t make enough money. If you’re on a team, you’ll immediately be on buyer’s appointments and such learning the ropes. The biggest problem for a superstar agent is not enough time - so they need newbies like you to help service their potential clients. I’ve tried multiple brokerages and I recommend starting with the brokerage that represents the superstar agent you’re going to go work for - usually like Keller Williams or Remax or Berkshire Hathaway. Good luck.

@Natalie Schanne Thanks. When you are part of a team, do everyone in the team split there commission with everyone else? Example if I’m part of a team and client contact me to sale there house. Do the team get commission off that as well or the star agent ?

@Adrienne Medina Thanks. One top of the commission split are there separate fees you have to pay brokerage firm?

@Lydia Woods - Talk to teams and ask them how they structure it. Sometimes it's tiered based on your experience and value add. Some teams will hire you straight for like $10-20/hour to do showings. Others do a commission split. Generally it's like you split 50/50 with you and the star agent/team lead, but the star agent is paying for staff who don't sell houses like your transaction coordinators, administrative assistants, etc. So at REMAX your star agent might pay $1500/mo + 5% of gross commissions to the main office, then pay his or her admin staff (probably $30k+/year per person), then the commissions you make are split 50/50 of that 95%. One team I looked at recently on a "ZILLOW PREMIER AGENT" profile with 300 5 star reviews, 200+ recent sales,was actually like the combined work of 20 people. So, if you participate in a deal at 3% buyer's side for a $300,000 house, the $9000 commission goes 5% to REMAX as a franchise fee then the 8550 gets split 50/50 between you and your team lead and you get a check directly for like $4275. If you agree to work for like $20/hour doing showings, then you would probably not receive any commission money (depending on what you had agreed to). 

@Natalie Schanne Thank you for breaking it down, makes sense

@Natalie Schanne Was going to start LLC to put my rental properties under. With being a realtor do the name of business matter? Don't know if it will be problem.