How to find low cost Sponsoring Broker for part-time real estate agent?

I work as a software developer full-time. I have always wanted to become my own real-estate agent for convenience and plan to do my own real-estate investments in the future.

When I completed my courses and passed my TREC (Texas Real-Estate Commission) exams. I received my real estate license. Then the next step was to find a sponsoring real-estate broker.
So I began my research and found the following questions or criteria are important for me:

1. Low monthly cost (if any)
2. High than normal commission split (or flat fee commission split)
3. Support or help from Broker
4. Quality and integrity of sponsoring broker's office.
5. Initial investment (setup fee)

What I found during my research...

Large Franchise Firms

Most real-estate firms / agents are full-time and most of them engage with multi-national real-estate firm / franchise like Re-Max, Keller Williams, Sothesby, Century 21, etc...  These are the mainstream solution for most real-estate professional for is going to be doing full-time real-estate. But they do not work for me for the following reasons:

1. Most charges office fee. (I do not need an office).

2. Some charges initial fee / setup fee to get started.

3. Some have minimum quota for number of transactions. (pressure to do transactions).

Online Only Firms

I also found many online only real-estate firms such as Real. Real is a new kind of real-estate agency, they operate online and encourages their agent to work from home. Real is almost perfect for me but I don't like the commission split.

Somewhere in between

After weeks of looking... I found the perfect real-estate agency for me, it is called United Real Estate. United is a multi-state company, I am not sure if it is a franchise. Their Houston office has excellent friendly staff and most importantly a Broker (Dianne Moore) who is helpful, friendly and very knowledgable. Being a new real-estate agent with lots of questions having support is very-very important for me. United Real-Estate offers flat-fee commission splits and low cost of $60 / month fee. For me this is the perfect Broker Sponsorship. I have done 2 transactions with United Real Estate, Dianne Moore has been awesome! And her office team are all very responsive and very friendly.  I highly recommend United Real Estate if you are a part-time or even for full-time agents.

Questions? want to join United Real Estate?

I have been a real-estate for only 7 months and thanks for United Real Estate the process has been a pleasant one...  I hope writing this blog may help someone with same scenario as I.

If you have any question about becoming a part-time real-estate agent please leave a comment and I try to help you. 

If you want to Join United Real Estate please let me know, I can help and would like the earn $100 referral incentive for bringing new agents. :-))

Thanks

--Andrew

How many years active experience as a salesperson do you need to qualify to become a broker?

You need FOUR years of active working experience as a Texas real-estate salesperson (licensee) to qualify to become a Texas real-estate broker.

What is TRELA?

In Texas Real Estate, TRELA stands for Texas Real Estate Licensing Act.

TRELA is the law governing Texas real estate transactions, Texas real estate professionals (sales person / broker). TRELA is enforced by TREC (Texas Real Estate Commission)

How much actual transactional experience points are required to become a Texas Real Estate Broker?

Qualifying active transactional experience must total 3600 points to become a Texas Real Estate Broker.

Licensee wrong doing in Texas is considered a Class A misdemeanor which means?

Class A misdeameanor in Texas = $4000 fine and up to 1 year in jail.

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But the problem is how to sell and buy with good timing? This is called the chicken-and-egg problem.

This is when bridge loan can help. Owner can apply for a bridge loan where the current house equity will be mortgaged for next home's down payment.

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