Do estate agents / realtors earn loads in the USA?

[Hobbes8]

I’ve been watching Dead To Me on Netflix. It stars Christina Applegate as a recently widowed realtor. She lives in a massive house and is obviously considered v successful. I think there’s other examples from US TV as well - eg Phil Dumphy from Modern Family.

Is it a really high paid job in the US? Or is it just a typical TV thing where everyone lives in gorgeous flats and houses and never discusses how they afford to pay for it (stares hard at unemployed / waitressing Friends crew).

I knew this would be about Dead to Me. 😊 I've been wondering the same.

They get 5% commission. Sometimes 6%. But it’s a multiple listing service so quite often it is split between the listing agent and the agent with the buyer. You can go see any listed house with any agent (so say a Foxton agent could show you a house listed with Winkworth and they would split the commission).
However I found they do quite a bit more than a UK agent. They also need to take an exam and be licensed.
Obviously if you sell more expensive houses you get higher commission. And also it’s fiction and the houses on US tv shows are always way more expensive than the person living in them could afford in real life (like Monica’s flat in Friends....)

Monica’s apartment was rent controlled!

6% is my experience but as there is a buyer and seller agent they split it, so 3% each. Then if the realtor is affiliated with a broker (estate firm, which they have to be when starting out) a cut goes to that office as well.

My friend did her license her and it was about 9mths of study and exams and then 2yrs with a broker office for experience. It’s been hard for her to get established and build a client base. She has a side hustle as well. I also know another guy who sells with his aunt and he has a couple of other jobs. It’s not easy.

They get a commission from the sale so it depends on the cost of the house. In dead to me I think your woman is selling high end houses so that’s why she’s loaded. If I house sells for two mil they’d get 6% of that, so 120,000 for what could be only a few weeks work if it’s a quick sale. If you’re selling several houses a year you’d be loaded.

But I know some realtors in US who barely sell anything and will maybe sell a house every two years for 20,000 / 30,000 commission. I think it’s just one of those jobs that if you’re brilliant at it you can make a fortune.

Sorry all the posts above weren’t here when I posted. What they said!

i would think the usa similar to canada, agents only get paid once a home has been sold and money exchanged. they are paid a percentage of the home's selling price or combinations of 10% for the first 100K and 3% for the remaining type situations.
meanwhile they pay hefty desk fees to be affiliated with a company (say $250 per month) and it can take a couple years to get customers.

i gather a new agent can expect about 1 sale in their first 6 months, 2 in the following 6 months and eventually hope to work towards 1-2 a months.
but they have expenses as well and would pay taxes on their earnings.
some work as teams, get paid less but have more sales.
big homes on big lots seem relatively common in the usa.

Ooh like Santa Clarita Diet as well. They have a gorgeous house.

In most areas of the US houses are bigger and cheaper than here. Plus it’s tv not real life! A friend of mine has just moved from St Louis & her house looks like a mansion, huge pool, steps going down from a big terrace off the master bedroom suite (his & hers bathrooms & dressing rooms), lots of reception rooms etc and it costs less than a 1 bedroom 1st floor flat in Ealing!

Only if selling high end properties successfully! But in many parts of the US land is cheaper than crowded Europe and houses tend to be larger, our "small" 2 bed duplex (semi detached) in the US was as big as our 4 bed in the U.K. and housing on us tv shows is often wildly unrealistic for income!

Some can, yes. I have a few friends in the US who are realtors. One is only housed because her parents pay her mortgage (she’s lazy and doesn’t get up til 11am every day though! She’s in her late 30s and still lives like a student). The others have a very comfortable life. But they work in Manhattan and Washington DC and are selling quite high end properties.

I always wondered about US properties, on Supernanny US the families lived in massive villa style houses with pools and the mum was a SAHP and the dad a postman or traffic warden.

Thanks All - I knew the hive mind would know! So it’s a combo of real estate being a genuinely well paid career in the US and a bit of unrealistic TV housing.

I know my sister in the US has paid 6% more than once, but their EAs seem a lot more professional - as a PP has said, they have to be qualified. From what I've seen, their 'blurbs' are a lot more detailed, too. Whereas here, more than once I've known an EA not have a clue even about something so basic as the length of a flat's lease. And seem taken aback when you ask!

As for their SPAG and general competence here, they often leave a lot to be desired, but whether Brits would rather pay 6% instead of maybe 2% for more professionalism, remains to be seen. I suspect not.

Whether they earn a lot more in the US I dare say depends largely on area and they type of property they typically handle. There are UK EAs who are mostly very high-end, so not usually trying to sell the grottier type of flat in a rough area.

And of course, same as here, whether the property market is booming or flat, or prices are falling, will have a good deal to do with how much they're making at any given time.