May 2007 Archives

I recently had time to surf around the Internet and came upon this terrific article regarding the top five real estate myths, that even some agents believe, from a well respected real estate publisher and investor, as well as a friend of mine, Rennie Gabriel of Gabriel Publications.

This article originated from Parade Magazine, an insert into many major newspapers. Rennie's comments are in response to the misinformation that abounds in that article, which, for the most part, I wholeheartedly agree with him on.

A couple of days ago in an article for Inman News entitled "Realtor® Ranks Swell but their Pocketbooks Don't", Glen Roberts reported what we agents already knew: that despite the huge increase in housing prices over the last ten years with the accompanying public perception that agents are making gobs of money, the truth is quite different.

In actuality, Realtor®'s median income was down 3.2% in 2006 compared to 2004, while their 2004 median income had dropped 5.6% from 2002. Roberts quoted Chang-Tai Hsieh, an associate professor of economics at University of California, Berkeley, who said that the median-income drop for Realtors®

"is clearly driven by the fact that there has been excessive entry in the last two years. You would expect to see some exit in the near future, but as soon as housing prices pick up we're going to see more entry and then that's going to drive down (income)."