Many Gen Z real-estate agents, who were born after 1997, started their careers in a booming market.
Over 170,000 new agents joined a big realtor group, but 140,000 left during the last housing crisis.
Hard times typically thin brokers' ranks, but young agents believe they'll prove their mettle.
Lately, Caleb Spears, a 25-year-old real-estate agent in Florida, has soothed some panicked colleagues on the other end of the phone.
"They will call me after a house sits for three days and be like, 'Oh my god, do you think we need a price drop?'" he told Insider.
Spears, however, remains calm. Since his brother — who was already working as an agent near the Florida resort city of Destin on the Gulf of Mexico — lured him away from a Chick-fil-A job when he was 20 years old, he's been representing buyers and sellers for six years.
According to Redfin, in June 2019, when Spears was already working, it took houses in Destin more than 78 days on market to sell, compared to a zippy 10 days in June 2021.
His fellow Gen Z agents, though, may have never witnessed slower spells.
"All they've seen is this volcanic activity in a market where everything sells over asking price in a week," Spears said. "But, historically, that's an incredibly rare instance."
The oldest members of Generation Z, who were born between 1997 and 2012, entered the workforce during unprecedented pandemic times — and real estate was no exception. As rookies became agents, home prices rose at their fastest rate in 45 years, bidding wars became commonplace, and houses flew off the shelves in days — even sight unseen.
Now, the market has shifted beneath these newbies. They're still selling houses, but at reduced prices and in longer timeframes. At best, it means real-estate agents and mortgage brokers make less money. At worst, it means firms lay off employees or they quit voluntarily during the so-called bust parts of the housing market's boom-bust cycles.
Gen Z agents told Insider that they see the current moment as an opportunity. They said they believe that if they can deepen relationships with clients offline and improve their marketing to reach more potential customers, they'll rise to the top of the industry — even in a downturn. Other people, they said, can head for the exits.
"You're not only going to survive, you're going to capture all the business all those thousands of agents would have done," Spears said.
The hot market made it easier for Gen Z real-estate agents get started
"Historically when the markets do well, more people want to give real estate a try," Lawrence Yun, the chief economist of the National Association of Realtors, said.
An additional 170,000 agents joined the association's ranks between July 2020 and July 2022, bringing membership to an all-time high of over 1.58 million brokers nationwide. Yun said the surge even beat the association's own expectations for the period.
Take the 20-year-old Nimel Sonna, who goes by Tre and started working as an agent in Seattle in August 2020. Sonna was working for a moving company when he admired a client's house. Sonna asked the owner what he did for a living, and he answered that he was a real-estate agent.
Sonna said he feels lucky he jumped into what he called the pandemic-housing "heat wave" because it aligned with his main method of signing clients: cold calling. Early on, he got in the habit of dialing strangers to find homeowners on the fence about selling to represent or people struggling with their searches for properties to buy.
Sonna said three of his first six deals were the results of cold calls. Many of his targets, he added, already had selling or buying on their minds when he had called. News of the market was inescapable, making it easier for him to swoop in.
"Cold calling is completely a numbers game," Sonna told Insider. "But numbers games work so much better when the market is hot as hell."
Tampa, Florida-based Julieniz Baez Fonseca joined the family business by becoming a broker herself in June 2020.
She was told that getting her first listing as a seller's agent might take a few months. But Fonseca got her first listing in two weeks — and sold it just three weeks after that.
"I've heard of agents who haven't gotten their first deal in a year or so in past times," Fonseca, now 22, told Insider.
A cooler market offers rookie agents a moment to stand out
What goes up must come down. Few experts expect a 2008-like crash, but the housing market has shown signs of downshifting from its fever pitch.
In times of slower market growth, agents exit the industry due to increased competition or overall loss of income. From December 2007 to December 2008, during the onset of the 2008 housing crisis, the National Association of Realtors said it lost 140,000 agents.
Some Gen Z agents, however, already anticipate the herd thinning and see it as the time to prove their mettle.
"Everybody that was doing this part-time, or they just thought this was easy money, they're going to quit, they're going to give up," Spears said.
"We're going into the season that separates the boys from the men," Sonna, who is preparing to compete for fewer listings by leaning into his social-media presence, said.
He considers his online audience — namely, his 15,000 followers on TikTok — as a source of potential buyers and sellers who may trust him more when they see how many people follow him.
"Historically when the markets do well, more people want to give real estate a try," Lawrence Yun, the chief economist of the National Association of Realtors, said.
An additional 170,000 agents joined the association's ranks between July 2020 and July 2022, bringing membership to an all-time high of over 1.58 million brokers nationwide. Yun said the surge even beat the association's own expectations for the period.
T ake the 20-year-old Nimel Sonna, who goes by Tre and started working as an agent in Seattle in August 2020. Sonna was working for a moving company when he admired a client's house. Sonna asked the owner what he did for a living, and he answered that he was a real-estate agent.
Sonna said he feels lucky he jumped into what he called the pandemic-housing "heat wave" because it aligned with his main method of signing clients: cold calling. Early on, he got in the habit of dialing strangers to find homeowners on the fence about selling to represent or people struggling with their searches for properties to buy.
Sonna said three of his first six deals were the results of cold calls. Many of his targets, he added, already had selling or buying on their minds when he had called. News of the market was inescapable, making it easier for him to swoop in.
"Cold calling is completely a numbers game," Sonna told Insider. "But numbers games work so much better when the market is hot as hell."
What goes up must come down. Few experts expect a 2008-like crash, but the housing market has shown signs of downshifting from its fever pitch.
In times of slower market growth, agents exit the industry due to increased competition or overall loss of income. From December 2007 to December 2008, during the onset of the 2008 housing crisis, the National Association of Realtors said it lost 140,000 agents.
Some Gen Z agents, however, already anticipate the herd thinning and see it as the time to prove their mettle.
" Everybody that was doing this part-time, or they just thought this was easy money, they're going to quit, they're going to give up," Spears said.
"We're going into the season that separates the boys from the men," Sonna, who is preparing to compete for fewer listings by leaning into his social-media presence, said.
He considers his online audience — namely, his 15,000 followers on TikTok — as a source of potential buyers and sellers who may trust him more when they see how many people follow him.
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