Real Estate Broker
Real Estate Broker
Career Overview
Real estate brokers help people buy, sell, and rent homes, commercial properties, and land. Brokers can also manage real estate businesses and guide agents. It’s a people-focused career that combines sales, negotiation, marketing, business, and knowledge of the real estate market. Today, brokers also use digital listings, social media, virtual tours, data, and AI-powered tools to reach clients and understand the market.
Education
Requirements vary by location, but becoming a real estate broker generally involves high school completion, real estate education, practical experience, and professional licensing. If you’re interested in this career, courses in business, economics, mathematics, communications, and marketing can give you a useful head start. Strong negotiation and people skills are especially valuable.
Future Outlook
The outlook is steady, but the career is competitive. People will continue to need real estate professionals when buying, selling, renting, or investing in property. At the same time, technology is changing the industry through virtual tours, online listings, digital marketing, data analytics, and AI. Brokers who combine strong people skills with business knowledge and modern technology can stay competitive as the industry evolves. Current projections point to modest growth through 2034.
Work Environment
Real estate brokers may work in offices, from home, at properties, or out meeting clients. The schedule can be flexible, but evenings and weekends are common because clients may need to view properties outside regular hours. Brokers spend a lot of time communicating, negotiating, networking, marketing properties, and keeping up with changing market conditions.
Recommended High School Courses
- Psychology
- Business
- Communication
- Finance
- Real Estate
- Marketing
- Computer-aided Design Competency
- Mathematics
- Active Learning - Understanding the implications of new information for both current and future problem-solving and decision-making.
- Active Listening - Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.
- Complex Problem Solving - Identifying complex problems and reviewing related information to develop and evaluate options and implement solutions.
- Coordination - Adjusting actions in relation to others' actions.
- Critical Thinking - Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions or approaches to problems.
- Judgment and Decision Making - Considering the relative costs and benefits of potential actions to choose the most appropriate one.
- Monitoring - Monitoring/Assessing performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.
- Negotiation - Bringing others together and trying to reconcile differences.
- Persuasion - Persuading others to change their minds or behavior.
- Reading Comprehension - Understanding written sentences and paragraphs in work related documents.
- Service Orientation - Actively looking for ways to help people.
- Social Perceptiveness - Being aware of others' reactions and understanding why they react as they do.
- Speaking - Talking to others to convey information effectively.
- Time Management - Managing one's own time and the time of others.
- Writing - Communicating effectively in writing as appropriate for the needs of the audience.
- Administration and Management - Knowledge of business and management principles involved in strategic planning, resource allocation, human resources modeling, leadership technique, production methods, and coordination of people and resources.
- Building and Construction - Knowledge of materials, methods, and the tools involved in the construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads.
- Clerical - Knowledge of administrative and clerical procedures and systems such as word processing, managing files and records, stenography and transcription, designing forms, and other office procedures and terminology.
- Communications and Media - Knowledge of media production, communication, and dissemination techniques and methods. This includes alternative ways to inform and entertain via written, oral, and visual media.
- Computers and Electronics - Knowledge of circuit boards, processors, chips, electronic equipment, and computer hardware and software, including applications and programming.
- Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
- Economics and Accounting - Knowledge of economic and accounting principles and practices, the financial markets, banking and the analysis and reporting of financial data.
- Education and Training - Knowledge of principles and methods for curriculum and training design, teaching and instruction for individuals and groups, and the measurement of training effects.
- English Language - Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
- Law and Government - Knowledge of laws, legal codes, court procedures, precedents, government regulations, executive orders, agency rules, and the democratic political process.
- Mathematics - Knowledge of arithmetic, algebra, geometry, calculus, statistics, and their applications.
- Psychology - Knowledge of human behavior and performance; individual differences in ability, personality, and interests; learning and motivation; psychological research methods; and the assessment and treatment of behavioral and affective disorders.
- Sales and Marketing - Knowledge of principles and methods for showing, promoting, and selling products or services. This includes marketing strategy and tactics, product demonstration, sales techniques, and sales control systems.
- Deductive Reasoning - The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Inductive Reasoning - The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Information Ordering - The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Near Vision - The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Oral Comprehension - The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Oral Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Problem Sensitivity - The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.
- Speech Clarity - The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Speech Recognition - The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Written Comprehension - The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Written Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Contract real estate to clients.
- Prepare sales or other contracts.
- Negotiate prices or other sales terms.
- Supervise sales or support personnel.
- Appraise property values.
- Obtain property information.
- Review accuracy of sales or other transactions.
- Review laws or regulations to maintain professional knowledge.
- Monitor market conditions or trends.
Schools
Approx Salary Expectation
References
Trend Analysis - Explorer the Market, Labour Market Information, Government of Canada https://www.jobbank.gc.ca/trend-analysis.
O*NET OnLine, National Center for O*NET Development, https://www.onetonline.org/.