Recently I was tagged to write a MeMe and one of the comments said "What I want to know is what was your first career" Instead of going into a detailed answer I thought it would make a great on-going subject for many people and decided to start a group.
Below are a few highlight from a NAR report released May 10, 2007 containing information about 2007 NAR Member Profiles.
- 40-hour work weeks. The typical member is 51 years old, works 40 hours per week and has been in the business for seven years.
- Sales volume dips. In 2006, typical residential sales members sold one of their own listings and five of someone else's, .......volume was $1.9 million.
- Not the first career. Only 4 percent of members report real estate is their first career.
Since 96% of us did something else prior to a real estate career there must be plenty of stories.... When you are in the mood to reflect on the past add stories to this GROUP. Feel free to share more than once, it could be your first job, corporate career or other business ventures.
This is not just for REALTORS®. I know people in the Mortgage & Home Inspection business that had other careers so join in.
The MEME tag works quite well. I suggest tagging the stories MOC for My Other Career. Posting can be public or members only. you may even pick up some new clients based on your old career.
Well, that's an interesting question for me...almost an embarrassment, actually. So let me preface this by telling you I was ADHD before the term was invented. And all I knew was I had a demon. I didn't know what it was. So with that to start with, here's what I've done:
I was a radio personality from 14 through 23, I ran a small restaurant while in college, I traveled as a solo pianist playing hotel dining rooms all over the U.S., I was the comptroller of a bank in a suburb of St. Louis, I wrote a weekly column for a daily newspaper for 10 years (500 of them), and I still write a monthly column for Texas Escapes (www.texasescapes.com). I was a TV on-camera feature writer/reporter for Channel 24 in Houston. I wrote a book, Bill Cherry's Galveston Memories (VanJus Press - 2000) and have two more book manuscripts in the mill at Texas A&M University Press. I was the financial principal for a mutual fund broker/dealer and the commercial loan officer for Guaranty Savings. And I've been an adjunct professor at one four year college and a community college, plus founded and operated Galveston's most successful residential real estate company. It also had a branch office in Houston's Museum District.
Did I tell you that I also tune and repair pianos? And I still regularly play for receptions, dinner parties, weddings and background music -- a Gershwin, Sinatra-type music kind of guy.
But when all is said and done, my real interest has always been real estate. I've been doing it as a broker and investor for 43 years. But when I go to my Heavenly Reward, I will not have to say that I didn't make every attempt to try everything I was ever interested in.
I recommend that lifestyle, by the way.
VERY interesting idea!! I'll have to work on a post for you. I wonder what kind of stuff we'll find out with this?
(Whoops, almost told you it was OK to throw these in the Meme Group, must have skimmed over your new group while talking to Little One! Going to join it now!)
Really no other career. I have been with McCue Mortgage Company since 1980 as a Mortgage Loan Representative in the New London area.
I have seen lots of people come into and then leave the business, but that is for another day.
Dan,
Experimental electronics technician, for the Boeing Co. Dispatch and sales for ready-mix concrete Co. Real Estate investment and sales. Trucking and equipment leasing, owner and operator. General Contractor and residential builder. Free lance building inspector and home inspector. Lodging owner /operator. 25 years volunteer fire fighter. Fire fighter training instructor. Former motorcycle racer. Former stock car racer. Toured over half million miles on a Harley, and still riding.
Alaska Don