How did I become a Realtor?

No one was more surprised than I was to find that I had become a Realtor!

In early 2006, I got a job working as the assistant to the owner of a small home-building company. At that time, I had never been around the real estate industry directly, so it was a whole new world for me.

(I should probably clarify that the title "assistant" meant more than you might think. Some days I sat in the office, answering the phone, placing orders for materials and with subcontractors, and keeping the books. Other days I spent in the field, running errands and checking on job sites. And on other days, I might be working on the job sites, doing anything from helping lay tile to painting. A lot of that came later, though, after I had been working there for a while.)

Our office was located in the building with a real estate brokerage, so for the first time in my life I got to experience what it was like to be involved in real estate. I got to witness and be involved in decisions about the whole process, from choosing a lot, to figuring the costs of building a particular plan, to deciding what cabinets to put in the kitchen and what color to paint the walls. What a surprise...I loved it!

When the owner of the company chose to shift from building to flipping houses, I hung in there with him. It was hard work, but I loved making something beautiful out of something no one wanted.

By the fall of 2007, I had decided that I was really interested in getting my real estate license, in spite of the fact that less than 2 years earlier I had proclaimed that was something I could NEVER do! I had the unique advantage of getting to see the business of real estate up close for a long time before deciding to take the plunge. When my boss decided to change his focus from real estate to a side industry, I realized just how much I would miss being a part of it. So I signed up for licensing classes.

I completed my classes, took my state exam, and hung my license in early 2008. Since that time, the real estate market has changed drastically. Many agents have moved on to other jobs. But every time I got to my office, or show a client a house, or congratulate another client on a sale, I am glad that I stayed!