How Do Real Estate Teams Work?

Are you thinking about joining a real estate team or even building a real estate team to grow your business? You probably have a very important question: How does a real estate team work?

Real estate teams work by being both efficient and effective. They are a development in the industry that is allowing agents to reach new heights in their careers while giving clients the best possible experience.

What Is a Real Estate Team?

A real estate team is two or more real estate agents who split commissions and work together toward a common goal. This team can be as small as two agents or it can have five or more licensed and unlicensed real estate professionals.

With a team structure, the team works collaboratively to generate leads, manage listings and clients, combine marketing efforts, and develop professionally.

How Do Real Estate Teams Work?

Real estate teams are a collaborative effort. Team members work together and support each other with every client, and clients take notice. A client can contact any team member to answer any questions they may have, even if they are primarily being served by another agent on the team. This gives clients access to a real estate agent at almost any time of the day, helping them to relax and enjoy the real estate experience. The more positive your client's experience, the more likely they are to recommend your services.

The team leader is at the heart of how the real estate team works. The leader often serves as a mentor and generates most leads for the team. They help guide other team members toward the common goal, set up systems to support the team, recruit or hire new team members, and manage how the team is run.

Here's a look at some of the most common areas of real estate team operation.

Working Toward Common Real Estate Team Goals

One of the key elements of the team operation is working toward a goal. Real estate team goals are developed by the team leader and ideally broken down into short-term and long-term goals that can be tracked. While revenue is important, top real estate teams also set goals that support a sustainable business model and foster professional development and future referrals and leads.

How do real estate teams work toward their goals? Through training, mentoring, collaboration, shared resources, and effective systems in place. A goal may be split evenly among team members, or several goals can be set with each team member working toward their respective goal that's best suited to their skills and contributes to an overall team goal.

Real Estate Team Commission Split: How Do Real Estate Teams Split Commission?

How do real estate teams get paid? Real estate team compensation for team members can be done in many ways. Members can have a flat rate if they are on a salary, the commission can be divided by set intervals, or the commission can be split based on performance.

When building the team, the team leader should give plenty of thought to the right real estate team compensation model. Keep in mind the brokerage split usually stays the same. Team members will need to split the commission they receive. In most cases, the team leader receives anywhere from 20% to 50% of the total commission earned depending on their role.

Real estate team splits may be determined by the team structure and duties. Some teams create a real estate team commission structure based on their goal, such as growing referrals.

No matter which real estate team commission split you decide on, make sure it's reasonable, not too complicated, and in writing. This compensation model should be included in your real estate team agreement.

Real Estate Team Structure Defines How Real Estate Teams Work

The next crucial element of how a real estate team works is how it's structured and the duties of each team member. How to structure a real estate team will depend on the goals you have set and how you plan to run your business.

Two-person teams can be comprised of two top real estate agents who pool their resources to grow their business and generate more leads. A larger brokerage team can include a team leader responsible for listings, two, five, or more buyer's agents, and a host of support team members such as showing agents.

All real estate agent teams are different. Think of the real estate team structure as the blueprint for how the team works and how responsibilities will be shared.

Shared Responsibilities and Collaboration

One of the benefits of working on a real estate team is collaboration. Team members help support each other's clients and grow their business together to make everyone more successful and clients happier.

This collaboration may involve bouncing marketing and open house ideas off each other, turning to team members with specialized knowledge, or brainstorming sessions to improve day-to-day operations and reach long-term goals.

Even though the basis of every real estate team is collaboration, team members specialize in tasks. Real estate team roles defined with a clear team structure are important to make sure each team member is doing what they do best, all important elements of the business receive dedicated attention, and metrics can be tracked efficiently.

Real estate agent team responsibilities are usually divided among team members as follows:

• Listing Agent(s) – CEO or Team Leader
• Listings – Specialists to Generate and Promote Listings
• Buyer's Agents – Buyer's Specialists
• Support – Transaction Coordinators, Assistants, Administration
• Marketing and Communications – Specialists in Advertising and Listing Promotion

Many teams exist because single agents realize that there is too much involved in real estate transactions and day-to-day operations to effectively do it all for every client. That is why teams, and specialization on those teams, has developed so strongly in the real estate industry.

Training, Education and Professional Development

You completed your training and obtained your real estate license. Now, you may realize that nowhere in your training did you learn how to secure business for yourself. Therefore, to progress into the best real estate agent possible, you need to find support and a mentor. This is exactly what a real estate team can offer.

Real estate teams can be a powerful tool for new agents to develop the skills and knowledge they need to become successful on their own. Many teams have weekly training sessions where agents will share successful tactics they have implemented. These sessions can be on anything from how to talk to new clients to how to effectively work with investors.

Teams provide an educational opportunity that is difficult to replicate elsewhere.

New agents are not the only ones to benefit from continued training. Experienced real estate agents know that you must evolve and be continuously learning if you want to become a top producing agent. Real estate teams work with you to help you achieve that goal. This opportunity for professional development fostered through collaboration and mentoring from agents with different specialties is a core element of how a real estate team works together.

Shared Resources

How does a real estate team work to make the best use of resources? Most real estate agent teams pool resources to reduce costs and increase revenue. Teams can share resources that are expensive or challenging to acquire and manage on their own such as:

• Leads
• Marketing resources
• Software for customer relationship management (CRM) and transaction management
• Personal assistants
• Transaction coordinators

This approach gives team members access to a breadth of resources and tools that help them reach their full potential. The team can also better generate and capture leads with systems in place for social media marketing, phone calls, and more with less time spent on administrative tasks.

Legal Considerations for Real Estate Teams

There are many important considerations when working on or creating a team. Here are just some areas that must be considered to remain in compliance with state real estate regulations.

• Real estate team names must follow any state regulations. In Ohio, for example, there are real estate team name rules prohibiting the use of the words "real estate" or "realty."
• Real estate team advertising may have additional regulations. The brokerage name may need to be included prominently, for example.
• Teams must be supervised by a managing broker. Some states require brokerages to have specific control. In Maryland, the brokerage must designate a team leader who has specific qualifications.
• Special care must be taken to ensure unlicensed team members do not perform tasks that require a license.
• Dual agency disclosures are crucial and all team members must be compliant with confidentiality laws regarding shared clients.

Benefits of Joining a Real Estate Team

Now that you know how a real estate team works, you can probably already see many of the benefits that have encouraged 26% of Realtors to build or join a team.

Here are just some of the reasons joining a real estate team may be right for you:

• Better work/life balance
• Opportunities to expand your business and revenue
• Support from fellow agents and administrative team members
• Opportunities to collaborate and develop professionally through mentorship and hands-on training
• Providing better representation to clients

These are only a handful of the advantages that you can expect to receive when becoming part of a real estate team. Evaluate your current situation and determine if any of these benefits could positively impact your career!

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