Hi I'm Jessie. Today thanks to Student Edge we're gonna go inside a career and
find out if it's the right job for you. Now houses come in all shapes and sizes
but have you ever thought about what's actually involved in selling one? Which
is why today we're at Altitude Real Estate to see if it's the right job for you.
Today we're having a chat to someone who knows all about the real estate
industry. Paul Tonich, director of Altitude Real Estate Hi Jessie, Paul Tonich
Hi mate.
Look today we want to find out exactly what it takes to do what you do you
So do you reckon you can show us around?
Yeah no problem, let's go. Jessie, come into my office and I'll answer your questions.
So Jesse, what you want to know? Well mate, you've won countless awards, I want to know
exactly how you got to where you are
The age of 26 I was looking for a career change and I just purchased a properly a few years
earlier and the real estate agent
actually called me when he heard about that and said hey why don't you come
have a look at real estate. It struck my interest I had a meeting with him and
didn't look back
I think when i look back at why my results have been what they are
it's my ability to communicate I really went out and met with some great people
that showed me probably just a little tweaks you've gotta do to have the
ability to win trust really quickly. We only get 45 minutes with someone. In that
45 minutes
obviously we've got to know our product and strategies but winning their trust is
probably the best thing you can do to really step ahead in the career get away
from the pack. So Paul I imagine being a real estate agent is just all about
selling houses. No, it's a lot more than that. Really you get to see a broad part of
society and when someone calls you
they actually have a problem that you've gotta solve and usually it's coming off
something that has happen in their life. Sometimes it's a death of a family member
sometimes it's actually a job promotion or having kids or even a marriage
breakup, and at the time you have to be able to, I suppose, relate to the people and
actually absorb their pressure and stress or actually listen and actually know
what they want and so part of it is not just actually pulling the property on
the market it's actually understanding why. Okay Paul, so let's go behind the scenes
I want you to take me through a normal day of a real estate agent.
Yeah, firstly it's seven days away no matter what part of the career involved in you actually
serve the public and you serve your clients so you know you can set a
structure for the week but part of it is that we're reactive. The phone suddenly
rings, you had four five things to do that day like getting marketing ready
writing ads, you know, talking to the owners. You've always gonna be prepared
you always going to be ready
it's one of the things that the elite people in this industry know, always be able to
be contactable, always being on call and that's a really hard balance as you
develop maybe getting married or having a family, of keeping that sustainable.
well mate it looks like there's a lot of hard work but there's also a lot of
rewards.
Yeah absolutely, it's probably the first opportunity that a lot of people get to
open a business and in a business allows if you are a creative type that you got
full autonomy of where you can take things, you've got the ability to be
flexible with your time but there is huge financial rewards. Someone coming in to
the industry that could actually work hard for the first couple years by year
three or four they could be taking home anywhere between six hundred thousand to
a million dollars a year and that's not totally unusual for elite performers.
Okay Paul, so now it's time to give us the edge, I've got 3 question for you, what makes
a good agent? Huge energy to start with, great enthusiasm and the real
ability to win trust with people. How do I become an agent and what
qualifications do you need? You don't have to have gone through uni, you do need
to be licensed so you do a course with the Real Estate Institute, but really
there's a chance for traineeship, a lot of good agents are looking for personal
assistants. After maybe two or three years those people develop into sales
people themselves and build your own business.
OK Paul, so if you can start again next week what's one thing you would do
differently i think I'd understand that I could have joined the industry earlier
when I did join i was 26 years of age, the average age of an agent was 57 and
I had this perception that you maybe had to be old and gray to get credibility
with owners.
Nowadays at the age of 20 you can start as an agent, you just got to have drive and ambition
Well Paul, thanks so much for chatting to us today No worries Jesse.
So there you go. Hopefully now you've got enough information to decide whether being a
real estate agent is the right career for you.
For more information and to get involved hit up studentedge.com.au