Does switching brokerages mean starting over?
I'm a pretty new agent at a small CRE brokerage and the commission splits are pretty low (50-50 even after several deals). My thoughts are to learn as much as I can for the first 2 or 3 years and then switch over to a different brokerage that has higher splits. Would switching to another brokerage in a few years mean I have to start from zero and drop all of my old clients? If that's the case, why do some people switch brokerages after 6 or 7 years when they would have even more to lose?
[{"id": "fe4jpa6", "text": "I'd worry about the future when it happens. dont count your chickens before they hatch.  make the money, if you're a top dog your boss will give you a better split almost for sure.  5050 starting out is good.  \nif you do leave, you'll probably take some clients w.you if they want only you and you don't care about bad blood.  don't know your market but nyc everyone knows everyone.  I try not to screw people over bc it will come back to you. play fair.  \n\nanyways good luck. make dat paper", "replies": [{"id": "fe8mknu", "text": "100% agree with the tight community part, that\u2019s pretty much everywhere. ESPECIALLY with the CCIM community. clients will come and go, but the brokers are always around. NEVER screw over a broker.", "replies": [{"id": "febevft", "text": "I learned this the hard way. thought I was a tough guy after 7 yrs on wall st and treated one guy like an asshole.  he ended up being the son in law of an owner that owns like 15 prime soho buildings.   I had to suck it up and apologize.", "replies": [{"id": "fecbzoa", "text": "Yeesh. another pro tip is never to leave a brokerage behind ur broker\u2019s back. For example, like when theyre out of town. Agents do it all the time and it\u2019s super scummy and cowardly.", "replies": [], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "fe4pue4", "text": "Depends on what your contract says.  Keep a personal crm and use your cellphone # on your cards.", "replies": [{"id": "fe4smru", "text": "That's good advice. Thanks!", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "fe5qrnp", "text": "50/50 and they feed you deals, or 50 / 50 and you did all the work? \n\nThere are two things brokers care about, splits and platform. In theory there is a tradeoff, lower splits means you have a better platform. \n\nSomething like CBRE or JLL, Cushman ect, all have lower splits, but you should be getting something out of the deal, name recognition, less BS in terms of paperwork, they have lower E&amp;O insurance, a better marketing and research platform ect. \n\nLee &amp; Associates, Kidder Matthews, Coldwell Banker Commercial, ect, those should have better splits, since why else would you want to work there? Are you getting fed deals? Is the guy in New York sending you those tenant rep assignments? \n\nAnd if you are in a 50/50 shop, well, you think those are your clients, but is that fortune 500 company going to follow you after you said for 5 years how great it is to be at CBRE and they really like the fact that their last couple deals were not screwed up? Would they trust you more than they would trust your multi-national company? \n\nBut if you got a local furniture guy or whatever, he could probably care less and will follow you whereever you go since you are his guy. \n\nSo take a look at the clients you have and think about if they are more in love with you, or your company. \n\nIf they are more in love with you, you can leave and get better splits and not deal with whatever politics you have going on right now. \n\nIf they are more in love with your company and the relationship is somewhere else, well, find more clients and maybe some will jump with you. \n\nSwitching does not mean starting over, unless you are going to get blackballed by your senior brokers. \n\nBrokers are jumping now because people are writting checks to get top talent, because they feel they are constrained where they are at and want to be the bigger fish in another pond, they jump ship because of all kinds of reasons, but it is mostly money, better platform, because they got screwed over by their existing company or all kinds of things. \n\nFigure out what your long terms goals are, figure out who your clients are, figure out where your market is, figure out if there is enough deal volume to feed you. Talk to other brokers in your market and start poking around to see where the market is at. \n\nAnd realize you get what you negotiate, so if you don't like where you are at, and you think your are pulling more than your weight, whose fault is that?", "replies": [{"id": "fe5spx4", "text": "All really good considerations, thanks! I'm pretty new, so I'm still trying to figure out what it means to put in more than I get out. Also, my specialty is multi-family, so I'm not dealing with Fortune 500 clients as tenants; I'm not dealing with tenants at all, just landlords.\n\nI'm not being fed clients, but the training is pretty solid (my main attraction to the brokerage) and I don't have desk fees, am not required to join a realtor board, etc. I basically don't have any overhead. I feel like that probably justifies the 50/50 in the early stages, but that kind of split seems like it would be kind of whack by the 4th or 5th deal when training isn't as beneficial (In my market, a typical multi-family deal would be about $2M).\n\nIt's good to hear that jumping ship doesn't mean starting over. I can't really imagine being blackballed by a Senior Broker. I don't see what kind of leverage they would have on me unless they referred a buyer to me, in which case they would make a referral fee anyway. Do you have any examples of ways in which a Senior Broker might screw me?", "replies": [{"id": "fe5xubz", "text": "Multi family is different in that usually you don\u2019t have repeat business and are dealing less with relationships and more brute force cold calling. \n\nAn example of a senior broker screwing you would be if you leave they force a non compete or call up all your clients and try to force their way in. They may have relationships with developers that they can leverage against you but in multi family it is quasi residential, and 2 million dollar deals is going to be a volume business anyway. \n\nMake relationships with title reps and apartment owner associations, and figure out how to get in contact with high net worth individuals. \n\nGet your own crm system and start building out your farm. Once you decide to leave, your existing team may come after you if you had any desks in the pipeline or listings prior to your departure. Often I will see brokers slow down for like 3 months, jump ship then close all the deals they brought over to their new company. \n\nTalk to some managing directors at competing shops, it is their job to try to recruit young talent. \n\nThe first step is to figure out where to jump to, and it helps to know which shops pay which commissions. \n\nGood luck.", "replies": [{"id": "fe5xzxe", "text": "Genius. Thanks so much!", "replies": [], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}, {"id": "fe6hsel", "text": "No desk fee, no association dues, no mls fees, no overhead all sounds awesome. I don't know your firm's prestige in the market or what kind of split everyone else is on, but 50/50 doesn't feel terrible given those facts. I know people who are on 50/50 splits who are also paying multiple association fees and other overhead. And if 50/50 is firm policy, it doesn't matter how many deals you do, you'll still be 50/50 - I'm on a graduated threshold split and it resets annually - \"what have you done for me lately?\"", "replies": [], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}, {"id": "fe61577", "text": "I wouldn\u2019t say better myself. \nJust read trough this post and think carefully about moves you make in the industry. If you are worrying \n about split, than you need to asses what you are getting. It is never a perfect situation when it comes to splits. Even on 100% commission Company or on your own, there is always a trade off. Look at your career and where do you enviou yourself to be and look at companies with similar values and objectives. \nJust don\u2019t make too many moves, it will slow you down and not help with getting momentum in the sales process.\nGood luck! This is an amazing career", "replies": [], "depth": 2}, {"id": "fe6krdi", "text": "Really good post", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "fe73az0", "text": "In my opinion if you have done a great job for your client and kept in touch with them switching companies should not make a difference. It also depends the market you are in. Bay Equities is looking for agents \n\nCRE, is Market Knowledge and relationship based industry so it shouldn't", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "fealqtt", "text": "I'm in a boutique firm in Midtown with 50/50 splits nothing else with house deals. Started few months ago I prefer it that way, and the deals are big, and my colleagues have good clients . At this point no other big name company attracts me", "replies": [{"id": "fecdnkl", "text": "That's comforting to know. Thanks!", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}]