On Friday, there was an article on Inman news (behind a paywall) asking, "Is Real Estate a Trade or a Profession?", specifically it was compared with journalism, below is a segment: After all, he reminded us, one does not need a degree to be a journalist. There are laws regulating libel and individual privacy, and journalists are expected to comply with those, but there is no professional standards organization, no state or federal licensing, no real job requirements at all except, presumably, the ability to tell a story and convince an editor (and your readers) that you’re good at it. This has become increasingly apparent in the digital age, when editors are no longer gatekeepers dictating who has a platform to tell a story. The emergence of the Internet and blogging has given anybody who chooses to say something a way and means by which to say it. He pressed us all semester: What was the difference between an amateur blogger and a professional journalist? Could we even use the term “professional” when discussing what we planned to do for a living? (Are any of these questions sounding even vaguely familiar?)
Considerations
We had this discussion within our team in a Slack channel (chatroom), we eventually came up with the consensus that professions tend to be mostly taught in a classroom, then refined in the market, with continuing education for new tools and techniques. Whereas trades tend to have a Master-apprentice relationship that is mostly experience.
Apprentice for 2 - 5 years, Journeyman for 2-5 years, before becoming a master craftsman.
A "C" Licensee is a Master of their field, common ones include plumbing, painting and electrician.
A "B" Licensee is considered a "General Contractor" and is allowed to sub-contract to other "C" Licensee's
For some, this may sound familiar with how the "Salesperson" licensee and "Broker" licensee for real estate. One is implied to be more "Sales", the other more "Management", but either can do both (though salespeople cannot directly have other salespeople work under their supervision).
Conclusion
Real Estate seems to have aspects of both, but we feel the main point is whether the training is mostly in the field, or in a controlled setting. If we were to follow the Millionaire Real Estate Agent Model, we are always serving 2 masters, Sales, and Running a Business, both of which are better 'experienced' than 'learned'.
For the practitioners on the audience, I would like to ask how many people apply DAILY what was thought in the licensing courses (most questions were ethics or trust accounting related). In addition to personal integrity/character, are decisions made from a book (legal precedent, GAAP accounting), or is it what is 'reasonable' and 'makes sense' based on past events?
I will come down on real estate (brokerage and property management) as more of a trade than a profession, with being an office broker as more similar to being a profession, though still on the trade side of the equation. There is nothing wrong with this (last week we covered how contractor wages are going up), as there are arguments to be made on both sides of this thought experiment.
What do you think, is real estate a trade or profession?
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