It was not too long ago that I took the exam to become a licensed California Real Estate Broker. I didn’t really have any prior real estate experience, but I knew that having a real estate license couldn’t hurt. I made the decision to get the license my last year in college. A few of my friends had salespersons license, and I wanted one too. I went online to figure out what was needed to get one, and I found out that a broker’s license wasn’t much harder to obtain than a salespersons license, and I could still act as a salesperson if I wanted.
I found that the requirements to become a licensed California Real Estate Broker were that you had to either have two years experience as a real estate agent (this meant getting your salespersons license first), or you could simply have a four-year college degree. Since I was going to graduate in a few months time anyway, I figured I would just delay getting my license until I was eligible for the broker’s license.
There were a few more requirements to get the license. You had to take about eight classes, pay a fee, pass a background check, take some fingerprints, and of course, pass the exam. The classes were a joke. I only needed to take a few online because I had already completed several throughout college (accounting, econ, law, etc.). The online classes were very simple. You pay a fee, get a 500-page book, then you have three opportunities to pass a 100-point multiple choice open-book online test. A passing score is 60 or above.
The fee to apply for the license and exam totaled around $200. Not a bad price, but then you have to factor into account the price of your classes and study material. The application was pretty simple, just had to fill in a bunch of info about myself and list any felonies I had on my record. Thankfully my record was clean and thus the background check went fine.
After I sent in my application, I was told I had to get my fingerprints taken. This cost me nearly another $100 for the Live Scan. I guess they take digital fingerprints that they can save in a database. If you are wanted fugitive, you might not want to apply to get your brokers license.
Finally, I was allowed to pick a test date. The test is an all-day event. If you have a full-time job, you will need the entire day off. I went in at 8:30 in the morning and walked out by about 3 in the afternoon. The test was quite difficult and I wasn’t convinced that I had passed when I left. The study guide I had used to prepare definitely came in handy; I definitely would have been in trouble had I not used it. About a week later, I checked the results online and found out that I passed! Anything over a 75% is passing, and they don’t tell you anything but that you passed.
It took a few more months for the last of the paperwork to get processed, but I was finally given my license, relieved that the whole process was over.
Author: Tom Noonan
How to obtain a real estate license
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Posted under Get Real Estate License
This post was written by admin on June 6, 2009
