How much experience do you need to become a self-employed estate agent?

If you’re thinking about becoming a self-employed agent and wondering if you’re experienced enough to make it a success, this article can help guide you through the process and provide you with the options you need.

To cut to the chase, there really isn’t a definitive answer to this question. Some brokerages allow agents to join without any experience and offer training to help get you up and running, while others require a minimum level of experience before considering your application.

Perhaps a more important question to consider is, How much experience do I need to be a successful self-employed estate agent?

In this article, I’m going to share my perspective as the founder of Hortons. We were one of the first brokerages to open in the UK, and I’ll give you insight into how we work and why we’ve been successful. I’ll also talk about some other brokerages with different policies and provide a few words of advice if you’re hoping to become self-employed but have limited experience.

What we do at Hortons

At Hortons, we don’t recruit new self-employed agents (we call them Partners) without prior agency experience. Ideally, we look for 3-4 years of experience in a valuing role, combined with a range of other junior roles prior to that, meaning most of our agents have at least 6-8 years of experience.

The reason for this is that we are a boutique, quality-over-quantity brokerage. We want agents who are versatile and well-rounded—a full 360-degree agency experience is important to achieve this. We’re not looking to recruit just anyone. The quality of our team is something we’re proud of, and it’s something our existing Partners know we protect. It’s most important to us that our Partners are proud to work alongside the other agents in our team.

However, there are exceptions to the rule. Sometimes, we come across agents with exceptional experience across the industry but who may lack one or two prior roles on their CV, preventing them from having a completely rounded grounding as an agent. In those situations, we look at the ‘grey areas’ and figure out how we can best support them. Crucially though, they'll have a vast and relevant experience to build from.

And of course, the agent will need to meet our Grandma Test—that’s critical. If you’re not familiar with it, you can read about it here: The Grandma Test

If we stick to these values, we’ll ensure we retain high quality and attract great agents who want to work around other great agents.

Other brokerages

Across the industry, there are more self-employed brokerages now than ever before. This is great for the industry as it gives agents (and clients) choice, creates healthy competition, and encourages brokerages to push themselves to deliver a great platform for their agents, all in the hope of attracting and retaining talent.

Some brokerages, such as Keller Williams, iAD UK, and The Property Experts, recruit agents with no experience. Others, such as EXP UK, require as little as two years of experience.

If you’re an experienced agent, you’ll likely have a clear idea of the culture and type of business you want to join, and the kind of brand you want to be associated with.

However, if you have no experience or have limited experience (such as just a couple of years), I highly recommend speaking to multiple brokerages to understand how they will support you. You’re committing to a business relationship with a brokerage, taking a huge risk, and your personal reputation will be tied to the brokerage you choose. It's not a decision to take lightly, even at the early stage of your career.

Why are there such differences in approach?

The reason some brokerages recruit people with limited experience is that they are focused on building headcount. In other words, they recruit many more agents, each selling fewer properties per person, rather than recruiting fewer agents who sell a higher volume or generate more income per client.

The truth is, to do the latter, it takes experience, time, and a network. If a brokerage doesn’t prioritise experience, they have no choice but to focus on recruiting a larger volume of agents.

No experience? My advice:

You might think my advice is biased, given our recruitment philosophy at Hortons, but my view is based on my experience running a brokerage since 2016 and watching hundreds of agents make the change to self-employment, as well as seeing many other brokerages enter the space.

My honest view is: do not become a self-employed agent unless you have built up a solid foundation of experience across all areas of the residential sales industry.

Going self-employed is a huge risk, requires a great deal of effort, and demands that you support yourself financially while building up your sales pipeline. Brokerages that are happy to recruit agents without or with minimal experience often do so because there is very limited risk to them. Most will even charge you for any out-of-pocket expenses, meaning your success or failure makes no difference to them.

Now, it’s not impossible to succeed as a self-employed agent without experience, but it is the exception, not the rule.

Attempting it, with all the risks it comes with, without experience, massively stacks the odds against you.

Instead, enter the industry in a more traditional way - join an agency as an employee and work your way up. You might not earn as much as a successful self-employed agent, but you should view this stage of your career as working to learn, not to earn. Aim to find a job that will train you and give you training in different roles, and exposure to as many different types of properties, markets, and areas as possible. Once you’ve had some success in a traditional agency, and crucially, when you start to notice that you’re building a network, then you might be ready to take the jump to self-employment. You’ll notice when your personal network starts to grow, and sellers seek you out rather than the company you work for.

If you take this route and then make the jump straight into self-employment, you’ll stack the odds in your favour and massively increase your chances of success.

If you’ve got questions about self-employment, feel free to reach out to me directly at adam@hortons.co