Recently Pat Weber, from RE/MAX Anchor Realty in Qualicum Beach, spoke at the Career Centre theme workshop on Finance, Insurance and Real Estate industries. He offered some interesting pieces of information. When people think of real estate, they think of residential home sales, but Pat highlighted the many other avenues in real estate. For example, Pat has a background in economics and urban development, and before becoming a realtor, he worked for Indian Affairs in land management. Other jobs in real estate include reception, conveyancing, website maintenance, advertising and property and strata management. He explained that many people who work in land titles and other land management divisions in the government, started their careers by working for private real estate companies in an administrative role.

Sauder School of Business, in collaboration with UBC, provides the training to be licensed as a real estate agent or a property or strata manager, and it also offers other professional development courses.

Pat recommends talking to people who work in the industry to find out if it’s right for you. Also the RE/MAX Nanaimo website has a real estate simulator where you can take a self test, which takes about an hour, to find out if working as a real estate agent is right for you.