Well, the 2007 NAR Member Survey is out. Somewhere in the first few pages, here's what you'll find:

- The average REALTOR made about $47,700 last year
- The average REALTOR spent about $7000 in expenses last year.
- The average REALTOR worked 60+ hours a week last year.

So, CONGRATULATIONS! The average REALTOR made $13/hour last year!!

Minus taxes. And no health care (or out of pocket). No vacation. No dental. No sickdays.

Which means the average REALTOR would have done better if they'd been employed as a pastry chef at a casino (according to salary.com) with health care, pension, time off and paid sick days.

Oh, and let's not forget this cute tidbit: The average REALTOR only PLANS to spend HALF of what they spent the previous year on technology - less than $850 annually.

Which means one of two things: They spent less on technology because they earned less (that's possible). Or alternately, they earned less because they spent less on technology. If you believe the former, then just shrug and move on. If you believe the latter, then ask yourself what you're going to do about it this year?

Economics 101: invest nothing, get nothing in return. Even in the down market, the average REALTOR's income was only off about $5000 from the previous year; that's only about 10% off. So why did the average agent spend 50% less on technology? It's certainly not proportional... why the dramatic drop?

I think it's simple: most agents still see technology as "optional" to their productivity. They see it as "ancillary" to their "real job" of doing "something" called real estate. So if there's a place to cut costs - it's in that crazy technology which doesn't really do anything than frustrate us anyway - and let's crank up the spending of what few dollars we have left in oh-so-useful things like, oh, let's see - postcards, newspapers, maybe? Rather than see the correlation between using technology to cut costs, expand market presence and penetrate online markets, "down time" agents simply think to cut the expense in the critical tool most likely to help them survive and recover... But then again - cutting technology means we won't have to learn Vista, right! Yay!

I've been told to never leave a blog posting half empty - right? So here's the silver lining.
Looks like the "above" average agent will only need about $1200 to spend 50% more on technology than their competitor.

Cool, huh?