Success! My year long journey to becoming a REALTOR

Looking back to this time last year, life was 100% different. Last July was one of the lowest points in my life. I had just been laid off from my dream job out of college. I was an oil and gas Consultant working at a boutique technology firm in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It was an incredible Hail Mary to go from graduate school in Indiana - where I was pursuing a Master's in Public Affairs and Master's in Russian Area Studies - to working in the oil industry in Oklahoma. (Yes, that's correct - 2 graduate degrees at the same time!) But, I set my sights on returning home and did whatever I could to get there. After those 3 grueling years in the frigid north (it was cold y'all), I landed my first big girl job in July 2019.

My boyfriend (who was already working in Oklahoma) and I had discussed real estate investing, but it seemed crazy. In another post on this blog - "Let's break down a real estate investment deal" - I outline how I changed my mind and decided to dive into the real estate investing world. But in this post, I'll explain the series of events that occurred between July 2020 and July 2021 that led to a retooling of my career goals. My fulltime job working as a Consultant (now in Life Sciences) is something I've worked very hard for and won't leave anytime soon. However, I desire to retire at some point and would like to be financially free by then, so thus the importance of real estate.

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July 2019 - March 2020

Life was great! I was learning a lot as a young Consultant and even survived my first on-site project. For 12 weeks straight I lived out of a hotel room and worked at a client site. It was brutal, but a great learning opportunity - both personal and professional. Real estate was a mere fly buzzing at the back of my head. It was important, but something I would eventually get to. For the present moment, I was too busy working and paying off my student loans. Life was going so well, how could it not stay amazing?

Late March 2020 - Summer 2020

The fun times ended. I was put on a 90 day furlough due to Coivd-19 and had to navigate the unemployment process at the same time as millions of other Americans. My student loans were half-way paid off, but without a job and stable income, I was financially lost. I had done everything right by going to school, working hard, and landing a dream gig. I had even forgone the fun of spending my first adult salary since the majority of it had been used to pay off my student loans. All the sacrifices and delayed gratification seemed to be a waste.

In life, you usually have a trade-off: you're working full-time and your spare time is priceless or you aren't working and your spare time is abundant. Knowing I had a lot more free time, I dove into online classes to keep my skills up and to learn new ones. It was also at this time that I finally sat down to consume all the real estate books, blogs, and podcasts I had been meaning to. I couldn't believe what I was learning since it sounded too good to be true: passive income, a mortgage that someone else pays off, an ever-appreciating asset! It sounded too good to be true. I'm extremely risk-averse so I investigated the safest way to invest in real estate. I decided to get my license since that was a surefire way to learn the local laws and have direct access to the MLS (multiple listing service). I, along with my mom and boyfriend, signed up for a course offered by a local real estate brokerage. We had to wait a few months because this was the earliest class they had that took place in the evenings.

January - February 2021

The first class was 90 hours - 60 in-class and 30 on your own - and it took place over 6 weeks. We learned the basics of real estate and Oklahoma's perspective on real property. After this course, we had to take a qualifying exam with the brokerage that would then allow us to take the state exam. I passed on the first try.

March 2021 - May 2021

An extremely busy project schedule at my full-time job meant that I had to wait for a lull to take the 4-hour state exam. The nice thing about this gap in time was that I could study and stay on top of topics that had previously confused me. In mid-May, my project calmed down enough and I took the exam. It was a painful 3 hours, but I passed! Upon successful completion of this test, I finally got my Oklahoma Real Estate License Number. I'm the real deal now!

June - July 2021

With my License Number from the Oklahoma Real Estate Commission (OREC), I could go "hang" my license at a brokerage. We all chose Chinowth & Cohen, a firm renowned in this state for exquisite homes and a high level of attention to detail. The final step in the long process to becoming a practicing Real Estate Agent in Oklahoma is to complete a 45-hour course. In this class, we learned the intricacies of how to list (sell) a home, how to assist a buyer in purchasing a home, and all the paperwork required for both. The majority of the content was in class, where we met Mondays-Thursdays for 3 weeks straight for 3 hours in the evenings. The final class was the exam and, like the other tests before it, I passed on the first try.

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Around 2 months into my real estate journey, and I'm really enjoying it so far! After the worst July I'd ever experienced in 2020, this summer is shaping up to be great. It's incredible the difference a year makes! While I'm certainly not living in la-la land thinking life is perfect and couldn't turn bad, I definitely have a much stronger appreciation for grinding for what one wants.