In the real estate industry, recruitment remains one of the most challenging aspects of running a successful agency. With industry turnover rates hovering around 50% within the first twelve months, many principals find themselves constantly caught in the cycle of hiring new talent.

As a real estate mentor with years of experience working with agencies across Australia and New Zealand, I’ve identified where most businesses are getting recruitment fundamentally wrong—and how implementing proper systems for real estate recruitment can transform your business outcomes.

The most common mistake I see when working with real estate business owners is hiring too quickly out of necessity. This reactive approach typically looks like:

• Sitting across from someone in an interview who appears energetic and promising
• Making a quick decision based on first impressions and urgent need
• Discovering 3-4 months later that the new hire lacks the energy and tenacity they initially projected
• Starting the recruitment cycle all over again when they leave

This approach not only costs your business time and money but creates a reputation for instability that affects your entire team.

Through our “18 Months to Success” framework, we’ve developed a comprehensive system that transforms how real estate agencies approach recruitment. Here’s what it involves:

The Two-Step Interview Process

Rather than making decisions after a single conversation, implement a structured two-step interview process that allows you to evaluate candidates more thoroughly.

This creates multiple opportunities to assess their consistency, communication style, and how they respond to different challenges—giving you much more reliable data than a single meeting.

The Commitment Test Strategy

One crucial element missing from most recruitment processes is what I call the “commitment test.”

Between interviews, ask prospective candidates to complete a specific task or project. This isn’t about the quality of their work as much as determining whether they’re looking for a career rather than just a job.

Those seeking long-term success will enthusiastically complete these tasks, while those just looking for a quick paycheck will often disappear from your recruitment pipeline—saving you months of frustration later.

Profile Testing for Predictable Results

As a real estate agent coach, I’ve found that proper profile testing is non-negotiable for sustainable recruitment success.

We take prospects through comprehensive profile assessments that evaluate:

• Natural communication styles
• Energy and resilience factors
• Problem-solving approaches
• Values alignment

Most importantly, we compare these results against benchmark assessments of high-performing agents to determine the likelihood of success. This data-driven approach removes much of the guesswork from recruitment decisions.

Recruitment is only the beginning. Where many real estate principals fail is in the onboarding process that follows. New agents are eager to make money quickly—they want to attend open homes, sit in living rooms, and make sales immediately.

This urgency, while understandable, sets them up for long-term failure.

Our three-phase onboarding system creates substantially better results:

Phase 1: Building the Prospecting Foundation

The first critical phase focuses exclusively on prospecting skills—calling, door-knocking, and other fundamental activities.

The key differentiator in our approach is teaching new agents to “be someone’s agent before they need an agent.” This relationship-building focus creates a pipeline of future business rather than pushing for immediate listings.

As I often tell new agents: “The longer I can keep you away from the listing, the better your career will be long term.”

Phase 2: Mastering Client Communication

Once prospecting fundamentals are solid, we move to phase two—teaching effective communication with buyers and vendors.

This includes:

• Extracting meaningful feedback from buyers
• Presenting sometimes challenging information to vendors
• Managing expectations in changing market conditions
• Building trust through transparency

These skills become increasingly critical in softening or changing markets, where agents must deliver news that owners may not want to hear.

Phase 3: The Art of Winning Listings

Only after mastering the first two phases do we focus on the art of sitting in living rooms and pitching for business. By this point, the agent has built:

• A solid database of relationships
• Strong communication skills
• Market knowledge and credibility
• The confidence to present effectively

Through this systematic approach, by approximately the 18-month mark, you’ll have a fully-developed sales professional rather than someone still finding their way.

This methodology has produced remarkable results for our clients across Australia, creating sustainable performance rather than the boom-and-bust cycle that plagues many agencies.

If you take one thing from this article, let it be this: don’t throw new agents into the deep end with nothing but a desk and phone, telling them to list and sell.

While they’ll naturally chase the commission and may even secure a listing in their first month, you’re doing them a disservice by not providing the framework for long-term success.

The short-term gain of a quick listing pales in comparison to the value of a systematically-trained agent who can consistently perform for years to come.

Implementing proper systems for real estate recruitment isn’t just about finding better talent—it’s about creating a stable, high-performing business that doesn’t constantly leak time and money through the revolving door of recruitment.

As a real estate mentor who has helped hundreds of agencies transform their recruitment approaches, I’ve seen firsthand how these systems can dramatically improve business outcomes.

Would you like to learn more about how our “18 Months to Success” framework could work in your business? [BOOK A BRAINSTORM CALL] today, and let’s discuss how to build recruitment systems that create sustainable growth for your agency.