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New Study: Real Estate Agents Job Searches Decline Across U.S. States

A new study by Flatworld Mortgage Solutions examines the trend in the real estate agent job market in the United States from 2019 to 2024. The study explores various aspects, including overall growth, year-by-year trends, resilience during economic challenges, and state-level insights into employment.

Key Takeaways

  • The search interest for "realtor jobs" dropped to under 64 in 2024, reaching its lowest point since 2016, according to the Google Trends search interest index ranging from 0 to 100. This is a significant decrease from the peak interest of 83.08 in 2022.
  • The growth rate for real estate agent jobs slowed to 1.53% in 2023, down from a substantial growth of 9.33% in 2022, indicating a significant cooling down of the real estate agent job market.
  • California experienced the most significant decline, losing 8,160 real estate agent jobs, while Nevada saw the highest growth with 1,140 new jobs.

Significant decrease in 2024

The interest in realtor jobs is experiencing a noticeable decrease in 2024, reaching its lowest point since 2016. According to Google Trends data, the search interest for “realtors jobs” was the highest in 2022 (83.08), followed closely by 2021 (82.83). It went under 64 in 2024. The search interest index ranges from 0 to 100, where 0 indicates no interest, and 100 represents peak popularity, reflecting relative search volume.

The peak years 2021-2022 could be related to changes in the housing market during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. This data suggests that while there have been fluctuations, interest in realtor jobs has experienced a potential cooling off recently.

Cooling down of the real estate agent job market

Looking at the employment data from the Bureau of Labour Statistics about Real Estate Sales Agent and Broker, we can see a somewhat similar trend, but the data are only up to 2023. In 2020, while the overall job market experienced a 5.29% decline, the number of real estate agent jobs increased by 4.04%. Real estate agent jobs continued to grow substantially in 2021 (5.17%) and 2022 (9.33%), outpacing the overall job market recovery. In 2023, the growth rate for real estate agent jobs slowed to 1.53%. It remained positive but is under the overall job market, indicating a significant cooling down of the real estate agent job market.

Severe Job Losses in Some States

At the state level, a median growth of 50 new real estate agent jobs, suggests that while some states are experiencing severe job losses, more than half of the states are still seeing some growth or stability in real estate agent employment. California experienced the most significant decline, losing 8,160 real estate agent jobs followed by North Carolina (-5870), Texas (-3190), and Florida (-1350). There's a stark contrast between the bottom-performing states and the top-performing states, like Nevada (1140), Tennessee (850) and Missouri (770).

This analysis reveals a challenging period for real estate agent employment across the United States, with some states managing to grow despite the overall negative trend. The reasons for these disparities could be related to local economic conditions, housing market dynamics, or regulatory changes, and might warrant further investigation.

Methodology

This study primarily utilizes employment data for real estate sales agents and brokers obtained from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) for the period 2019-2023. The BLS data, which includes information on employment numbers, growth rates, and average annual wages across different states in the United States, was downloaded and processed to calculate year-over-year growth rates and identify state-level trends. This analysis was complemented by search interest data from Google Trends for the term "realtor jobs" (2019-2024) to provide additional context on public interest in real estate careers. The Google Trends data, ranging from 0 (no interest) to 100 (peak popularity), reflects relative search volume over time.