Two perspectives on opportunities in residential real estate

By Joe Ward

The typical real estate agent in 2016 was a 53-year-old woman. That woman’s manager is just as likely to be a man as a woman. The firm’s owner, however, would typically be a 56-year-old man, according to the National Association of Realtors’ 2016 member profile.

The real estate industry is thought-of as a female-dominated industry, and although that may be true, the gender makeup at different levels of the industry shows that there are hurdles to women entering leadership roles in the profession.

Sixty-two percent of all agents were women in 2016, up from 58 percent in 2014, according to NAR. Sixty-six percent of sales agents are women, while 56 percent of brokers are women. Women also make up about 70 percent of managers who do not sell, but only make up 58 percent of managers who do sell.

Of course, the industry was not always so women-dominated. NAR did not specifically ban women members when it was founded in 1908, but it didn’t admit its first woman until two years later. In 1949, NAR membership was 98 percent men. It wasn’t until 1996 that the majority of NAR-affiliated brokers were women, according to the organization.

What happened between 1949 and 1996? More and more women started entering the workforce in addition to handling child-rearing and household responsibilities, and many took to real estate’s flexible hours, said Barbara O’Connor, managing broker at Dream Town’s Lincoln Square office.

“You had women that were at home with the family looking for some extra money, not necessarily looking for something full time,” O’Connor said.

Men, on the other hand, are disproportionately represented among real estate brokerage owners, upper management and other finance-focused aspects of the industry. They make up the lion’s share of broker-owners who don’t sell (68 percent) and broker-owners who do sell (57 percent), NAR reports. Sixty-seven percent of appraisers are men.

The difference isn’t coincidental, said female real estate professionals interviewed by Chicago Agent Magazine. Women have a hard time ascending the ranks because of longstanding practices that kept their inclusion in corporate hierarchy down in all types of industries, they said.

“Real estate is like a lot of other industries,” said La Shandria Sanderson, currently a broker with Jameson Sotheby’s and former broker-owner of Chicago Realty and Asset Management. “In some areas we’re seen as not being as knowledgeable as men. But there are things out there to help climb the ladder a little bit.”

One explanation for the breakdown is gender stereotypes that are as old as the real estate profession: that women belong in and are happier home-making, and men are better suited to handle money and make calculated business decisions. That dichotomy transfers pretty easily to real estate, where women historically show and sell homes and men run the company and finance the loans, O’Connor said.

“I think men back in the day were more business men,” she said. “Men are more risk takers; women are more caring. I believe you’re going to see that change slowly.”

The disparity is even greater in areas like Chicago, particularly downtown and in its ultra-competitive submarkets, where men make up an even greater percent of leadership because they deal heavily with the male-dominated development industry and work among “corporate shark” types, O’Connor said.

In Downtown Chicago and its surrounding areas, the real estate business is seen as being high-stakes and ultra-competitive. The culture and the male-dominated environment can scare off some women, Sanderson said.

“I don’t think that women don’t want to do [these jobs],” she said. “I just think it can be intimidating.”

For a few reasons, the suburban markets seem to be more amenable to women in manager and owner positions, according to Sanderson and O’Connor.

“As you go to the suburbs you will see more women managing brokers,” O’Connor said. “It’s a slower pace. More female-dominant brokers, more of a mothering touch versus when you go into the city urban market where it’s very fast paced.”

As a managing broker for eight years, O’Connor is proof that women can excel in such management positions, but it wasn’t easy for her to get there. At a previous job, O’Connor said she told her bosses that she had interest in moving up, but “they wouldn’t even look at me,” she said. Then she met a neighbor who worked at Dream Town and went on to convince the company she was ready for the opportunity.
There are ways to succeed despite such roadblocks. For example, civic incentives for female and minority-owned businesses. In Chicago, women and minority-owned businesses are sometimes given a leg up in contract bidding. Sanderson said she was able to own her own brokerage for nine years because of a government initiative that helped her get a contract with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

“They [Fannie and Freddie] wanted to work with minorities, wanted to work in minority neighborhoods,” Sanderson said. “That helped, but it was difficult to get to that.”

Though she said the vast majority of agents don’t want to become managers because of the dip in pay and being chained to a desk, O’Connor said there are plenty of female agents who would relish the opportunity. But they’ll continue to be overlooked until the industry’s corporate culture moves forward, she said.

“I can’t figure out why they’re not hiring or interviewing more women,” she said. “It emulates their ownership, or corporate America. Do I see it changing? I think when corporate America changes,” it will.