My brother i with Keller Williams and he has great things to ay about their training. I have never been with a big company.

I was talking to a local broker/owner who had a small company for years and recently went with Century 21 -- He was going on and on about their training.

I hope us small guys don't get pushed out.

Keller does offer some great training and serves kool aid at every function. However the commission split and the training are not necessarily separate issues. We offer on line as well as in house training, business planning and video seminars. We bring in Wickman and other speakers that are the motivators, as well as the trainers and offer a 95% split. So training is available, if the agent wants it. I have 3 brokers in my offices and they are all available for group, power group or one on one training. Less than half our agent take advantage.

I actually think that is a good number since we have worked on promoting the need for further education. Our online is the most popular because it can be done when they have time and can stop the course and begin where they left off.

Are we the best. We have all the information to be the best but if you don't use it, how do you make that judgement. A small company could provide all we have in information. So, I think there is no best, just different ways of presenting the same thing and hopefully having a candidate that want to avail himself/herself of the training.

I would say Keller Williams, hands down. We have weekly classes, courses,on Dec 19th a speaker is coming to Chicago to give a free all-day talk  at a hotel downtown - and the amazing thing is that the top agents who speak share their success strategies and resources. This is true of the office I work from and atlease two others I know of in Chicago.  I am very happy with the education and business model of KW. One of the reasons I picked KW when I was a new agent is I did not want a week of training and then be left not knowing what to do!

Having only experienced two companies - that's hard to answer.  We don't have a Keller Williams here on PEI.  I always thought EXIT had a great system and really motivational training.  

We don't get an abundance of training at Coldwell Banker.  I am always looking for seminars and classes offered locally by our Chamber of Commerce or by an association called Women in Business.  I love to learn so I think continuous training is very important!

In my first three years in real estate I have been with three companies and Prudential Georgia Realty seems to offer the best training so far.  Classes are held weekly at my local office.  There are multiple training opportunities in any of the other offices as well.  Quite a bit of the training is free and there are scholarships offered for a lot of the designation classes.

Of course, a company can offer all kinds of training but it's up to the individual agent to take advantage of all that is offered.  If it's slow in real estate, it's a great opportunity to take classes and learn.

Bill:

I am a small Broker with three offices in Pennsylvania.  We are an independent firm --- nor franchise.  I have been in the business over 20 years and with firms like Coldwell-Banker, Realty Executives and Better Homes and Gardens.  IMHO the BEST training platform out there is available to EVERYONE it is Dirk Zellers Real Estate Champion book/course.  Hands down.  That coupled with a Broker that will really show you how to do the whole job and not just the public side is IMHO the best set up possible.  Your Uncle and that Book will beat out anyone elses attempt at training.

Never having been anywhere but RE/MAX, I cannot give objective opinion on which Major RE Co offers the best training.  But I am not sure it is a Company question as much as a broker question.

Having been at 3 different RE/MAX offices, I can tell you that training ranged from very personal and unstructured, to very structured and impersonal, to virtually non-existant.  Each office was very different even if the Major Company Name was the same.

Will say this... RE/MAX Intl offers excellent online training through web delivered Video On Demand classes, web delivered resources, and free membership to all agents in a co-branded version of www.Imprev.com where you can make postcards, flyers, and hosted web commercials or virtual tours with just a few clicks.  Further, RE/MAX negotiates special rates with printers, postcard providers, and even local advertising outlets based on combined buying power of all the RE/MAX agents in town - even if at independently owned brokerages we still are a buying pool.  

RE/MAX strongly supports Brian Buffini training, and Howard Brinton.  One one of my offices encouraged Wickman training, and another made the Buffini "100 Days to Greatness" program available at half price to experienced agents with no commission sharing over the next few months.  This differed from the new agent program where the new agent would pay half the usual price for the training, plus 5% or 10% of commission over the next 3 - 6 months (paid to the local class facilitator.  This faciliator / coach was a brokerage agent and management employee who had attended Brian Buffini coach training (not me!).

Again it depended more on broker than company, but the behind the scenes work at RE/MAX Intl and online web delivery of VOD training sessions is very good.

I'm at Keller Williams currently and they offer a lot of very good training. In our office the majority of it is geared toward newer agents, and medium producing agents who want to achieve the "next level." My first office was a small, independent and that broker also offered excellent training for newer agents. When I was at Better Homes and Garden (later the same office became GMAC) that particular BROKER offered great training for all levels of agents. But that was a broker, who had been a very good and high producing agent (100+ closings per year) when he sold, so he had a wealth of information he shared with all of us.

But in general, I'd have to say Keller Williams and small companies with training minded brokers would be the best places for new agents to learn.

When I was first trying to decide who to go with as my first real estate company, I really liked what Prudential in Chicago (they had couple offices in Chicago and the burbs) had to offer. So, I joined and realized that while the training was perfect for some people, sure wasn't for me (that doesn't mean it was bad .... just not my style). After couple months, I was just about ready to leave the company mainly because I hated the training and lucky for me, the manager I worked under at that time wasn't very happy with the corporate office training we (her newbies) were going through and she pulled us out of the training and started training us herself. While I didn't sell or list a single piece of real estate while going through the company training (other than buying my own first house where I made loads of mistakes having no idea what I was doing), it took me only 2 weeks to finally start selling under her guiding wing. She's no longer with the company and neither am I. And now, having my own office, I always thing of how would she handle things. I don't copy her style but try to use what I learnt from her as much as possible. And guess what, out of our 6-member office, 5 of us started under her wings. To me, it's all about the mentors and broker managers ... they are the ones who teach you the REAL  tricks of the trade.

Hi Bill.

Well, I've just gotten through my Salesperson exam, and I've been talking to brokers to narrow down the list of choices and see who I fit best with to affiliate with them.

The thing is this:  EVERY company out there says it has the best training.  I've spoken to Century21, Keller-Williams, Prudential, MetroBrokers, Harry Norman...and they all say they have the best training.  I'd love for JD Power to do a test of realtors at 12 months and see which company is *actually* training their agents best, but that's not happening.  So I'm as confused as you.

Thanks to everyone up there who gave aqdvice, because it's good for me, too.  :)

I use to be with Metrobrokers. I went to school there and thought that it would be a great place to start my career. After 9 months of nothing, I was invited to a Keller Williams "team meeting" and after talking to about six or so of their agents, it became clear to me that this is where I belong. I have been with them for a month now and learned more of the nuts and bolts of the business in that one month then I did with 9 months of Metrobrokers. Also, the monthly fees are cheaper. I can ask any agent there about how they do things and they will be more than happy to tell you what works for them and what didnt so you dont waste time and money.

By the way, after a few of my friends at Metrobokers saw how I was doing and came to a meeting, They too have made the move and are loving it there.