Is It Better To Be a Buyer’s Agent or Seller’s Agent?

Is a listing agent the same as a buying agent? How does representing buyers instead of sellers change a real estate agent’s job? Is it harder to represent buyers than sellers? Which client base pays better?

Below, we’ll break down the roles real estate agents can play, whether it’s better to be a buyer’s agent or a seller’s agent, and the pre-license education you need to get started.

What’s The Difference Between a Seller’s Agent and a Buyer’s Agent?

Seller’s agents (also called listing agents) represent homeowners who are putting their homes on the market, while buyer’s agents (sometimes, confusingly, called selling agents) represent people looking for the right home to buy.

Many states allow the same agent to represent both parties in a single sale. It’s called dual agency, and it’s very common. Most states require disclosure to all parties in a dual agency sale as long as the agent swears to do their best at balancing their duties to the buyer and the seller.

But many people argue there’s an inherent conflict of interest in dual agency deals. The real estate agent is theoretically accounting for the seller’s interest in a higher price and the buyer’s interest in a lower price but the agent themselves benefits from a higher price (and therefore a higher commission), so how hard will they push to haggle it down?

For this reason, seven states ban dual agency, and many buyers in dual agency states seek separate representation.

How Is Being A Buyer’s Agent Different Than Being A Listing Agent?

In cases where the roles are split by law or by client preference, a buyer’s agent and seller’s agent have different duties and priorities.

While there’s a lot of overlap in knowledge and necessary skill (like negotiation), seller’s agents are more focused on putting the property in the best possible light with the right price, photos, descriptions, and renovations or repairs. Everything they do is to help a specific property sell on terms the owner will be happy with (or, at the very least, can live with).

Buyer’s agents are more focused on getting their clients into a home that will best suit their needs. They’re not trying to sell any one property. Instead, they’re considering multiple properties through their client’s eyes and making sure they are suitable and in good working order.

Is It Hard To Be A Listing Agent? Is It Harder To Be A Buyer’s Agent?

First, let’s talk about the challenges that all real estate agents share. Both must:

• Make Money Entirely on Commission: This can be a blessing when times are good and a curse when times are bad. In the early years, it may mean little to no income.
• Run Their Own Business: This means struggling with handling your own taxes, business expenses, health insurance, and time management, along with your official duties of marketing, leads generation, leads nurturing, and closing deals. It can be overwhelming, especially at first.
• Work at the Mercy of the Market: Conditions are often beyond their control, and they have to deal with what they get in terms of sale prices, mortgage rates, inventory availability, and whether it’s a buyer’s or seller’s market.
• Create a Work-Life Balance: You’re often told that real estate agents set their own schedules, but in reality, they’re often at the mercy of others. This can mean working a lot of evenings and weekends instead of spending time with friends and family. And success requires hustle, meaning long hours.

The Special Challenges of Listing Agents

In addition to the general challenges of being a real estate agent, those who focus on serving home sellers have to:

• Win the Listings Race by convincing sellers to sign an exclusive listing agreement with them instead of another agent.
• Choose the Right Asking Price. Lowballing it will shortchange the client (and the agent’s commission), while aiming too high can put buyers off.
• Sellers Can Be Stressed or Indecisive. A listing agent’s client is going through a very complicated, personal, stressful process. This can mean a lot of hand-holding and persuading them toward a strategic course of action.
• Sellers Have Higher Expectations. Homeowners looking to sell hire an agent knowing that they’re going to take a cut of “their” money. They often fight for the lowest commission but the highest level of service. This makes them more critical as a client base.
• Failure Creates a Stigma. There are so many ways a deal can fall apart, and while buyer’s agents have to cope with this fact as well, putting a house back on the market can leave it with a stigma while buyers can simply try again. There’s also time pressure because people assume that houses that have been on the market “too long” are undesirable in some way.

Of course, there are upsides, too. Listing agents often cite more guaranteed business and a higher earnings potential as reasons they choose to represent sellers.

The Special Challenges of Buyer’s Agents

Meanwhile, agents who focus on home buyers have different struggles like:

• Buyers Are Less Committed. There are no exclusive agreements with buyer clients, so they’re able to agent-hop. They have less skin in the game to complete a transaction, so they’re more likely to ghost you. And if you don’t close each buyer’s deal, you don’t get paid for some of your work.
• Buyers Are More Time-Intensive. The process of learning the client’s needs, showing multiple homes, and making multiple offers on behalf of a buyer simply requires more of a time commitment than helping a seller prep their home and vetting offers for the right one.
• The Market Is Smaller. Since most states allow dual agency, not all buyers seek out a separate agent. Meanwhile, almost all sellers will eventually engage one. A buyer’s agent has to drum up their own demand.
• It Might Pay Less. We’ll go into more detail below, but in all but a handful of states, being a buyer’s agent comes with certain financial disadvantages compared to being a seller’s agent.

Given all these challenges, why do some agents choose to focus on buyers? Many of them say it’s simply more fun. Buyers have more reasonable expectations than sellers, generally speaking, and they’re more likely to be satisfied and appreciative of your work. This can result in more referral business, which reduces the need to hustle for leads.

Do Listing Agents Make More Than Buyer’s Agents?

This is a big point of contention, and the answer to this question will depend on the market and the agent’s popularity and level of skill. However, there are many real estate agents who argue that seller’s agents can make more than buyer’s agents.

The reasoning goes that:

• Sellers Are More Dependent on Agents, so more of them will commit to their services. After all, only 6% of homes are closed For Sale By Owner. The process is just too daunting for most people to handle alone. That means there’s a bigger pool of clients to choose from and more of a likelihood that each client will end in a commission.
• Listing Is More Scalable because sellers require less time than buyers on average. You can have more clients at once as a listing agent, which means more deals closed.
•  Sellers Can Make Twice as Much Per Deal in states that allow dual agency. When an agent represents both the buyer and the seller, they take home the entire commission. When a buyer’s agent is involved, the commission is always split between two agents. This argument doesn’t factor in for the states that ban dual agency because all deals involve a split commission.

It's hard to say for certain how the math works out since most salary-tracking tools don’t distinguish between the two roles when gathering information. Additionally, not everyone exclusively specializes in one or the other. Most agents take both types of clients.

Is It Better To Be a Buyer’s Agent or a Seller’s Agent?

This is really a judgment call that every real estate agent has to make for themselves.

Your skill level and experience should certainly factor into your decision since a newbie might struggle to make enough income representing buyers for all the reasons discussed above.

Other considerations might be your ability to wrangle difficult sellers (good for listing agents), your skill at building an unshakeable rapport (more helpful for buyer’s agents), and the type of market you’re working with (favoring sellers or buyers).

Perhaps the best solution is to straddle the line and take both kinds of clients. In states that outlaw dual agency, you’ll never be able to match one of your sellers with one of your buyers, which is frustrating, but that’s really the only limitation on this strategy. You’ll get the best of both worlds and more variety in your work.

All Agents Need Quality Education

Regardless of the type of client you favor, all real estate agents live and die by their ability to be well-rounded in various topic areas and stay up-to-date on the latest regulations or strategies.

It’s important to start your career with quality pre-license education and sustain it with plenty of continuing education. Both of these course types are also essential for gaining and keeping your real estate license.

We offer state-approved courses in both categories and, better yet, they’re online for maximum convenience. You’ll be able to study at your own pace, on any device with the internet, at any time that’s convenient for you.

Enroll today!