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Leading real estate professionals from across NSW have been working on how to take the industry forward.
Originally, Leanne Pilkington had hoped there would be an Australia-wide move to establish an industry standard for real estate, but she recently told host Phil Tarrant on Secrets of the Top 100 Agents podcast that it is now just an REINSW initiative.
Last year, the REINSW president invited 120 real estate leaders from around the state to workshop ideas that need to be considered to make real estate a profession.
“It requires a better level of training and education than we currently have. It requires a code of ethics that we will actually adhere to, and if you don’t adhere to it, you cannot be part of the profession,” she said.
“So we’re working through all of that right now.”
Although she hoped for it to be a national agenda, it was too challenging to get all the REIs from around the country together.
“We will make it happen, and then we are very hopeful that once we’ve shown the way, the other REIs will come on board,” Ms Pilkington said.
Although it is a slow process, she has had a lot of support from top agents and business owners. However, while many think it is a good idea, it has been challenging to get people committed to working towards increasing the industry standard.
“Everybody’s going, ‘yep, concept’s great, but what does it actually mean and what are the actions we have to take?” So we’ve got a subcommittee working on that right now,” she said.
The only reason it has not been tackled until now is that it has been a hard step to take, she said.
Ms Pilkington is not prepared to shy away from the challenges as she looks forward to the benefits that will come from real estate as a profession.
One of the significant benefits will be for the consumer as they can be assured that their agent is a professional who adheres to a code of conduct.
“Part of the problem we’ve got in the industry, as we stand right now, is the government has just eroded the education and training to such a degree, and I’m speaking specifically about NSW, but it is true in a number of the other states as well. The education and training are so bad that it is so quick to get a real estate license or to get your certificate, that the quality of service, the quality of advice, the quality of information you’re getting from the agent is not what it should be,” she said.
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