22 Sep 5 Reasons Uber Drivers & Lyft Drivers Win At Real Estate

There are some obvious reasons that Uber drivers and Lyft drivers make great real estate agents (like plenty of practice in dealing with people all day) and some not-so-obvious reasons (like knowledge of the best routes around town at rush hour). A real estate career forces real estate agents to wear many hats. Driving for Uber or Lyft while you’re launching your real estate career (or as a supplement to your income once you’ve already established yourself as a real estate agent) has some distinct advantages.

You have flexible schedules

If you are an Uber driver or Lyft driver, you are probably used to a “non-traditional” work schedule (not 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday). Some of the busiest times for ride sharing services in major metropolitan areas are during the evenings on nights and weekends when people are out and about for social events.

This is an advantage for several reasons. Working in real estate will require you to work around the schedules of your clients, which usually means you’ll be working some nights and weekends to accommodate their needs.

Plus, you can work a few nights a week or weekends a month so you can continue to pay the bills while you build your real estate business. The flexibility will allow you to scale up or scale down as needed, plus it makes it easy for you to respond to last-minute showing requests from clients.

You are personable

If you like people enough to be willing to drive strangers around town for a living, you are definitely personable enough to succeed with real estate consumers. Just like your riders, people shopping for homes come from all walks of life. Having polite an intelligent conversations with people from all different backgrounds is part of the job in real estate, too.

Also, it is well-documented that people do business with people they like. This is true in any field. If you’re likable, you’ll do more business.

You know your way around the city

Whether you need to get to a school, Walgreen’s, grocery store, public transportation stop, In-N-Out or Five Guys, Uber drivers and Lyft drivers know their way around town. It’s the same story with real estate agents. If your job is to drive around town to pick people up, drop people off, tour different areas or check out property, it looks very similar from the perspective of a ride sharing driver and a real estate agent. I have been to parts of town I NEVER would have discovered on my own to check out properties for clients.

People who are in the car all day long also know about the latest construction, bike lanes and best routes around town at certain times of day. This is invaluable knowledge, and also provides insights into where the new real estate development is happening.

You meet dozens of strangers every day

The hardest part of the real estate business is finding new clients. It’s NOT learning the housing inventory or real estate laws. The technical parts of the business are fairly straightforward. Finding new clients? That takes some doing.

If you are in a position to have conversations with random strangers in your hometown every day, you will inevitably find people who are thinking about buying or selling their property.

You (probably) have lots of patience

Dealing with the public, especially when they are in a situation where they are running late for something, takes some patience. People will be mad at things that are out of your control (traffic, app is buggy, road construction, traffic accidents, etc.), but you’ve learned to take it in stride. When people are stressed, they will sometimes act in ways that are abnormal for them.

It’s the same in real estate.

When people are in the middle of a real estate transaction, they can be sensitive at times. Learning to have patience and not to take anything personally is a skill that transfers well from Uber drivers and Lyft drivers to real estate agents.

Uber drivers and Lyft drivers make great real estate agents. Are you an Uber or Lyft driver, thinking about getting into real estate? Sign up here to get started with the process.