Qualifications

Qualifications

While there is no traditional education required to start brokering like there's no tomorrow, it's not a terrible idea to pursue at least a four-year degree. It's crucial in this line of work to be a people person, and what better place to start learning about that than living in an overcrowded dorm room? 

Plus—reality check—few people are going to trust an eighteen-year-old kid with handling their $500,000 loan regardless of the talent he or she brings to the bank table. You may as well take some math classes and smarten up while you ripen a bit.

Regardless of your college plans, you're going to need to research the qualifications required to practice mortgage brokering in your state. Different states have different laws governing loans, and so they sorta kinda want you to know what you're doing before accidentally advising somebody to break the law.

Fortunately, these qualifications are easy to get—they usually only require a one-time fee and an exam. And if you need help learning the ropes before sitting down to prove you know what you're doing to the state, there's usually an online class, tech school, or community college ready to offer you a specialized course for a few hundred dollars.

The most important qualification of this job, however, cannot be taught. Only practiced. If you want to succeed, you're going to need to learn both how to market yourself and how to make people like and trust you (we hear that being likable and trustworthy can help with this). Your success in this role comes down to you and you alone, so you're going to need to be absolutely sure that clients see only the best you when choosing whether or not to hire you.