Realtors hear the straight scoop

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Realtors gathered at an industry meeting in the San Fernando Valley today got a strong dose of reality from one of L.A.’s original real estate kingpins, according to this breaking report from the Times’ Peter Hong.

Fred Sands, who has already made his killing in real estate, minced no words telling Realtors that the housing market is in the tank and that perhaps they should consider another line of work.

‘If you’ve been in it for five or six years and are barely making a living, you might want to think about what you were doing before and get back into it -- you can come back in a couple of years,’ Sands told members of the California Assn. of Realtors meeting in Universal City.

Not to be too cheeky, but hooray. Thank goodness someone from within the industry is finally speaking clearly. The biggest bubble created by the recent housing boom was in real estate agents. A spokesman for the Realtors’ group told me today that about one-third of the group’s 200,000 members have been in the business five years or less. Thus, they have never seen a downturn -- or a lack of clients -- until now.

What’s more, Kevin Burke, a San Diego broker who also trains sales agents, told me last month that 60% of the 540,000 licensed agents in California have not done a deal in the last 12 months. He expects about half of these agents to let their licenses lapse in the next year.

Of course, Sands took his own advice some time ago and got out of the residential biz for commercial real estate.

Are we looking at a Realtor bust?

Thoughts? Comments? News tips? E-mail annette.haddad@latimes.com