In Minnesota, your brand-new salesperson license cannot be activated until a licensed broker agrees to sponsor you, so your first real decision is not marketing, it is where you hang your license. The second decision is the sequence: budget, database, daily conversations, and a written 90-day plan, in that order, before you spend a dollar on leads. Get those two right and year one stops being a lottery.
This article answers the question new agents type into Google, ask on Reddit, and bring to every lunch meeting: what do I do first? We cover the legal order, the brokerage decision, the first-90-days sequence, and how "first client" actually happens in a seasonal market like Central Minnesota. Where it is honest to tell you not to join a team like ours, we will say that too.
The Short Answer
In Minnesota, your salesperson license cannot be activated until a licensed broker agrees to sponsor you, so the first decision is not marketing, it is where you hang your license. Choose that broker for mentorship, lead flow, and training rather than the biggest percentage. Then build your database, follow up daily, and run a written 90-day plan.
What should a new real estate agent do first, in order?
One thing about the word "first": it is a sequence, not a single step. New agents who skip the first steps feel like they are sprinting and are actually going backward. Here is the order that matters, and the order most quitters skip.
Hang your license with a sponsoring broker. In Minnesota, a salesperson license cannot be activated without an actively licensed broker agreeing to sponsor you. Your sponsoring broker submits the license application to the Minnesota Department of Commerce on your behalf. Until that happens, you legally cannot practice, cannot hold a listing, and cannot be paid.
Choose that broker for mentorship, not percentage. The most expensive mistake in year one is "picking a brand instead of a mentor", signing somewhere because the split looks big, then getting a login and a good luck. The split means nothing on the days you have no closings.
Budget for six months with no commission. Real estate is commission-only. The median new agent with two years or less of experience earned about $8,100 in 2024, which means most first-year checks are small and late. If you do not have a runway, that is not a character flaw, it is a math problem, and no brokerage split fixes it. We ran this math in Is real estate worth it in 2026?
Build your database before you prospect it. Your sphere, family, friends, past coworkers, neighbors, is the only list you own on day one. Enter everyone into a CRM in week one. You cannot activate a list you cannot open.
Start daily conversations and daily follow-up. The first client comes from conversations with people you already know, consistently, over weeks, not from one guilt-fee post. Fast follow-up on every single lead, same day where possible, is the cheapest advantage a new agent has.
Write a 90-day plan and review it weekly. Not a vision board, a plan with a number: conversations per week, appointments per week, agreements by day 60. Systems beat motivation by week six.
Why is choosing a brokerage your actual first step in Minnesota?
It is not a preference, it is the law. Minnesota requires every salesperson to be licensed through the Department of Commerce, and a license cannot be issued, activated, or held without a sponsoring broker. You complete the pre-licensing coursework, pass the exam, then a broker files the application for you. If you wait more than a year after passing, the requirement is that you retake the test. Your career is legally on pause until the day a broker says yes.
That is why every "what first" answer that starts with marketing is wrong. You cannot meet with a client, hold an open house, or draft a purchase agreement without an active license. The broker is the gate. The only real decision is which gate.
Definition
What is a sponsoring broker?
Every real estate salesperson in Minnesota must be supervised by an actively licensed real estate broker. That broker sponsors your license, files your application with the state, holds your license records, and carries the supervisory and legal responsibility for your transactions. Practically, your brokerage is your sponsoring broker, and their insurance, training, and support are part of what the arrangement buys you.
What should a new agent compare before choosing a brokerage?
Here is the honest comparison table. The point is not to sell you any row, it is to show that each home-type asks you a different price in the currency a new agent does not have yet: attention and runway. Read it, then call your Minnesota licensing board numbers to verify what a offer says.
| Model you would join | What it actually gives a new agent | The catch | Assume the risk |
| Traditional large brokerage | Brand recognition, an office, often a basic onboarding class, sometimes a mentor program. | Quality varies wildly by branch manager. New agents can sit in a branded office and still have no one to call. | Trainers divided by the branch, not a team with a shared pipeline. |
| High-split / flat-fee shop | You keep most of the commission you earn. The math looks like a dream if you already produce. | It assumes you have volume. A huge split on zero closings is 100 percent of nothing, plus fees. | You plan, prospect, market, and transact with no support built in. |
| A team inside a brokerage | A named lead, weekly training, a shared lead flow, and transaction support on top of a brokerage license. | Teams take a share of deals. Only worth it if the team brings business you would not have found alone. | Leadership quality and lead rules vary. Ask before you sign. |
| Full-suite builder (e.g., Elevate Group inside eXp Realty) | Capped plan, revenue share on top, national tech platform, plus the team's local lead flow, coaching, and transaction coordination. | You still have to build your database; no team can call your mother for you. | Vet the team like any other. We tell you to, honestly, in this article. |
The honest rule for year one: you are not buying a split, you are buying three things in order of importance: lead flow with a number attached, training from a live person who knows your market, and supervision that will not let you die in a transaction.
What should you ask for before you sign with any brokerage?
Get these in writing before you sign. A "yes to everything" is not an answer and a time to ask for the pen; it is a book and watch it slow-fill:
| Ask for this | Why it decides your first year |
| How many leads will I get in my first four months, and who are they? | "We have leads" without a number is not an answer. A number, a channel, and a name is. |
| Who runs my training, and what is on this week's calendar? | You need live practice on scripts, pricing, and contracts, not a login to a video library. |
| Who is my mentor on day ten, and what is the cadence of check-ins? | A team that can name your mentor before you sign will be there when a deal goes sideways. |
| Show me every fee and the cap in writing, before the split. | E&O, franchise, tech, transaction, and desk fees all come off the top. Small per closing, real by closing ten. |
| How long have the current agents been here, and why do people leave? | Tenure tells the truth the brochure omits. Ask for one current agent you can call as a reference. |
For a new agent in the Brainerd Lakes Area, this is not hypothetical. The market here is a lake market, it booms from spring through late August and then the phone can go quiet for months. A model with no lead flow leaves you running on your own in a market that is empty for half the year. We wrote the honest details in How to find consistent leads in a seasonal market, read it before you commit anywhere.
When does a higher split actually make sense for a brand-new agent?
Honestly, almost never in year one. A 95/5 split on zero closings is as close to nothing as a split can get. And a high split stacked with monthly fees, tech fees, and no mentor can leave you with less net than a capped 80/20 from a team that feeds you leads and teaches you. The percentage is not the first number in a new agent's math, volume is. We put the whole worked example, with a table you can run on your own numbers, in Is a higher commission split better?.
The exception, and it is real: if you already have a client-rich network and a year of savings, a low-fee shop with a high split might genuinely pay you best from day one. Do not let any recruiter, including us, tell you otherwise. The data belongs to you, not to the person showing it to you.
Why do most new agents quit, and how do you avoid the exact reason?
The numbers you hear, that roughly 75 percent of new agents quit in their first year and 87 percent are gone within five, are widely repeated shorthand and you should treat them as directional, not precise. The direction is not about talent. Here is what actually ends first-year careers, ranked the way we see it:
Choosing a brand without a mentor. High split, no trainer, no one to call. The single most cited early-quit mistake in agent self-reports is the one nobody remembers showing a ribbon for.
Going cash-negative before you can convert. Buying expensive leads and marketing in month one, before you can turn a conversation into a meeting. The skill comes before the spend.
No follow-up system. Leads go cold in hours, not days. The agent without a follow-up habit loses the same lead three times a week.
Expecting a salary. This is a business, not a job with a paycheck. The emotional shock of the empty first quarter ends more careers than the math does.
Notice what is not on the list. Drive is not the failure. Talent is not the failure. Most failures are structural: the plan, the pipeline, and the support. We wrote the week-by-week antidote as the 90 Day Agent Launch Plan, and it is free to read, with or without us.
What does the first 90 days actually look like, week by week?
The plan matters more than the personality. The best version we know compresses into three moves:
Days 1 to 30: database + skills. CRM built with your first 150 contacts, scripts practiced daily, first agreements signed by week three.
Days 31 to 60: activity + conversion. Ten or more conversations a week, three to five appointments a week, six to ten agreements by day sixty.
Days 61 to 90: pipeline + production. Listings moving end to end, weekly pipeline reviews, and a written review of real numbers at day 90.
The full week-by-week version is free in the 90 Day Agent Launch Plan, and each week has a checklist. If it is not on the scorecard, it did not happen, is the rule. Agents who follow a sequence do not climb by luck, they just do not quit on a Tuesday in November.
So, how do you actually get your first client?
The same way every agent did: by being known. In the Brainerd Lakes Area, your first client will more likely come from a friend of your parents in Baxter, an old coworker in Nisswa, someone at the coffee counter in Crosslake, or an online stranger who found you because you answered fast. The database you build in week one is the phone list; the conversations you have daily are the engine; same-day follow-up is the clutch.
Two honest caveats for a new agent in Crow Wing County. First, the market is deeply seasonal: demand concentrates between April and August, so if you only prospect in the summer you will enter the fall with nothing queued. Second, your sphere here is tight and word of mouth travels fast, which is a superpower if you serve well and a liability if you do not. The first deal is about the 150 names in your phone, not the dollars you pour into a lead account before you can convert.
Should you go solo or join help in your first year?
The honest answer: solo works in year one only if you can check all three boxes. You have six to twelve months of savings. Your own network will hand you appointments within weeks. And you have proof you can run a business with nobody holding you accountable. If any one of those is missing, the math says take the structure a good team offers, and even if that structure is not us, take it from someone.
Use the team vs. solo calculator with your real numbers. If it says solo, respect it. If it leans toward a team, check what you would ask that team to cover against the Team Value Scorecard. A team only pays for itself when it brings business you could not find alone, and the calculator will tell you honestly whether that works for your numbers.
The honest bottom line for a new agent
Do these in order: hang your license with a broker who will actually train and feed you; budget like no commission is coming for six months; build a database by week one; have daily conversations with same-day follow-up; run a written 90-day plan reviewed weekly. Do that and your odds flip from slot-machine to skill.
Three decisions, not a brochure, decide your year:
Decide on These Three Questions
1. Can you survive six months on no commission? That single number, not your motivation, decides the first year.
2. Who is accountable to you weekly? If the answer is "nobody", tell me how that week ten of silence goes.
3. What is your first 90-day plan in writing? A plan with dates, not a pitch, is the only thing the season cannot take from you.
If you are still deciding whether the career is yours at all, start with Is real estate worth it in 2026? before you spend a dollar. If you are already licensed and sitting in a shop that hands you a desk and a slogan, the article You have a great split, but were built for more is probably the one that keeps you awake. And if you are weighing team versus the empty office, Should you join a team or go solo walks the whole decision.
Noah Goedker
Team Leader, Elevate Group at eXp Realty
A third-generation real estate agent and lifelong resident of the Brainerd Lakes Area. Noah built Elevate Group because he believes new agents should not have to choose between keeping their commission and having the support system they need to survive year one and the years after.