We Don't Have Enough Real Estate Agents In GR

Is there a shortage of real estate agents in Grand Rapids? According to the national ratio, the answer is yes.

The Grand Rapids real estate market is a little weird right now, with low inventories driving housing prices up. To make matters worse, a national study shows that we have a low ratio of real estate agents to working residents, which kind of indicates we may not have enough real estate agents here.

Which I have a hard time believing, but data is data.

The report, done by the Inspection Support Network shows that the Grand Rapids metro ranks third among large cities in terms of having the lowest number of real estate agents.

The study used the average of licensed agents per employed people to demonstrate the shortage. The GR metro has about .428 agents per thousand employees. That's well below the national average of 1.105 per thousand.

Of cities the same size, only Rochester, NY and Providence, RI have less agents.