Recently, I tutored a group of four students. Some had not taken the Florida real estate exam yet. Others had taken it once or twice. All of them needed to pass so they could make more money than the hourly wage they were making.

We decided to do practice questions similar to ones on the Florida real estate exam. I put the question up on the screen, and they would answer it. If they got the answer wrong, I’d explain it to be sure they understood it. Simple enough.

After a few questions, one of them started saying, “Can we just skip to the answer? We don’t know the answers. That will be quicker.”

“Nope,” I said. “You have to read it, think about it, and pick something. That’s what you would do if this were the state exam.”

“I know,” he responded. “But we don’t have time. We’d rather get through all of them.” What he really meant was, “We don’t want to do all this thinking crap – we just want you to tell us.”

It’s just like tying your shoes

This makes me think of a small child who says, “Daddy, please tie my shoe.”

Dad says, “You can do it by yourself. I’ll watch.”

Child whines, “Can’t you do it for me?”

Sure, the dad can tie the daughter’s shoe (let’s hope!). And yes, that would be so much quicker for everyone. If the primary goal were to get the shoe tied, that would be the best course of action. But that’s not the goal. The goal is to be sure that the child is not asking her friends to tie her shoe when she gets into high school.

If my goal were to give you all the information that was on the exam, I wouldn’t be teaching real estate classes or tutoring. I’d be selling Linda Crawford’s textbook. Everything you need to know to pass the Florida real estate exam is in that book. But it’s not enough to have the information. You have to be able to retrieve it from your memory. The more times you retrieve it from your memory, the stronger the path is.

How your memory works

Think about this … When you walk across a grassy field, you will leave some footprints where the grass is matted down a little bit, but the grass usually bounces right back up. That’s what it’s like when you first attend real estate school. The material is in your brain, but there isn’t any recognizable path to get to it.

But if you go to a college campus or community park, there are paths in the grass that are matted down so much they are nearly permanent. The more times you travel that path, the more ingrained the path gets. Our memory is the same way. The more times you recall something, the more permanent that pathway is. It gets easier and easier each time.

That’s why I made the students think about the answers to the questions. The absolute best way to prepare for the Florida real estate state exam is to do practice questions – but you have to treat like a real test. Don’t read the question then quickly look up the answer. Read the question, think it through, and commit to one answer. Even if you get it wrong, you will be learning more than if you just looked up the answer.

If you need help passing the Florida real estate exam, please give me a call. Just know that if you ask me to tie your shoes, I won’t do it. I’ll show you how to tie them instead.

Please note that neither I, nor anyone in the Climer family, have any affiliation with Climer School of Real Estate.  My father, Ron Climer, sold Climer School of Real Estate in 2014.  You can find me at Demetree School of Real Estate.