Agent income · North Carolina

What do real estate agents actually make in Raleigh?

Raleigh-Cary, NC · BLS wage data, May 2025

Median pay: $49,970
Employed agents: 2,150
Bottom 10% earn under: $27,940
Bottom 25% earn under: $38,120
Top 25% earn over: $99,890
Top 10% earn over: $120,090
Mean (average) pay: $74,770

Half of Raleigh's real estate agents earn less than $49,970 a year. A quarter earn less than $38,120. The top 10% clear $120,090. The spread, not the average, is the real story.

The top earners here make roughly 2.4x what a typical agent does - same market, same year, wildly different paychecks.

Why the spread is so wide

Real estate agents are paid on production, not a salary. There is no paycheck for showing up - income comes from closing deals, and a closing pays a share of the sale price, split with the brokerage. That single fact explains almost everything about the numbers above.

No sale, no income. An agent who closes twelve homes earns roughly twelve times what an agent who closes one does. The gap between the median and the top 10% is mostly the gap between part-time and full-time production.
The first year or two is the hardest. New agents build a pipeline before they see steady commissions, which pulls the bottom of the range down. Agents with an established referral base sit at the top.
The market swings it. The same agent earns far less in a slow year than a busy one. These figures are a snapshot of May 2025, not a guarantee of any year.
Many agents are not even counted here. This dataset covers agents paid as wage-and-salary workers. A large share of agents are self-employed independent contractors whose income is not captured in these BLS wage figures at all.