California

California is one of the few markets where the licensing exam is not a PSI or Pearson VUE product. The Department of Real Estate (DRE) writes the questions, seats the computers in Fresno, La Palma, Oakland, Sacramento, and San Diego, and will not print a numeric score for people who pass. A Texas sales-agent score report, a Florida sales-associate Pearson printout, and a New York Department of State pass letter are equally useless at DRE. That is the first fact that should change how you plan a California move.

The credential names matter. DRE issues a salesperson license and a broker license. REALTOR® is a National Association of Realtors membership mark, not a DRE product. You can hold a California salesperson license without joining NAR; you cannot practice without a responsible broker even if DRE has already issued the wall license. California will issue that salesperson license to an applicant who has not yet affiliated — an “unemployed” salesperson — which is the opposite of New York, where a sponsoring broker must authorize the application before the Department of State will issue anything.

Education is course-based, not an hour block. DRE requires three college-level statutory courses of at least 45 hours each: Real Estate Principles, Real Estate Practice (with the implicit-bias and interactive fair-housing components required since January 1, 2024), and one elective from the Commissioner’s list. Texas wants 180 classroom hours in six named TREC courses. Florida wants 63 hours of FREC I. California does not publish a 63- or 180-hour package, and continuing-education hours do not count as statutory courses. Members of the California State Bar are exempt from the college-level course list; they still sit the DRE exam.

The salesperson exam is 150 questions in three hours at 70 percent. The broker exam is 200 questions in four hours at 75 percent. Both are unified California content — agency under Civil Code § 2079, Transfer Disclosure Statements, Natural Hazard Disclosure, trust funds, and the Consumer Recovery Account — not a national outline with a California appendix. Original fees on DRE’s RE 206 schedule are $100 exam / $350 license for salesperson and $150 exam / $450 license for broker, plus $49 Live Scan processing. Licenses run four years; CE is 45 hours. There is no reciprocity with Texas, Florida, New York, Illinois, Georgia, Pennsylvania, or North Carolina.