The housing crisis put a significant dent in the number of registered real estate agents, a Bloomberg article said. The number of agents registered with the National Association of Realtors is more than 8% lower than in 2008.

That means the real-estate agents who stuck around after the housing bust are now enjoying a rare sweet spot as rising sales and prices boost the average commission per transaction. Based on the standard 6% sales commission, agents' annual income averaged $75,252 in 2014, 38% higher than the $54,361 earned in 2008. Of course, agents don’t receive the full commission personally, and the money usually is shared among multiple agents on each transaction.

However, the article added:

Since the barriers to entry in the residential real-estate sales business are low, that probably means this opportunity for the few to earn more won’t last very long.