Kaplan Real Estate School Review + Video Walk-through

Kaplan Real Estate offers three course formats for your prelicensing real estate education: Home Study, OnDemand, and Live Online. Assuming all three are available in your state, you can choose the format that best suits your learning style.

Home Study

Home Study is Kaplan’s textbook-based, self-paced option for learners who absorb information well by reading. With Home Study, you’ll guide yourself through multiple PDF textbooks, completing the reading, worksheets, and quizzes. You’ll also have access to the Kaplan Real Estate Interactive Study Groups, which are weekly webinars where students ask their instructors questions and coordinate with other students to study together.

OnDemand

If you prefer a video-based course, Kaplan’s OnDemand learning format is a hybrid curriculum of video content taught by expert instructors combined with text, along with supplemental information, activities, and quizzes. Plus, you’ll have access to the Interactive Study Group Webinars mentioned above. This package also includes an interactive Exam Prep workbook called OnDemand Review.

Live Online

If you need the structure of scheduled classes and want real-time access to expert instructors, Kaplan’s Live Online environment lets you join a real class with a live instructor and other students, interacting in real time—but from the comfort of your own home. The materials for this package are almost the same as those in the other two packages, but delivered in a virtual classroom. Because it is such a unique offering in the world of online real estate schools, this is our pick for Kaplan.

Optional Add-ons: Textbooks, the Kaplan Career Launcher & More

Within each package, there are different tiers. For example, California has a Home Study and Home Study Plus, which includes a textbook. The Career Launcher is offered in all three packages in many states and includes an eight-hour course called Real Estate Accelerator, which teaches everything you need to start your real estate business.

It also offers Career Mentor Live Online Connect, which is full of tips and tools to help you get the most out of courses and prepare you for your career. The Carnegie Career Launcher is one more option that includes a course, Win Friends and Influence People: Secrets of Success, based on Dale Carnegie’s 30 principles.

One of Kaplan Real Estate’s greatest strengths is its faculty. Most, if not all, instructors are practicing professionals as well as teachers, and are some of the most experienced agents, brokers, lenders, inspectors, and attorneys in their fields. Kaplan faculty are often guest speakers at conferences around the country, and even offer expert opinions for legislation.

Kaplan Real Estate Pass Rate

Not every state publishes pass rates broken down by education provider, but according to the Texas Real Estate Commission, for combined years 2020-2022, the Kaplan Real Estate student pass rate is 67.66%, which is on par with Colibri Real Estate and higher than The CE Shop.

Kaplan offers several avenues of customer service. Their website has a chatbot ready to answer simple questions. Their technical team is on hand to answer questions via email 24/7 or by phone during business hours. When we placed a call, it was answered within seconds and the support staff was helpful and knowledgeable.

Currently enrolled students may email for questions about their lessons or the curriculum and expect an answer back the next business day. We wish there were better options here for more immediate assistance with questions related to the content of the classes.

Is Kaplan Real Estate Accredited?

If Kaplan Real Estate offers courses in your state, that means that their courses have been approved by the state governing board and are fully accredited.

Right from the get-go, the Kaplan experience is straightforward and easy to use. Signing up for Kaplan courses and getting started takes only a couple of clicks.

After logging in, you arrive at your course menu, where you can click into any of the courses you’ve purchased.

Following the course orientation, Kaplan students can launch Unit 1 of the OnDemand package. Lessons start with a video lecture, followed by a short quiz and an opportunity to take notes in your supplemental material.

Unlike the completely self-paced Home Study option, which requires extensive reading, the Kaplan Real Estate OnDemand package is based almost entirely on these video lessons. It’s a perfect strategy for learners who need to watch and listen to absorb information effectively.

As a former Kaplan instructor, I can tell you that in the Minnesota OnDemand course, the level of expertise and expectations for quality instruction are incredibly high. It’s clear that the instructors aren’t just reading from a script—they know and practice real estate and are ready to engage with students.

Supplemental Real Estate Materials

Kaplan students can fulfill their course requirements by watching the video lessons and completing the quizzes. However, you’d be remiss if you didn’t also reference the supplemental workbooks and study materials.

These long-form PDF documents provide tools to expand your learning—a strategy that Kaplan instructors have been using for a long time. The more ways students internalize and then demonstrate their understanding of the material, the more likely they’re able to synthesize the information for successful performance on their exam and in their careers.

When you’ve finished for the day, the OnDemand log-off procedure couldn’t be more straightforward. The Kaplan system tracks your progress through the course, so there’s no need to save your work periodically.

The top right-hand corner of the interface has a menu that allows you to navigate back to the course menu quickly, get notifications pending on your account, contact your instructor, or log out.

When I first experimented with this menu, I thought I did something wrong because it was so quick and easy. It turns out that the interface doesn’t need to be complicated to be effective. I definitely appreciated this straightforward design.

Kaplan Real Estate only covers about half the states in the country, and even then, there’s limited availability of their Live Online product. This program is a marquee feature of Kaplan Real Estate, and we’d love to see it made available to more students.

One of the critiques Kaplan often hears is that their interface is outdated and boring. We agree—the platform has a distinct Windows 2000 vibe. We know that the flash and dash of a more modern interface won’t necessarily better prepare you for your career as a real estate professional. But we think that design and user experience are important, and this is an area where Kaplan could improve—especially when it comes to mobile devices.

We’d love to see better on-demand student support. Kaplan offers excellent student support via email for every Kaplan program, but sometimes, email isn’t the best medium for asking quick or multipart questions. Yes, there are the Q&A webinars every week, but if there isn’t one of those happening for another five days and you have a question now, that can be frustrating. We’d love to see some phone-based instructor support.