I remember days when I’d start working around 8:30 in the morning and wouldn’t finish until 7 or 8 at night.
By the time I was done, I was exhausted.
But on some of my best days, I’d close eight, nine, sometimes even ten deals. I believe ten was my personal record.
And I’d sit there thinking, Damn, I just made a lot of money today.
Well, potentially.
I worked in 100% commission home-security sales, and closing a deal didn’t automatically mean getting paid. The customer still had to get their system installed, which could happen weeks or even months later.
Sometimes the installation happened as planned. Sometimes it got delayed. And sometimes the customer canceled altogether.
I could have an incredible sales day and still not know exactly how much of that production would eventually turn into a paycheck.
But I genuinely loved the work.
I loved competing, closing deals and seeing my numbers climb. I started that job when I was 24, and I’d never made that kind of money before.
The income gave me a level of financial freedom I hadn’t experienced before.
So, are commission-only sales jobs worth it?
For me, absolutely.
But if somebody offered me another 100% commission job tomorrow, I’d have a lot more questions than just how much money I could make.
What working on 100% commission actually meant
Before I started working on 100% commission, I’d been in a B2B sales role where I earned a base salary plus commission.
So I wasn’t completely new to sales. But moving into a job without a guaranteed base salary was definitely a different experience.
I joined a home-security sales team that had an established process and provided leads for us to work.
That last part matters.
I wasn’t spending my entire day trying to find people who might be interested in buying something. I had prospective customers to contact, and my job was to turn those opportunities into sales.
Honestly, the day-to-day job was pretty straightforward. We had a system, leads coming in and a clear idea of what needed to get done.
Most conversations lasted around 15 to 25 minutes, although some were much shorter and others could go considerably longer.
When someone agreed to purchase, we’d schedule their installation.
But that didn’t mean I had earned a commission yet.
In my role, the customer generally needed to complete the installation before the sale qualified for payment.
And because many customers were in the process of buying a home, their installation could be weeks or even months away.
A home purchase might fall through. Someone might reschedule. A customer could change their mind.
So even after closing a deal, I still had to pay attention to what happened afterward.
That meant following up, staying organized and helping address concerns when necessary.
If a sale never reached a qualifying installation, I generally didn’t receive commission for it.
That’s an important distinction when you’re considering a commission-only job.
Depending on the company, a commission might be earned when a customer signs, pays, or receives a product or service.
Those can be very different dates.
And the difference matters when you’re trying to figure out when you’ll actually get paid.
The upside was better than I expected
I’m an extremely competitive person.
Sometimes probably to my own detriment.
And honestly, I think that’s part of why I enjoyed commission-only sales so much.
I loved closing deals, seeing my production numbers climb and being near the top of the team.
There’s something satisfying about having a really good sales day and knowing your work could translate directly into more money.
Especially when you’re in your mid-twenties and you’ve never earned anything close to that before.
I started the job at 24, and things took off pretty quickly. I became one of the stronger performers in my division.
In 2025, I grossed approximately $150,000 in W-2 compensation, before taxes.
And I don’t want to downplay how much that changed my financial situation.
For a while, I barely thought twice about ordinary expenses. I could comfortably cover my bills, enjoy going out, travel and still put a substantial amount of money toward investments.
During some of my strongest periods, I was investing roughly $5,000 to $7,000 a month.
That was a pretty incredible feeling.
The income also played a major role in making it possible for me to buy my first property, a duplex. It gave me the financial flexibility to handle a substantial mortgage payment, even during the months before the other unit was rented.
I had an established sales environment, consistent opportunities to work and a compensation structure that rewarded strong production.
I also recognize that I was fortunate to be in that position.
Not every commission-only job provides good leads, and not every salesperson is going to produce at the same level.
For me, though, the upside was very real.
And I genuinely enjoyed earning it.
What I couldn’t control
Being good at sales doesn’t mean you control every part of your income.
I could control how I handled a sales conversation, how consistently I followed up and how much effort I put into the work.
But lead volume was one of the biggest variables.
Some days, I’d have more opportunities than I knew what to do with. Other days, things were considerably slower.
And when your entire paycheck depends on commissions, the number of opportunities coming your way matters.
Of course, a slower day didn’t automatically mean a bad sales day. I remember one day when I received relatively few new leads but still managed to close several deals from conversations I’d started earlier.
That’s why staying organized and following up mattered so much.
Even after closing a sale, there was still a lot that could happen before installation.
Some customers were buying homes, and their closing dates could change. Installations got rescheduled. Sometimes people changed their minds or their circumstances changed entirely.
And sometimes the circumstances were genuinely unfortunate.
I talked to people who had lost their jobs, were going through divorces or were dealing with unexpected problems involving their homes. I’ve even encountered situations involving house fires.
Other times, it was something less dramatic. Maybe the financing wasn’t working out the way someone expected, or they simply decided they didn’t want the service anymore.
There were all kinds of reasons a deal could fall apart.
I remember periods when I had a substantial number of installations expected for the month, only to finish with considerably fewer than I’d anticipated.
That was frustrating as hell.
You could look at your pipeline and think you were about to have an incredible month, then watch some of that expected income get pushed into the future or disappear altogether.
And sometimes there really wasn’t much you could do about it.
I did get better at handling cancellations over time.
Earlier in my career, I wasn’t particularly good at saving deals. If someone wanted to cancel, I’d ask if there was anything I could do, and if they said no, I’d usually move on.
Eventually, I learned to ask better questions and understand what had changed.
Sometimes there was a legitimate concern I could help resolve, and I’d spend another 20 or 30 minutes on the phone working through it.
Saving one of those deals could be just as satisfying as closing a new sale.
But not every cancellation was preventable, and I wasn’t going to talk somebody into buying a security system they genuinely didn’t want or need.
That’s the reality of commission-only sales. You might have substantial influence over your performance, but you still depend on the opportunities available, the customer’s circumstances and whatever has to happen before a sale qualifies for commission.
For me, the upside was worth those variables.
The hardest part wasn’t a bad paycheck
For me, one of the biggest downsides of working on 100% commission wasn’t worrying about whether I could pay my bills.
I was fortunate enough to be doing well financially, and even my slower months were still pretty good.
It was the feeling that whenever I wasn’t working, I was potentially leaving money on the table.
And I’m already an extremely competitive person, so that probably didn’t help.
When every sale could mean more money, it became pretty difficult to switch that part of my brain off.
Especially when I wanted to take a vacation.
I could be somewhere enjoying myself, but I’d still know that new opportunities were coming in while I wasn’t there to work them.
And because this was a high-volume sales job, taking time off didn’t just mean missing a few days of production. It could affect what I earned weeks later.
I had coworkers who helped cover my accounts when I was away, and I was genuinely grateful for that. But they couldn’t completely replace the time I would’ve spent making new sales.
I experienced that firsthand when I spent about 10 weeks away for required Army training in late 2024.
I had a supportive team and a job to return to, but I still needed time to rebuild my sales pipeline afterward.
That wasn’t anyone’s fault. It was simply one of the tradeoffs of having a job where income depended on ongoing production.
And honestly, I wanted more flexibility in my life.
I enjoyed the work, but I also wanted the option to travel, work from different locations and not necessarily have to choose between the two.
The money gave me tremendous financial freedom.
But the ability to comfortably step away from work, or work wherever I wanted, was a different kind of freedom.
And that’s something I started thinking about more as my career progressed.
What I’d look for before taking another commission-only job
Would I ever take another 100% commission job?
Absolutely.
But I’d have a lot of questions before accepting one.
The biggest thing I’d want to understand is where the sales opportunities are coming from.
In my previous role, I was fortunate to have company-provided leads and an established sales process. That made an enormous difference.
If I were considering another commission-only opportunity, I’d want to know whether I’d be responsible for generating every lead myself or whether the company already had a reliable way of bringing in prospective customers.
And I wouldn’t just ask whether leads were provided.
I’d want to understand how many opportunities a typical salesperson actually receives and whether those leads are genuinely qualified.
A company can advertise unlimited earning potential all day long, but that doesn’t mean much if there aren’t enough real opportunities to sell.
I’d also want to see what people are actually earning.
Not just the highest-paid salesperson on the team.
I’d want to know what the average or median representative earns, how long they’ve been there and what percentage of the team is hitting the numbers being advertised.
I’ve been fortunate enough to be one of the stronger producers in a commission-only environment. But I wouldn’t assume someone else could walk into a different company and immediately replicate my results.
Average employee tenure matters a lot to me, too. It’s something I looked into when evaluating my current job.
If a company advertises incredible earning potential but most new hires are gone within a few months, I’d want to understand why.
Maybe there’s a reasonable explanation. Maybe the role attracts people who aren’t prepared for commission-only sales. Or maybe there’s something about the opportunity that isn’t nearly as attractive as it sounds.
Either way, I’d want to know before accepting an offer.
Then there’s the compensation structure itself.
I’d want it explained clearly, preferably in writing.
When does a sale qualify for commission? How long does it typically take to get paid? What happens if a customer cancels or something gets delayed?
I’d also want to understand whether commissions can be reduced or recovered after payment, rather than finding that out when a paycheck arrives.
And I’d pay attention to how the company operates.
Are there established systems? Does the sales team have the support it needs? Can the company actually deliver what its salespeople are selling?
Those things might sound less exciting than hearing about someone making six figures, but they matter when your income depends on completed sales.
I’d also consider my own financial situation.
When I took my previous role, I already had sales experience and, from what I remember, some savings to fall back on. I wasn’t going into it completely blind.
If I were starting with no savings, substantial fixed expenses and no sales experience, I’d be a lot more cautious about giving up a guaranteed paycheck.
I still think commission-only sales can be an incredible opportunity.
But I’d want to understand the business behind the opportunity before betting my income on it.
Would I do it again?
I don’t regret working on 100% commission. Not even a little bit.
I made more money in my mid-twenties than I ever expected to, developed tremendously as a salesperson and worked with some genuinely great people.
And honestly, I miss parts of it.
I miss the competition. I miss having those days where everything seemed to be going right and I’d finish work knowing I’d potentially made a ridiculous amount of money.
There’s something exciting about that.
But I also know how fortunate I was to be in the position I was.
I had an established sales process, leads coming in, supportive coworkers and a company that compensated strong performance very well.
Not every commission-only job looks like that.
And I wouldn’t assume I could walk into another company tomorrow and immediately produce the same results.
These days, I’m working in a different kind of sales role with a base salary and commission. The sales cycles are longer, and building relationships and developing a territory takes time.
Having a base salary makes sense for that kind of work, especially while I’m still building things up.
That doesn’t mean one compensation structure is automatically better than the other.
They’re different opportunities with different tradeoffs.
For me, commission-only sales was absolutely worth it.
But knowing what I know now, I’d ask a hell of a lot more questions before accepting another one.