Redfin, the upstart online real-estate company based in Seattle, announced that it laid off about 20 percent of its staff, CEO Glenn Kelman said in a story today.

Kelman told Times residential real-estate reporter Elizabeth Rhodes that the credit crunch hit the company hard in the past month. After a 50 percent jump in revenue as buyers and sellers looked for ways to save money on home deals, the picture quickly changed as loans became harder to get and the stock-market plunge erased money for down payments. Pending deals fell through, and new ones dried up, Kelman said in the Redfin blog post about the layoffs.

Redfin isn't the only real-estate company that has made cuts, though. Some agents -- particularly fairly new ones paid on commission -- are finding the real-estate industry a tough one. This is quite a change from a few years ago, when when people fled other industries to become real-estate agents or mortgage brokers during the housing boom.

So what are all of those former agents, brokers and loan officers doing now?