I don’t think I’ve ever until now linked a story from Channel 9’s A Current Affair. Tonight, however, they had a story on an idea that’s been a hobbyhorse of mine for a long time: DIY real estate sales.
Having spent nearly 20 years running a private legal firm which involved supervising a substantial conveyancing practice, I know with absolute certainty that real estate agents very seldom earn their substantial sales commissions. The reality is that most people list their properties with real estate agents solely because they feel a bit nervous and are not sure they know what to do. I doubt that a real estate agent achieves a higher price for a vendor than they could do for themselves more than once in ten sales at most.
More importantly, you’re paying a very high price for having an agent hold your hand and do things for you that you could actually do better for yourself. Agent’s commission is typically at least $10,000-15,000 for the average sale, and may be much higher in inflated markets like Sydney and Melbourne. This is money you could be keeping in your own pocket. The ACA story highlighted several commercial operations that help people sell their property on a DIY basis for a commission/price of around $1000. You’re almost always going to do better that way than using an agent IMO.
They do have the whole “paid ACA to praise them” black mark against them, though.
That black mark is easily swamped by having entire paid for TV series (Auction, Hot Property…) promoting the Real Estate dealers.