The National Association of Realtors, representing roughly 1.5 million real estate agents, has agreed to pay $418M over the next four years to settle a group of cases nationwide accusing the association of artificially inflating their agents’ commissions.
The settlement terms, if approved by a federal court, could alter how Americans buy and sell homes by eliminating a centuries-old commission structure. The standard commission typically ranges between 5% and 6% of the sale price of a home, which a home seller pays to their agent for listing the home on a multiple listing service, known as the MLS. The commission is then split between both the seller’s and buyer’s agents. But under the settlement, brokerage commissions would be opened up for negotiation with sellers, potentially opening the door for lower fees.
The legal agreement comes after the National Association of Realtors CEO Bob Goldberg resigned in November, following a jury decision finding the association and big residential brokers liable for $1.8B in damages for conspiring to keep home sales commissions artificially high.
I wonder if any of that settlement money will go to the sellers who had to pay inflated costs to realtors. Selling real estate isn't easy most of the time and those folks do earn the money but we could all use a break.
Real Estate sales commissions have long been a scam. The work involved in selling a $200,000 property and a $2M property is about the same, but the guy selling the expensive house pays 10 times what the other one does. The wealthy support to little guy. Don't play ball with the Realtors and you have trouble getting your property shown.
The suit(s) and sites like Zillow get credit for put this back in balance.
@ William_Wallace = If that happens, you will see a lot more "For Sale By Owner" happening. It was big there for a while back in the 90's and 2000's. They had their own Home Listing Magazine like the Homes & Land has too.
Let's hope this doesn't backfire and real estate agents start charging greater than 6% commissions.
I am waiting to see if they switch to what they do at Car Auctions, the Seller pays their Realtor an agreed Commission for selling their Home and the Buyer pays their Realtor an agreed Commission for when they buy a Home.