Home-seller balks at $67K commission for Agents !
Published Thursday, June 30, 2016 6:34PM PDT
Vancouver homeowner Horst Weckwert believes in honest pay for an honest day’s work.
Unfortunately for local realtors, Weckwert doesn’t believe selling his Kitsilano teardown is worth a $67,000 commission, which is thousands more than the average Canadian salary.
“In this hot market on the west side, most agents sell their house in seven days,” Weckwert told CTV News. “I think it’s totally outrageous, so I decided to list it myself.”
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Horst Weckwert
Horst Weckwert is selling his Vancouver teardown on his own rather than pay an “outrageous” commission to a realtor. June 30, 2016. (CTV)
Weckwert purchased his home, located near 16th Avenue and MacDonald Street, for $300,000 a quarter-century ago. He’s now hoping to sell it for $2.4 million on his own.
Saving money on realtor fees hasn’t been simple, however. Weckwert posted his home on Craigslist weeks ago, but has yet to receive any purchase offers.
“I am not forced to sell, so I have the luxury of time,” he added.
Weckwert said one realtor quoted him the $67,000 price tag, but that’s a slightly higher commission than most charge.
Most commissions are seven per cent of the first $100,000 of a home sale and 2.5 per cent on the rest. Using that formula, a $1 million home would net a $29,500 commission, and a $2.4 million home would net $64,500.
Homes are also selling faster than they have in 11 years, staying on the market for an average of just 22 days in Vancouver. Paired with skyrocketing prices, it’s taking real estate agents less time to make a lot more money.
Real estate investor Pawan Johar of PNJ Property Group said he’s sold several homes this year, and decided to go with a discount brokerage to save some money.
“At the end of the day, in this market, houses nearly sell themselves,” Johar said.
That brokerage is OneFlatFee.ca, which promises to advertise homes on the Multiple Listing Service while still cutting thousands off customers’ commissions.
“You’re saving about 50 per cent in commissions,” said Mayur Arora, who launched the company six years ago.
Though discount brokerages remain a niche part of the real estate market, Arora said if Canada is anything like the U.S., he expects that to change soon.
“This is going to be the next biggest thing,” he said.
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Mi-Jung Lee
