Thinking of opening your own agency?
100% of the commission isn’t 100% profit.
A business that makes you money isn’t necessarily a business you can sell. Before you sign a lease, let’s look at the numbers.
The numbers don't lie
The cost of being your own boss.
Before you sell your first home, the bills have already started. And they don't stop when sales do.
- Setup investment
- Office fit out
- Staff and recruitment
- Office lease
- Technology
- Compliance and licensing
- Insurance
- Marketing and branding
- Legal and accounting
- Working capital
- Finance costs
- Lost selling time
And the more successful the business gets, the more infrastructure it needs. At PropertyCo we've already built it, so you can just sell.
Average net profit margin for Australian real estate agencies in FY24, after every expense. A whole business carrying all that risk, for a slim margin.
A whole agency profit measure, not comparable to an agent's split. Source: Macquarie business insights snapshot, residential real estate, 2024The ownership trap
Stay small or grow. Either way, you run the business.
Stay small
- No big team to pay
- Still doing admin, compliance and accounts
- Every hour running it is an hour not selling
Grow the agency
- Hire salespeople
- Share the commissions you used to earn
- More management, more costs
The discounting trap
Keeping 100% of a smaller commission doesn’t make you more money.
“I keep 100%, so I can charge less.” Dropping from 2.5% to 1.8% cuts your gross commission by 28%, and the bills stay the same.
PropertyCo vs your own agency
Run your own numbers.
Setup costs, running costs and the selling time you lose running a business. Year one and five years, side by side, before personal tax.
remaining$200,000
Illustrative cash flow, not industry averages. Own agency: GCI less lost selling time, less operating costs, less establishment costs (counted once and carried forward over five years). PropertyCo: GCI × 80%. Excludes GST, personal tax, financing costs and other agent expenses. Some establishment capital may be recoverable.
Own the rewards. Not the overheads.
Build assets without starting an agency.
Life at PropertyCo
Real agents.
Real sales.
Real Coast.
Less running. More selling
The more time you spend running your agency, the less time you have to sell real estate.