Opendoor's Buyer Agent Commission Advantage
/Even in a cooling market, Opendoor's buyer agent commissions -- the fee paid to a buyer's agent when a house is sold -- remain significantly lower than market averages.
Why it matters: Leveraging its powers of scale, Opendoor is pushing down buyer agent commissions in order to reduce its expenses -- a trend that began in early 2020.
Opendoor's buyer agent commissions range from 0.5 to 1 percent lower than the market average (typically, but not always, three percent).
At scale, this could save the company over $50 million in commission fees annually.
Dig deeper: The data above, collected from Datadoor.io, looks at over 9,000 listings in Opendoor's 20 largest markets as of September 2, 2022.
There were also 226 listings with buyer agent commissions above three percent -- typically on houses that are struggling to sell.
The bottom line: Opendoor is deftly turning the buyer agent commission into a competitive advantage to optimize its business model.
The lower fees save the company millions, without affecting its ability to efficiently sell houses.
Read more: Big Tech Coming After Agent Commissions in a Big Way