CBS News
How much do real estate agents cost?
Getty Images
Interest rate cuts could be coming later this year, which could mean a further drop in mortgage rates. Currently, 30-year fixed mortgage rates are below 7% and could continue to drop even further, with many expecting dips to 6%.
Lower mortgage rates mean many people could be looking for a new home, especially those who might have put those plans on hold with higher mortgage rates. If you’re thinking about house hunting, you might want to enlist the help of a real estate agent.
You don’t necessarily need a real estate agent to purchase or sell a home, but they are some of the most helpful people in executing the process. Most agents handle home sales affiliated with the National Association of REALTORS (NAR) — the largest trade association in the country.
How much agents get paid depends on a few factors, including location, the home sale price, and what both buyers and sellers negotiate with each of their agents. Below, we’ll detail how much real estate agents cost and how that impacts what you pay for your home.
Ready to buy a home now that mortgage rates have dropped? See what rate you could secure here today.
How much do real estate agents cost?
There isn’t a one-size-fits-all cost for real estate agents. All of the experts we spoke to note that real estate commissions have always been negotiable.
“Most real estate commissions in the U.S. range between 4.8% and 6.6%,” says Tiffany Banks, the CEO of Nevada REALTORS. “Numerous data sets show the national average for a real estate transaction commission is around 5.5%.”
While buyers and sellers may cover agents’ costs, the amount agents earn can vary depending on each agreement.
“Compensation has been and will continue to be negotiable between agents and their clients,” says Jennifer Stevenson, 2024 NAR Regional Vice President, Region 2. “Those fees can take many forms, such as fixed commissions paid directly by clients, fee for service, concessions from a seller or a portion of a listing broker’s fee.”
But that amount might not last for long. The NAR settled a lawsuit earlier this year and agreed to cut commission fees. In some cases, commission costs could go down as much as 30%.
While the NAR settlement is still going through how much agents will get paid going forward, you can see how much agents get based on what they previously earned. For a $400,000 home at 5% commission, the agents would earn $20,000. Keep in mind that amount is split not only between the buyer and seller, but also between the team of people who helped both parties, including listing agents and brokers.
Learn more about your potential homebuying costs here.
Who pays real estate agents?
For many home sales, the sellers pay for the real estate agents of both the buyers and the sellers of the home. But that’s not always the case.
“While buyer agent compensation was typically offered by listing brokers as a condition of listing property in the MLS prior to August 13, now buyers and sellers will be financially responsible for their agent’s compensation,” says Emily Chenevert, CEO of the Austin Board of Realtors. “But [buyers] may still seek seller contributions to offset the buyer’s expenses in the transaction.”
Remember that commissions are negotiable, so who pays what and how much are always up for discussion and debate. Going forward after the NAR settlement, sellers could pay much less to agents if commissions are cut.
Why you should use reliable real estate agents
Using a real estate can make the homebuying process much easier for both parties involved. Homebuying and selling can be very long and challenging undertakings.
“Realtors understand the legal requirements and ethical standards of the real estate industry,” Banks says.
Use your agent’s expertise, including their existing connections to brokers, neighborhoods, properties, communities and more. You should find an agent that knows the ins and outs of where you want to live and how your budget and lifestyle fits into that. An agent should lead with your needs first.
“Agents understand what is in the best interest of the buyer and know how to manage what are often complicated processes,” Banks says. “There are many difficulties that can come up during a transaction that most buyers would not be aware of or understand how to navigate without the help and representation of an agent.”
Ask friends and family who they recommend for real estate agents or if they know anyone who would be a good fit. You don’t have to take the first one you find, but word-of-mouth is one of the best ways to find a reputable and trustworthy agent.
The bottom line
The real estate industry can be challenging for many people, especially those who are buying homes for the first time or have never taken on this large of a purchase before.
Real estate agents come with a cost, but they also come with a wealth of knowledge and access that you may not otherwise have if you went down the homebuying or selling road alone. The cost of real estate agents might go down in the future, so if you’re hoping to buy a home in the coming months, you may want to use a real estate agent to help.
Have more questions about the homebuying process? Learn more here today.
An Israeli airstrike hit a mosque in central Gaza and Palestinian officials said at least 19 people were killed early Sunday. Israeli planes also lit up the skyline across the southern suburbs of Beirut, striking what the military said were Hezbollah targets.
The strike in Gaza hit a mosque where displaced people were sheltering near the main hospital in the central town of Deir al-Balah. Another four people were killed in a strike on a school sheltering displaced people near the town.
The Israeli military said both strikes targeted militants, without providing evidence.
An Associated Press journalist counted the bodies at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital morgue. Hospital records showed that the dead from the strike on the mosque were all men, while another man was wounded.
In Beirut, the strikes reportedly targeted a building near a road leading to Lebanon’s only international airport and another formerly used by the Hezbollah-run broadcaster Al-Manar.
Hussein Malla / AP
Israel and Hezbollah have traded fire across the Lebanon border almost daily since the day after Hamas’ cross-border attack on Oct. 7, 2023, which killed 1,200 Israelis and took 250 others hostage. Israel declared war on the Hamas militant group in the Gaza Strip in response. As the Israel-Hamas war reaches the one-year mark, nearly 42,000 Palestinians have been killed in the territory, and just over half the dead have been women and children, according to local health officials.
Nearly 2,000 people have been killed in Lebanon in the latest conflict, most of them since Sept. 23, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
With just a month to go before Election Day, Sabrina German sees herself as an essential worker for democracy. The director of voter registration in Chatham County, Ga., German has found herself in the spotlight as she works to comply with sweeping changes to state election rules in this critical battleground state.
“The first three words in the preamble, it says, ‘We, the people,’ meaning that we, as public servants, we are working for the people to make sure that they have a fair choice and a voice for the candidates that they’re choosing,” German said.
The overhaul in Georgia has many fronts, from the Republican majority on the state election board, to the Georgia legislature, which has made it possible for individuals to file a flurry of challenges to the voter rolls.
German said she had a thousand challenges to voter registrations in just one county.
Attorney Colin McRae, who chairs the non-partisan County Registration Board (on which he has served for two decades), said, “It doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to figure out the agenda behind some of the challenges,” he said. “In a recent set of names that were submitted to us, it included hundreds of college students. And it didn’t take a lot of research to figure out that all of the college students whose registrations were being challenged, all attended Savannah State University, [a] historically Black university.”
While these issues might seem local, they have a national political charge; and former President Trump has weighed in on the campaign trail, praising Republicans on Georgia’s election board. “They’re on fire,” he said. “They’re doing a great job. Three members. Three people are all pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency and victory. They’re fighting.”
“Sunday Morning” reached out to the members of Georgia’s election board praised by Trump. They have long defended their work, and one member told us the controversy over their efforts is “manufactured to suit some other agenda.”
What’s happening in Georgia is just one example of how challenges to the vote are roiling the nation. And the question remains: Are recent changes to state election laws addressing real problems? Or, is it just politics?
David Becker, a CBS News contributor who directs the non-partisan Center for Election Innovation and Research in Washington, D.C., said, “I’ve been looking and researching the quality of our voter lists for about 25 years now, and there’s no question that, right now, our voter lists are as accurate as they’ve ever been.”
So, what is fueling suspicion of voter rolls? “We see a lot of their claims about the elections driven just by outcomes,” said Becker. “They’re not about the actual process.
“The voter lists are public. They could have challenged these things in 2023 or 2021 or 2019. They’re waiting until right before the election, which tells you that they’re not actually interested in cleaning up the lists. What they’re really trying to do is to set the stage for claims that an election was stolen after, presumably, their candidate loses.”
The 2020 election still casts a long shadow. State officials like Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State, are bracing themselves for another contsted election.
On January 2, 2021, Raffensperger got an infamous call from then-President Trump asking if he’d “find” votes so Trump could win. “All I want to do is this: I just want to find, uh, 11,780 votes, which is one more that we have, because we won the state,” Trump said in a recorded conversation.
Raffensperger resisted pressure to not certify the 2020 election in Georgia. Asked if he would resist pressure again, he said, “I’ll do my job. I’ll follow the law, and I’ll follow the Constitution.”
Raffensperger will once again oversee and certify Georgia’s elections. Asked whether he believes any of the changes put forth by the election board are necessary, Raffensperger replied, “No. Not one.”
Raffensperger says voting is safe and secure in Georgia. Asked why the election board members keeps making changes to the rules, he said, “I think that many of them are living in the past, and they can’t accept what happened in 2020.”
Bloomsbury
Carol Anderson, an author and voting rights activist who teaches at Emory University, said, “One of the things about voter suppression is that it always looks innocuous, it always looks reasonable, except it’s not. What’s happening in Georgia with voting rights is that, you have a massive change of demography happening. So, you have a growing African-American population. You have a sizable Latino population. You have a sizable and engaged Asian-American population.
“And so, it is a power clash between a vision of a new Georgia and … the vision of the old Georgia, our old ways,” she said.
Chatham County’s Sabrina German said, because of the pressures on election workers, she thinks about leaving every day. German may be weary, but she and Colin McRae say their experience in 2020 has prepared them for whatever comes next.
McRae said he took it personally when Donald Trump asked the secretary of state to “find” 11,000 votes to put him over Joe Biden. “Of course, we took it personally; any criticism of the system is a criticism of the individuals who make up that system,” said McRae. “Again, the truth will come out. The truth will win out.”
For more info:
Story produced by Ed Forgotson. Editor: Carol Ross.
