A little over two years has passed since a Missouri jury found the real estate industry liable for colluding to artificially inflate real estate agent commissions. A verdict that triggered a series of events, which led many inside and outside of the industry to predict that there would be an increase in negotiations surrounding agent commissions, and even potentially lower commission rates.
However, despite all that has happened in the ensuing 24 months, a new study published on Monday by the Consumer Policy Center (CPC), shows that things might not be shaking out the way many expected they would.
Mystery shoppers deployed
Between July and September of 2025, the CPC conducted “mystery shopper” interviews of 281 active buyer’s agents in 26 metropolitan areas across the country. During the phone interviews, the callers posed as one half of a couple that was planning to move into a given metro area in two months and wanted to work with an agent for a few weeks before visiting the area to view properties. The mystery shoppers were looking to purchase a property “somewhat above” the area’s median home prices and they were paying cash.
The agents interviewed in each area were selected from the most active brokerages, but at least one agent in each area was from a different company.
According to the report, which was authored by Stephen Brobeck and Wendy Gilch, two senior fellows at the CPC, overall, the agents interviewed expressed strong resistance to negotiating commission rates with buyers but a willingness to lower rates when faced with pushback from sellers.
Buyers’ agents made negotiation difficult, says report
The report claims that buyers’ agents “make it very difficult for homebuyers to negotiate lower rates.”
“Buyers who try to do so are met with a barrage of arguments starting with the statement that negotiation was not necessary because sellers pay the buyer commission,” the report states.
Additionally, the report states that some buyers’ agents told callers that there was a “local standard rate,” and perhaps more problematically, some agents told the prospective clients that if a home seller isn’t offering buyers’ agent compensation it “discourages buyer agent from showing a house.”
In total, the report found that two-thirds of responding agents said they would accept a lower rate from a seller than the rate the buyer agents requested in the offer.
Among the agents who said they’d be willing to take a lower rate, nearly one-third said they’d accept a cut of at least one percentage point. The report also noted that after the National Association of Realtors’ (NAR) commission lawsuit settlement took effect, many agents observed more sellers who were willing to offer a buyer’s agent commission but were now insisting on a lower rate.
According to the report, during the “mystery shopper” interviews, 95% of responding agents quoted the caller a commission rate between 2.5% and 3%.
“Most agents quoting rates below this level were from the Boston area,” the report states. “Only one agent quoted a rate above 3%.”
Gilch added that buyers should negotiate their agent’s commission upfront and ignore claims that most sellers will pay the commission.
“The more you negotiate, the more opportunities you create for savings. On the seller side, watch for uniformity in buyer agent commission requests; it’s often a red flag for unchallenged risk premiums,” Gilch said in a statement. “Don’t advertise a specific rate upfront, and work with listing agents willing to negotiate these fees when offers arrive.”
Homogeneity of quoted commission rates in metro areas
According to the report, within individual metro areas there is “remarkable homogeneity” of quoted commission rates.
“This homogeneity largely reflects the influence of informal industry standards that are supported and enforced by most agents and brokers,” Gilch said in a statement. “Unlike prices for other consumer services, real estate commissions do not vary with the competence, reputation, and efforts of individual agents.”
Additionally, the report’s authors said that there is evidence that more agents are trying to charge 3% today than there were three years ago.
“We compared the percentage of all quoted rates that were 3% in this study with those found in a 2022 study (with a much larger sample) from the same 20 cities. In this period, the percentage of 3% rates increased from 40% to 64%,” the report states.
According to Brobeck and Gilch this increase may come from a desire by “most agents” to preserve “traditional 2.5% to 3% buyer agent rates.”
More class action litigation?
“The continuation of near-uniform commission rates, prima facie evidence of price-fixing, is an easy, tempting target for critics,” Brobeck said in a statement. “There will be continuing public criticism and eventually there will be more class action litigation.”
When it comes to buyer broker agreements, which were made mandatory by the terms of NAR’s settlement, the study reports that “a number” of agents ignored the requirement to have a contract signed prior to the first showing, telling the mystery shoppers that no contract was necessary.
Additionally, nearly half of the agents interviewed were willing to offer a short-term agreement or were open to terminating the contrast with no penalty if the buyer was dissatisfied. The report also found that the terms of many buyer broker contracts allowed the broker to re-assign the buyer to another agent.
Due to these findings, the report recommends that buyer’s agent and seller’s agent compensation needs to be completely separated, with each party being responsible for paying for their own representation. However, the report acknowledges that the most viable way to facilitate this would be for federal agencies to more easily allow buyers to include their buyer’s agent compensation in their financing package. The authors argue that if buyer’s agent compensation becomes an explicitly financed part of the sales price, it would allow for buyers to more meaningfully negotiate with their agents.
